All the World’s a Classroom

Secondary School Students Find the Extension School a Complement to Homeschooling

by Ursula Pawlowski

Cambridge triplets Ellora, Claire, and Julia Berthet have spent much of their lives traveling with their father, the world serving as their classroom. "We were homeschooled—but on the road," Claire says. "Our father took us on trips—to the Sikorski helicopter factory in Connecticut, a tour of the UN building in New York City, Wall Street."

From left: Julia, Claire, and Ellora Berthet

Early on, when they were still traditional students, Julia says they would play hooky from school, "but our father still made us do homework. We would go for the day to New York City and stop for several hours at the library."

"That was back in the sixth grade," Claire explains, when they were still attending Cambridge Public Schools, which they did until eighth grade. "In the ninth grade, my father decided to try to expand our educational experience, something that he had been thinking about while we were still in elementary school," Claire says.

The 17-year-old Berthet triplets have blue-green eyes and strawberry blond hair that frames their freckled complexion. Any one of them easily blends into the eclectic crowds on the streets of Harvard Square, where they currently take classes at the Harvard Extension School.

Registrar Susan McGee is interested in Extension School students who, like Ellora, Claire, and Julia, are high school age. "Since 2001, we have seen a steady increase in the number of students under the age of 18," McGee says. "In 2001, approximately 106 students were under 18. Just last year it was 208, doubling in four years." A number of these students attend local high schools, while others are homeschooled.

Extension School faculty have discovered unique qualities in students who are homeschooled. Dr. Paul Bamberg, who teaches math and physics, was struck by an exceptionally bright student in his advanced geometry course. "I had a half-dozen Extension School students combined with Harvard undergraduates in my class," he says. "The top two students happened to be Extension School students, and the top student was homeschooled." Of the homeschooled students he has come in contact with, Bamberg says he has found them to be "more inclined to speak up, more careful with all the detail on their homework." As for stereotypes, Bamberg says, "I've heard them—that homeschooled students are antisocial, a liability to high schools. I haven't met any of those types yet."

The nontraditional approach to education provides enormous flexibility. Once she and her sisters registered as homeschoolers in the Cambridge school district during high school, Julia says they "could take classes anywhere, whatever we wanted." They aptly refer to their experience as "travel-schooling." In addition to lessons learned on excursions with their father, they enrolled in schools around Cambridge—not for a transcript but to further their interests. They attended homeschool meetings at the Cambridge Library in the beginning, then took classes at Cambridge Rindge and Latin and the Extension School. In addition, their father, a self-employed architect, took them on trips to museums, galleries, and other places of interest, then assigned them papers on certain topics.

Julia, Claire, and Ellora don't consider their youth an issue at the Extension School. Though at the beginning they were keenly aware that most of their classes were filled with adults, they quickly adjusted. "I don't feel judged by age but by what I bring to the class," Julia says. Claire agrees that what matters is one’s level of involvement, while Ellora says that when she’s in a class "age just doesn't register."

The Berthet triplets are indeed deeply involved in their education. They ascribe their curiosity and zest for learning to their father, who, after all, conceived of the homeschooling plan and always encourages his daughters to explore.

They share a love of history. After seeing the first iron bridge in England, archaeological sites in Rome and Naples, and Peter Zumthor’s thermal baths in Switzerland, the sisters can see that science, technology, architecture, and history are all intertwined. They can visualize what other people are only able to read about in textbooks.

Their travels have undeniably enriched their educational experience. "I was doing this project on Theodore Roosevelt, and I chose a speech that he made on businesses while he was in Winona, Minnesota," Julia says. "I remembered being in Winona last summer when we drove cross-country. I was right there where he said it! My travels make everything seem more tangible, less textbook."

Claire (foreground), Julia (left), and Ellora Berthet study ballet at the Ballet Theatre, Cambridge.

Julia gravitates toward the humanities and enjoys history and literature equally. She loves to read and to interact with people. In addition to working in the Mathews Lab at the Harvard University Herbaria, where they study the phylogeny of flowering plants, she volunteers at Children’s Hospital in Boston and is working on a project to make the hospital more accessible to teenagers.

Claire is more visual and is enthralled with color. She enjoyed trips to see the ballet in New York City (all three are dancers themselves) because she is intrigued by the way the human body moves, the line a dancer’s body makes. In chemistry classes, she likes visualizing shapes. In the future, she intends to do something related to art history.

Ellora, the most quiet of the triplets, is drawn to history and the natural sciences, particularly biology, and can see herself teaching or conducting research down the road.

What they lack in years the three make up for in experience. Their travels have allowed them to become more aware of the connection between learning and experience. "Knowledge and experience tend to be separated in education whereas they are intertwined in reality," Claire says.

Julia says, "I have a quantitative side, which is helpful in history and literature. And I have realized that there is a problem-solving area to both."

At 17, they're unsure of the career paths they will ultimately choose, but they are halfway through the Bachelor of Liberal Arts Program, and for now they are satisfied with simply learning. "When we applied last year, a bachelor’s was not on our minds," Ellora says. "We just wanted to learn. But along the way, we realized that being in the program had a lot of benefits."

Her sisters nod in agreement. "Yeah, a lot of benefits," they say.