Welcome!

Neighborhood University (NU) is an effort to provide educational experiences for people of all ages outside the confines of conventional institutional settings. At NU, everyone is a teacher and everyone is a student. We all have skills and knowledge worth sharing and as humans, we are learning beings. Left to our own devices, we want to learn and enjoy it. And that's the kind of experience we hope we can provide for each other through this endeavor.

We're inspired by the work of the many free schools that have come before us (see the list on the left for some of the schools that are currently operating throughout the United States) as well as the current Do-It-Yourself (DIY) ethic that has gained momentum toward our necessarily becoming a "post-consumer" society.

Other inspirations include FUBAR Labs, in Highland Park, Tent State, Maker Faire, Chris Carlsson's book Nowtopia, and the burgeoning movement toward changing our relationship with money, which includes barter, solidarity, gift economies, local currency and the "Really Really Free Market."

For information about NU's upcoming discussion about Barter Economy as a cure for our economic blues, please visit our facebook page here.

Watch this amazing animation based on Sir Ken Robinson's talk on changing educational paradigms:

The full talk is available here.