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Who are we?
Founded in 2019, Horshna Forest School emerged from a collective desire to reimagine education, away from walls, crowded classrooms, and uniform expectations. Instead, we chose trees, soil, sky, and curiosity as our classrooms.
Located in Beirut-Lebanon, we serve a mixed-age group of children (approximately ages 2–6), allowing each child to grow at their own pace, in a peer learning and mentoring environment.
Why We’re Raising €15,000
While our day-to-day operations are already supported by our community through tuition (on a sliding-scale basis, as we stay inclusive and accessible to all families, regardless of income), this campaign is about growth, security, and long-term sustainability, in moments of war and instability.
When you support Horshna:
- You’re investing in children’s well-being through supporting forest-school learning that fosters resilience, emotional intelligence, creativity, connection to nature, and respect for community and land long-term assets often missing in conventional schooling.
- You support inclusion and equity through sponsoring underprivileged children who cannot afford tuition, ensuring no child is excluded because of lack of means. Our sliding-scale tuition and scholarship philosophy ensure children from diverse economic and social backgrounds can benefit — your donation multiplies that impact.
- You help secure a safe, stable winter location, so learning continues year-round even when outdoor conditions are challenging.
- You strengthen educators and the sustainable future of the program by ensuring fair social-security benefits for our educators, recognizing their dedication and enabling them to continue guiding children safely and sustainably.
- You help revive a culture of nature-rooted learning in Lebanon. In a country at war, where green public spaces are rare, we promote and expand the forest-school model across Lebanon, raising awareness about the value of nature-based, child-led education, and potentially bringing similar opportunities to more communities.
What Your Donation Will Actually Do
Donation Size/ What It Enables
- $25 – $100: Contribute to purchasing rain gear, nature-exploration tools, or basic supplies (soil, natural art materials, hygiene kits).
- $250 – $500: Help sponsor a child for part of a semester — enabling access for underprivileged families.
- $1,000 – $3,000: Secure part of a safe winter location (rent, utilities) or support educator social benefits for several months.
- $5,000 – $10,000: Enable a full winter-term venue, purchase of infrastructure (tenting, heating, sleeping/resting gear), or rent if we go indoors, and part-fund educator social benefits.
- $15,000 (Full Goal): Realize our vision: stable winter-ready school infrastructure, full educator support, inclusive scholarships, and capacity to expand outreach and open the door to more children and to do Forest School training to educators who want to open their own forest programmes across Lebanon.
A Call to Action
Your donation — whether small or big — makes a real difference. It helps a child discover the forest; it helps a teacher stay committed; it helps a community reimagine what education can be.
Join us. Be part of something hopeful. Let’s help Horshna grow — so more children can learn, play, and flourish in nature.
Thank you, from all of us at Horshna.
More about Horshna
In 2018, a group of individuals, dissatisfied with Lebanon’s existing preschool programs, initiated the Horshna Forest Program. They found most programs were urban based, detached from nature, lacked Arabic language engagement, and followed conservative pedagogies, accessible only to wealthy families.
Here, a nurturing community blooms, the Horshna Forest Program, where children aged 2–6 explore freely, guided by curiosity and cared for with a 1:5 adult-to-child ratio. They join the forest every day for free play, exploration of seasons, local plants and animals, storytelling, music, crafts, and imaginative games.
Horshna fosters not just minds, but empathy, creativity, and a deep bond with the land and community.
We aspire to inspire and connect with a growing network of forest schools and eco-initiatives across the Arab region.
FAQ — Common Questions
Q: Is this donation replacing tuition fees?
A: No — tuition continues to operate on a sliding-scale basis, based on each family’s financial capacity. The GoFundMe campaign is not for basic survival, but for expansion — allowing us to bring forest-school benefits to more families, and to secure structural stability for staff and program.
Q: How inclusive is Horshna really?
A: Very. We are committed to social equity: children from different backgrounds (income levels, social realities) are welcomed, and scholarships are offered. This ensures diversity, inclusivity, and access for those who otherwise couldn’t afford alternative education.
Q: Where do classes take place?
A: Outdoors — in forests and green spaces around Beirut and Baabda — when weather permits. For winter or harsh weather, we secure indoor or sheltered venues to maintain continuity.
Q: What kind of education model does Horshna use?
A: A child-led, constructivist, nature-based model. Children learn through exploration, free play, seasonal activities, arts, music, storytelling, social interaction, and connection with nature — not through desks, standard curricula, or forced tasks.
Q: How do you ensure safety, supervision, and quality?
A: We keep a high adult-to-child ratio (~1:5), provide trained educators, observe and respond to children’s needs individually, and adapt to season/weather conditions to ensure safety and comfort.