The Lighthouse Coastal Academy

The text below is transcribed from radio broadcast I picked up while on a recent time travel DX foray into one of the futures of northern Ohio, about the Lighthouse Coastal Academy, a school set up to train the mentat minds of Generation Q:

Calling all parental units! Calling all parental units!

We know you want the best for your kids and at Lighthouse Coastal Academy they receive the best: the best instructors and teachers gathered from all points across Eerie Lake Country. Our instructors have repeatedly received high accolades from the top educational journals and societies for providing classes as unique as the students who take them. But it is the students who really shine! The educational philosophy itself is built upon the best tenants from Waldorf-Montessoria, alongside access to the traditional instruction of many technical guilds, art and craft societies we partner with in our work-study program. The Lighthouse Coastal Academy is built around core principles of Love, Work, and Wisdom and we seek to develop the capacity for those all those who seek knowledge within our halls and walls.

The story behind the Light House Coastal Academy is one of reclamation. The town of Vermillion wanted to do something with its decaying Light House. There was also an old abandoned hotel on an adjacent property called the Captain’s Bell. Once destination spots that drew tourists to the area, the Captain’s Bell and Light House had become more of a blight for Vermillion. Town leaders decided to turn these properties into a college. The first wave of teachers and students helped fix up the places. They attended classes in rooms filled with leftover hotel furniture. Anything else they needed they built out of materials taken from the bin. It was all very much a Do It Yourself endeavor. In time the Lighthouse was restored and its lamp was relit. Since that time, the lamp of knowledge has never gone out, and it has become a beacon drawing seekers from all around the Lake Countries and beyond.

Though there are many courses and preset learning spirals available for the students to choose from, it is our evolving self-designed curriculum that remains the most popular. We realize that each student is on an individual journey, and we excel by helping them excel. Our decentralized network of mentors and teachers are there to act as guides and resources as the students flow through an ecological web of learning and knowledge. We also believe that education should never be separated from useful work in the world.

And though the lighthouse on our campus is a kind of tower, it is no ivory tower. We have seen in our history books how the college and university systems of the 21st century imploded. The causes were many, but were in part due to a tendency that privileged theory over practice. Academia had become completely unglued from teaching anything useful, and existed within its own self-referential echo chamber. Unmoored from reality, and after many scandals, financial, and otherwise, the majority of these institutions slipped into a neglect from which they never recovered. Our work-study program is an antidote to that. All of our students are required to get there hands dirty in practical jobs in positions throughout the Lake Countries.

All of our learning spirals, whether preset or self-designed, have an emphasis on interdisciplinary synthesis. No field of knowledge exists alone. One spiral of study leads to another, and as these interweave and interlace, they become a braided knot. On this knot the glass beads of learning can be slid. It is from this approach of synthesis and recombinant aesthetics that several of our students began working out methods for bringing the Glass Bead Game of Herman Hesse out of the realm of fiction and into the world of form. With these scholars early success in this matter the Lighthouse Coastal Academy has become the host of the biannual Glass Bead Game festival.

One of our students most beloved of interconnected spirals are those in the harmonic science grouping: music, astronomy, and geometry. Those who have made a thorough study in these areas have gone on to the great work of unleashing frozen music in the form of public buildings. The Akron Amphitheater was one such piece of frozen music designed by graduate Genevive Kaspel. The specific psychoacoustics within this building have been most useful for the all night sleep concerts held there used to enhance collective dreaming. Students of the art and science of radio are also known to participate in the harmonic science spiral. The voices and ideas of our students are well known throughout Eeerie country as they have full access to our campus AM, FM, and Shortwave stations, all operating under the WLCA call sign.

Speaking of communications, the communications spiral focuses on everything from radio design to broadcasting, analog internetwork analysis, and how to run and operate a successful amateur press association. Hands on learning is a must, and those interested in the textual side of things will love making their own newspapers and zines using our collection of antique movable type printers and mimeograph machines.

The natural world and local ecology of the Lake Eerie watershed are never far from our minds. Spirals focusing on bioremediation, water science, and agricultural studies -everything from permaculture, organic gardening, food forestry to urban farming and deep ecology- are available. A full course catalog and representative syllabi are available upon request.

It’s not all just hard work and study at the Lighthouse Coastal Academy. A rich tradition of sports and games permeates the air, to say nothing pranks. For those who want to get physical our Three Sided Football team is always open to anyone who wants to learn the art of goal defense. Our hiking and rowing clubs are also ever eager for new members. These only scratch the surface of clubs and societies created by our students and faculty, and we can’t even say much about those of, shall we say, a more clandestine nature!

Since our first days when the Captain’s Bell and the Lighthouse were our only buildings, we have managed to acquire further properties from the town, and have created a large library and laboratory. Your student will have access to these and all of the other amenities we have to offer. The Lighthouse Coastal Academy has brought new life back to Vermillion and the town is now filled with cafes, cabarets, music venues, clubs, and coffee houses. Many of the major and minor guilds now have a presence in Vermillion as representatives have come to be close by to the students who wish to learn from them. These guild members have opened many store fronts to distribute glasswork, woodwork, electrical circuits, spice, maps and more. Safe and walkable, Vermillion is only a short train ride away from the cities of Sandusky and Cleveland, and from these hubs other points around Lake Eerie Country, the Lake Countries as a whole, and points beyond.

Take a spiral ride with us into the realm of Love, Work and Wisdom. For more information please send us a letter, radiogram request, or for those with telephone service, call our offices at 1-888-555-CSTL, that’s 1-888-555-2785.

This message has been brought to you by the WLCA Radio League of Journeyers and by the Lake Eerie School of Retrocognition.

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