Summerhill gained renown in the 1930s and then in the 1960s–1970s, due to progressive and counter-culture interest. He joined a Dresden school in 1921 and founded Summerhill on returning to England in 1924. He took two jobs in journalism before World War I, and taught at Gretna Green Village School in the second year of the war, writing his first book, A Dominie's Log (1915), as a diary of his life there as head teacher. Raised in Scotland, Neill taught at several schools before attending the University of Edinburgh in 1908–1912. He died in Suffolk.Founding Summerhill School, advocacy of personal freedom for children, progressive educationĪlexander Sutherland Neill (17 October 1883 – 23 September 1973) was a Scottish educator and author known for his school, Summerhill, and its philosophy of freedom from adult coercion and community self-governance. After his publication of Summerhill: A Radical Approach to Child Rearing in 1960, which proved enormously popular in the USA, Neill gained a reputation as one of the world's most progressive educators, although did not seek plaudits. Rules were agreed by democratic vote and the school gained a reputation for giving a second chance to 'difficult' pupils, many of whom thrived under the freedoms offered. Neill returned to Britain in 1924 to found Summerhill, a school run by its pupils on self-governing principles. Neill wrote about his experiences in A Dominie Abroad (1923). After army service during the First World War, he went on to help set up a progressive school in Hellerau (Germany), where he was joined by Edwin and Willa Muir. Here he developed his ideas on education. He then became an assistant teacher in Newport-on-Tay and finally was able to attend the University of Edinburgh, where he gained confidence.

This involved him leaving school at fourteen, taking jobs which frustrated him, and the returning to school to serve as pupil-teacher with his father and then in Bonnyrigg ( Midlothian) and Kingskettle ( Fife).

Neill had a difficult and protracted education. Born in Forfar, the son of the strict Calvinist who was schoolmaster at Kingsmuir.

Summerhill alexander neill