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Dr. George Rutherford

Creating a Stress-Free School in the Inner City

In the spring of 1993, after completing a tour of the Maharishi School of the Age of Enlightenment in Fairfield, Iowa, Dr. George Rutherford told the faculty, “I look around this school and all I see are smiling children. This is too good for just 600 kids in Iowa. I want this for my kids, and I’ll have it!”

His kids were far from Iowa. Dr. Rutherford presided over a Washington, D.C. middle school that resembled a fortress in an embattled neighborhood, in the midst of one of the most violent areas of the city. He first introduced the Transcendental Meditation program at Fletcher-Johnson Learning Center five years ago to help quell tensions among his inner-city students.

“We had amazing results,” Rutherford says. “I used to have to be in the streets all the time to stop the fighting, but after we started the TM^® program, I didn’t have to go out there. You walk into the school and you feel it’s tension-free, a stress-free school right in the heart of the inner city, where we had plenty of violence.”

Question: What did you notice when you learned the Transcendental Meditation technique?

Dr. Rutherford: Oh, everything seemed to calm down. I had more energy, and it seemed as though my eyes opened up wider. In other words, I became a better administrator after I started meditating, because I didn’t feel so stressed. I had a better vision, could deal with a whole lot more, and do more for the School.

Question: And part of that meant bringing in the TM program?

Dr. Rutherford: Yes, because I felt it was good. And after seeing how the students were performing out in Fairfield, I knew my students needed to have the same opportunity—to be happy children and to get a better quality of life. And I felt the Transcendental Meditation program would be one of the vehicles to bring us out of that darkness and into the light.

Question: What was your first step?

Dr. Rutherford: It is important that teachers, who have daily contact with students, buy into what you are doing. I was just delighted when one of the teachers asked me, “What are you doing?” When I shared with her that I was meditating, she decided that she wanted to try it. After that, about 35 to 40 teachers learned.

Question: How did you teach the students?

Dr. Rutherford: We talked with some parents, they signed permission slips, and we got some students involved, the 5th and 6th grades. The next thing we did was to put in the “Quiet Time.” We knew that our students wouldn’t get chances to meditate at home, so we thought it was best if we gave them a chance at school.

We knew something needed to take place in the mornings, because we had a lot of fights. Our kids were very restless in the morning because of the stress, because the night before they probably heard gunshots and didn’t get any sleep.

So we put twenty minutes of Quiet Time in the morning and those students that wanted to meditate did. Other students had to be quiet. They read books or did homework in a quiet way. And in the afternoon we had a lot of problems stopping fights on the street in front of the school. So from 3:10 to 3:30 we put Quiet Time in again.

And we didn’t have any fights. I used to go down to the street on a regular basis to stop fights, and it was very dangerous doing that. We were able to not have any fights once we put the Quiet Time in, so we knew the benefit was great.

Our next goal was to raise our academic achievement, and we found out that our test scores did go up. One of the reasons was because of the Quiet Time, getting the students ready before the standardized test. In spite of all the negative activities that were taking place around that school in the community, our students did extremely well.

The meditation during Quiet Time helped to remove the stress that they were bringing to school. This alone made for a more pleasant environment.

Question: Do you feel this program could work in any educational setting?

Dr. Rutherford: Yes. Look at the violence in Littleton and the killing we have had in our schools. It really shook up the world. The amazing thing about it is that it has all happened out in suburbia, where you have the wealthy students and a mostly white population. I’m saying that what we are doing in the inner-city schools can benefit those in the suburban areas, especially Transcendental Meditation.

Students are students; young people are young people. Some come to you with a different set of stresses than others, but they all need a way to remove stress. With the Transcendental Meditation program, I think we can help remove all the stresses, from all the students, and make for more quality living for all our children.

Question: Would you recommend the program to other teachers and administrators?

Dr. Rutherford: I would recommend that all educators—for their own benefit—get trained in Transcendental Meditation. All of them come under stress and then they can’t perform in the ways they’d like to. By practicing Transcendental Meditation, we can maintain the quality of life that we are trying to offer our students, and be the kind of role models we are encouraging our young people to follow.

Question: Is the program cost effective?

Dr. Rutherford: You’ll cut costs across the board. You’ll have fewer students in special education, for example. With the Transcendental Meditation technique, you’ll be able to bring the attention-deficit students under control.

You won’t have teachers out sick, having to bring substitutes in and paying two people—the regular teacher and the substitute. You’ll have built-in academic achievement, because once you get the stress away, the kids will do well anyway. School systems should use common sense… that’s all, just common sense.

Transcendental Meditation has been researched more than any other program, and yet educators are talking about all the “reform models” for education, where consultants charge twenty, forty, or one hundred thousand dollars to come into the schools. All we have to do is take Transcendental Meditation into the schools as the reform model. You’ll see that once you remove the stresses, academic achievement goes up, everything improves.



