An Evening With Brooklyn Flying Squads

We just released a new interview!

On a rainy evening last November, Ben and I, along with two friends, trekked across New York City. We lugged our film equipment on the subway and down dark sidewalks. We were on our way to Alexander Khost’s apartment to film an interview with him about Brooklyn Flying Squads.

We arrived at Alex’s apartment wet and hungry. We were greeted by a warm apartment, a crowd of people, and a vegan feast for dinner. That evening, we met many faces we had only seen through the glow of a screen before. After dinner, we sat down to interview Alex Khost, his son James Khost, and our dear friend Zoe Jensen de Pedro.

Alex created Flying Squads and facilitated a group in Brooklyn for three years. Now he facilitates a Flying Squad in Romania. James and Zoe participated in Brooklyn Flying Squads for most of its existence.

I would most simply describe Flying Squads as a self-directed field trip program for unschoolers, though they describe themselves as a “youth liberation and anti-oppression collective”. I’ve been totally fascinated by Flying Squads since I discovered them a few years ago, so it was a real pleasure to speak to Alex, James, and Zoe about their experiences with the original Flying Squad.

We just released the interview we filmed on our YouTube channel. Go and give it a watch, like, comment, and share!

Also… be on the lookout for a full episode about Flying Squads coming soon!

We’re in the news (anonymously)

Thanks to Blake Boles for mentioning us in an article about alternatives to college!

Blake Boles, the author of books such as Better than College, echoes this. “It might be bad to never go to college at all. You might be closing some doors or making things harder for yourself in the world of the economy,” he says. “But what’s worse is to go to college for three years, accrue debt, and then drop out. Or even to finish the degree, accrue debt, and then realize you were checking more boxes, the way you did all through high school. It’s this shocking lack of self-knowledge and awareness of other options.

“It can be self-employment, independent travel, service work,” he goes on. “I was recently mentoring an 18-year-old who grew up in a homeschooling family in Pennsylvania. They raised $19,000 through Kickstarter to do a yearlong road trip and an investigative documentary series on the alternative education scene in the U.S. That’s the stuff I’m a big promoter of.”

Read here: What if College is Not Right For You?

Support a friend of the project!

Sari and Becka of Radical Learning are vying for a spot at the SXSW EDU conference with their panel “Consent: The Missing Link in Alternative Education”. Sari and Becka have been big supporters of our project since day one, and we’re a big fan of the important work they’re doing!

For their panel to happen they need to earn enough votes. You can support them by going to the SXSW PanelPicker website here, making an account, and voting for their panel. Voting ends on August 18th.