About Camphill Foundation

What Camphill Foundation Does

Camphill Foundation funds initiatives in which children, youth, and adults with special needs can live, learn, and work with others in healthy social relationships based on mutual care and respect. Every initiative we fund creates a community filled with education, meaningful work, real participation in community life, a stress-reducing rhythm of daily activities, seasonal celebrations, rich artistic and cultural life, natural therapies, and acceptance, individual recognition, and dignity for everyone.

Through the generosity of our donors, Camphill Foundation is able to:

• Enhance the lives of people living with cognitive, emotional and mental disabilities
• Create communities where everyone’s contributions are valued without regard to their financial assets, or their intellectual or physical capabilities
• Advocate for a daily life full of vitality and accomplishments and a world where people with disabilities ared able to participate fully as contributing citizens

We offer scholarships, research grants and program grants to organizations and individuals who apply sustainable models of curative education, social therapy, supportive community living, sustainable agriculture, and alternative therapeutic techniques:

• Curative education: A generative pedagogical model balances the unique physical, psychological, and spiritual needs of each person in the context of their social relationships and environment.
• Social therapy: Each individual is encouraged to express their full personal and spiritual potential by being treated as a valued member of the community. The emphasis is on creating life situations appropriate for people with a diverse range of needs and abilities.
• Community living: Living in a shared community setting – sensitive to the cycles of nature – is central to creating individual and collective growth and empowerment.
• Sustainable agriculture: Holistic methods of working with the environment give each person in the community a sense of greater purpose and connection through sustainable and healthy methods of consumption, agriculture, and natural resource use.
• Alternative therapeutic techniques: A range of techniques grounded in the arts and artistic expression, including art therapy, color light therapy, and eurhythmy have proven to be highly effective in caring for people with special needs.

Our community-based, culturally sensitive approach is consistent with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities that people with disabilities are subjects with rights, capable of making decisions for their lives and becoming active members of society.

Where We Have Come From

Camphill Foundation was originally established in 1966, as a supporting organization for Camphill communities. The first Camphill community was started in in 1939 in Camphill, Scotland, to provide a lively setting where adults and children with disabilities could participate in a rich and fulfilling community life. In every Camphill community, the vision of shared community living involves relationships of mutual respect, education, meaningful work, real participation in community life, a stress-reducing rhythm of daily activities, seasonal celebrations, a rich artistic and cultural life, natural therapies, and acceptance, individual recognition, and dignity for everyone.

There are now over 100 Camphill communities in 20 countries around the world, including Africa, Asia, Europe and North America.

From these communities, a model has emerged built around the inherent dignity and rights of each individual and each person’s ability to play a positive and enduring role in shared community life. It is a comprehensive, therapeutic way of life for people with significant developmental, cognitive and psychological disabilities, and has been remarkably successful in enabling these individuals to function at a higher level and live meaningful lives.

We are therefore expanding the mission of the Camphill Foundation to share that success.