History of ICASSI

ICASSI (the International Committee for Adlerian Summer Schools and Institutes) is a non-profit educational organization whose objective is to help professionals, students, and lay persons learn the teachings of Adler and Dreikurs and master appropriate skills, and to teach Adler’s and Dreikurs’ principles and methods where professional and personal development opportunities are needed.

Alfred Adler, a young colleague of Sigmund Freud in the early years of the 20^th Century, developed a psychiatric and educational treatment and prevention approach that today would be called a strength-based and community-oriented psychology. The emphasis was on the fundamental motivation of human beings to belong and to contribute to the larger society in which they live.

Rudolf Dreikurs, a younger colleague of Adler, established ICASSI and the Summer Institute in 1962. Dreikurs created ICASSI because of his ongoing dedication to spreading the teachings of Adler to people around the world, not only as a psychological method of treatment, but as a philosophy of life.

In his early days of practicing psychiatry in Vienna, Dreikurs saw the need to extend his office into the community. He was convinced that use of Adlerian education methods in the home and in the school would enable children to reach a higher level of functioning. He believed they would develop a greater sense of their own strength and ability, and would learn the responsibility of citizenship in a free world. He was also convinced that prevention was more important than treatment.

From his immediate community, Dreikurs extended his work to the nation and then internationally, starting with his first visit to Brazil in 1937 and again in 1946. He moved to the United States in 1937, working internationally in Israel in 1959 and holding the first International Summer School in Denmark in 1962. He visualized the acceptance of “social interest” among a steadily widening group of people world-wide, who would experience living in harmony and peace.

A Truly International Institute

It was Dreikurs’ hope to hold the Summer Institute in a different country each year wherever there was a group in need of impetus to grow.

His hope has been realized and the Rudolf Dreikurs Annual Summer Institute has been held in many different countries over the years.  Recent locations have included Malta, Ireland, the Netherlands, Germany, Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom and Lithuania.