		Dr. George Rutherford Creating a Stress-Free School in the Inner City In the spring of 1993, after completing a tour of the Maharishi School of the Age of Enlightenment in Fairfield, Iowa, Dr. George Rutherford told the faculty, “I look around this school and all I see are smiling children. This is too good for just 600 kids in Iowa. I want this for my kids, and I’ll have it!” His kids were far from Iowa. Dr. Rutherford presided over a Washington, D.C. middle school that resembled a fortress in an embattled neighborhood, in the midst of one of the most violent areas of the city. He first introduced the Transcendental Meditation program at Fletcher-Johnson Learning Center five years ago to help quell tensions among his inner-city students. “We had amazing results,” Rutherford says. “I used to have to be in the streets all the time to stop the fighting, but after we started the TM^® program, I didn’t have to go out there. You walk into the school and you feel it’s tension-free, a stress-free school right in the heart of the inner city, where we had plenty of violence.” Question: What did you notice when you learned the Transcendental Meditation technique? Dr. Rutherford: Oh, everything seemed to calm down. I had more energy, and it seemed as though my eyes opened up wider. In other words, I became a better administrator after I started meditating, because I didn’t feel so stressed. I had a better vision, could deal with a whole lot more, and do more for the School. Question: And part of that meant bringing in the TM program? Dr. Rutherford: Yes, because I felt it was good. And after seeing how the students were performing out in Fairfield, I knew my students needed to have the same opportunity—to be happy children and to get a better quality of life. And I felt the Transcendental Meditation program would be one of the vehicles to bring us out of that darkness and into the light. Question: What was your first step? Dr. Rutherford: It is important that teachers, who have daily contact with students, buy into what you are doing. I was just delighted when one of the teachers asked me, “What are you doing?” When I shared with her that I was meditating, she decided that she wanted to try it. After that, about 35 to 40 teachers learned. Question: How did you teach the students? Dr. Rutherford: We talked with some parents, they signed permission slips, and we got some students involved, the 5th and 6th grades. The next thing we did was to put in the “Quiet Time.” We knew that our students wouldn’t get chances to meditate at home, so we thought it was best if we gave them a chance at school. We knew something needed to take place in the mornings, because we had a lot of fights. Our kids were very restless in the morning because of the stress, because the night before they probably heard gunshots and didn’t get any sleep. So we put twenty minutes of Quiet Time in the morning and those students that wanted to meditate did. Other students had to be quiet. They read books or did homework in a quiet way. And in the afternoon we had a lot of problems stopping fights on the street in front of the school. So from 3:10 to 3:30 we put Quiet Time in again. And we didn’t have any fights. I used to go down to the street on a regular basis to stop fights, and it was very dangerous doing that. We were able to not have any fights once we put the Quiet Time in, so we knew the benefit was great. Our next goal was to raise our academic achievement, and we found out that our test scores did go up. One of the reasons was because of the Quiet Time, getting the students ready before the standardized test. In spite of all the negative activities that were taking place around that school in the community, our students did extremely well. The meditation during Quiet Time helped to remove the stress that they were bringing to school. This alone made for a more pleasant environment. Question: Do you feel this program could work in any educational setting? Dr. Rutherford: Yes. Look at the violence in Littleton and the killing we have had in our schools. It really shook up the world. The amazing thing about it is that it has all happened out in suburbia, where you have the wealthy students and a mostly white population. I’m saying that what we are doing in the inner-city schools can benefit those in the suburban areas, especially Transcendental Meditation. Students are students; young people are young people. Some come to you with a different set of stresses than others, but they all need a way to remove stress. With the Transcendental Meditation program, I think we can help remove all the stresses, from all the students, and make for more quality living for all our children. Question: Would you recommend the program to other teachers and administrators? Dr. Rutherford: I would recommend that all educators—for their own benefit—get trained in Transcendental Meditation. All of them come under stress and then they can’t perform in the ways they’d like to. By practicing Transcendental Meditation, we can maintain the quality of life that we are trying to offer our students, and be the kind of role models we are encouraging our young people to follow. Question: Is the program cost effective? Dr. Rutherford: You’ll cut costs across the board. You’ll have fewer students in special education, for example. With the Transcendental Meditation technique, you’ll be able to bring the attention-deficit students under control. You won’t have teachers out sick, having to bring substitutes in and paying two people—the regular teacher and the substitute. You’ll have built-in academic achievement, because once you get the stress away, the kids will do well anyway. School systems should use common sense… that’s all, just common sense. Transcendental Meditation has been researched more than any other program, and yet educators are talking about all the “reform models” for education, where consultants charge twenty, forty, or one hundred thousand dollars to come into the schools. All we have to do is take Transcendental Meditation into the schools as the reform model. You’ll see that once you remove the stresses, academic achievement goes up, everything improves. CLOSE WINDOW


	Speaking with...

Dr. George Rutherford

Creating a Stress-Free School in the Inner City

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