Yesterday, we took a field trip to Camphill Village at Kimberton. It was a fun experience, and I learned a lot about strides that are being taken to bash the boundaries and stigmas around disabilities. It started as an agricultural, farming community, but it has since turned into so much more than that. It has turned into a crafting community where the villagers and coworkers, as they like to call each other, each find their special talent and work every day on it. There is agricultural land work, pottery, dairy farming, housework, mosaics, and many other activities.
They really emphasize the fact that they live together without the use of labels, which I think is a very good thing. Too often we find places in the world such as group homes and in the general community, where the environment is hostile and unforgiving to people with mental disabilities, but this place is a haven to those who could be discriminated against. We weren’t there long enough to see those things in action, and I would look forward to seeing that.
Anna Lignelli - Design Thinking/Woodworking 