Looking to build a brave new world
Caprio seeks others for free school and ecovillage



HILLTOWNS — April Caprio has decided to live her dreams, and she’s hoping others in the Hilltowns will join her to make them a reality.

Caprio, who grew up in Rensselaerville and now lives in Berne, would like her two young children to get a free-school education and be raised in an ecovillage.

She’s set up meetings for both projects this fall, announcing them in a letter to the Enterprise editor this week, to gauge interest.
The idea for the school to provide a "democratic education alternative" came from a play group run by Deb Monteith in Rensselaerville’s Conkling Hall, said Caprio.

While starting as a preschool, the learning cooperative she hopes will one day include older children as well.
Caprio describes the free-school concept this way: "It assumes children are capable of figuring out what they want to learn when they want to learn if given free choice."
She juxtaposes that with the sorts of things she says are taught in traditional schools: "They learn to clean up, sit down, follow directions."
The free school, Caprio said, offers "a different take on education."
She went on, "I’m sort of addicted to education myself. I’m fascinated with how we end up in the places we do. I want to give my kids the freedom to choose."

Caprio’s own path began in Medusa. She left the Hilltowns, she said, only for college, at Franklin Pierce in New Hampshire, where she majored in history. She moved to Berne with her husband, Jason, six years ago and is currently working on a Ph.D. at the University of Albany’s Rockefeller College, where she earned a master’s degree in public policy.

Caprio was interviewed with her baby boy, Eden, on her lap. She also has a three-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Varia.

Caprio hopes there will be enough interest to start some kind of a program in the fall, possibly at Conkling Hall in Rensselaerville or at the Lutheran church in Berne.
"I would really like to see a community learning center developed," said Caprio, adding it might be in conjunction with a community center for the Hilltowns that is now being talked about.
So far, three or four parents with five or six children are already interested, Caprio said. "It’s just a matter of finding a few more interested people," she said.

Cohousing
Caprio is wary of calling cohousing a commune. "People get so freaked out when they hear that," she said.
What she envisions is "a village atmosphere linked with sustainability."

She cited the EcoVillage at Ithaca as a model. Joan Bokaer first developed a vision for an ecovillage in the early 1990’s while on a Global Walk for a Livable World, an environmental trek across the United States, wrote Liz Walker, the EcoVillage director.

The EcoVillage at Ithaca now has 60 homes with 150 residents, a common house, carports, and a barn on a 10-acre organic farm. It is meant to provide an alternative model for suburban living with a healthy, socially rich lifestyle, while minimizing ecological impacts.

The Cohousing Association of the United States lists 193 cohousing communities. The largest number, 42, are in California. Four are listed for New York State — two as completed and two as forming. In addition to the completed one in Ithaca, another one is forming there. Saugerties has a completed cohousing community and another is forming in the Hudson Valley, according to the association.

The association says that a cohousing community is a type of collaborative housing in which residents actively participate in the design and operation of their own neighborhoods. The residents are consciously committed to living as a community and the physical design encourages both social contact and individual space.

The association lists six defining characteristics of cohousing: Future residents participate in the design of the community; the physical layout encourages community; common facilities are designed for daily use and are an integral part of the community; residents manage their own community and perform much of the work required to maintain the property; leadership is not hierarchical — no one person has authority over others; and the community is not a source of income for its members.
"The village atmosphere isn’t what we thought it would be," said Caprio. "Cohousing people share the same values."
She went on, "I live in an 1800’s house in Berne. I have an apartment upstairs." The inhabitants of the house, she said, do not necessarily share the same values, although they share the same structure.

With cohousing, the community is intentional, said Caprio.
Asked how residents would be decided on, Caprio said, "It’s a voting-with-your-feet kind of thing."

She envisions a village that is environmentally sensitive, where the buildings are placed close together and the rest of the land is protected by conservation easements.
"It’s not off the grid, but minimizing our footprint on the earth," she said.
Caprio’s husband, who works selling industrial pressure washers, has been researching construction of the ecovillage, she said. "He’s interested in alternative building. Ithaca does straw-bale housing," she said. "He’s very interested in underground houses."
She said the term "underground" is actually a misnomer. The homes are built into the side of a hill and use passive solar energy, making them "super efficient," said Caprio. "There are quite a few green builders in the area."
She went on, "Intentional communities have blossomed so incredibly in the last two decades. A lot of Americans are feeling we’re isolated from each other. It would be wonderful to raise our children in a community that supports each other once again."
Asked about current interest locally in a cohousing community, Caprio said, "I have four families right now who are interested in moving forward....The more the merrier...I’m getting tired of waiting. I have two kids. I figure now or never."