Skip to main content

Taking Stock

I have never been particularly good at accepting compliments or celebrating success. Both as a student and now as a school leader, I tend to focus on the next challenge in front of me or how my performance should improve. Leading a school feeds my natural wiring in this regard, as there is never enough endowment, tuition, or campus improvement to make one feel like the work is done. And of course that is the point – if we do not gear our sights towards improvement, then mediocrity and decline will inevitably set in.

Late May, however, asks me to write a lot of speeches. Many of them focus upon honoring classes, students, or even careers. I am also asked to bring some kind of reflective perspective to the year as a whole. Additionally, the Board of Trustees requires a thoughtful self-evaluation about my own performance. When this writing is taken in totality, a Head of School can’t help but reflect upon all that we have accomplished in a year. In fact, I believe this year has been special thanks to great student leadership, hard work by employees, and incredible support from Berwick families.

In this year alone, we have articulated a new curricular vision focused upon student-directed learning and the development of skills. We have opened a beautiful new Wellness Center and raised funds for a new Inspiration Commons in our library next fall. Our campus maintenance has never been better, and we have hired a remarkable group of new employees to work with your children next year. Our college placement feels strong once again, and we are gearing up for an extended period of professional development in June. We have tackled the issue of Cultural Competency in a new way. We had memorable productions and compelling athletic success – not to mention nearly 500 grandparents on campus a few weeks ago. Looking ahead, we are planning a true celebration of our community in the fall for our 225th Anniversary.


We are clearly far from a perfect place, and there have been numerous individual valleys to endure this year for sure. We have also seen great progress in our work in promoting virtue and useful knowledge while establishing ourselves as one of the finest educational institutions in the Seacoast. As I turn my attention back to my rather daunting three ring binder for commencement season, I want to pause to say thank you. Thank you to our students, faculty, and parents for making this such an exciting year of growth. I have never felt more optimistic about our future.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Piercing the Bubble

This week we were so fortunate to have former NH Senator Kelly Ayotte address grades 7 – 11 in our theater about Civil Discourse in a time of Political Polarization. Senator Ayotte spoke to the need to take the high road in tough conversations and put an incredible primacy on building relationships with people who hold different opinions. She was able to speak to some of her own successes in working across the aisle to develop legislation to address the opioid crisis in New Hampshire as one powerful example of how this can be possible. Additionally, Senator Ayotte offered a strong reminder to our students of the need for more women in positions of leadership within our government, citing that she had only been the 53rd woman to serve in the US senate during her tenure. With a down-to-earth style and but an appropriately impassioned call to action, she challenged our students to become the leaders that they could be. Her call to action and example of service were powerful reminder...
Post a Comment
Read more

The wonders of nature at Berwick

I started my day in the Admin meeting on Thursday hearing about the newest iteration of Earth Day this year. Thanks to senior Quinn Santos and his Innovation Pursuit, we learned about the ways in which Earth Day will be a bit more hands on and active than it has in the past. Quinn has been a passionate environmentalist on campus and this year his IP project has focused on building out our Earth Day programming. As Head of School, it is pretty compelling to see one student mobilize an entire PK-12 school into action to clean up beaches and come to know our local wildlife. While we can sometimes worry about the amount of disruption and special schedules that these events create, it’s amazing that we have kids who care as much as Quinn does. His passion is authentic, and it goes well beyond any kind of grade motivation. He is off to Unity College next year to take this passion to the next level. I finished my day by enjoying the miracle that Lower School parents know as the Lower S...
Post a Comment
Read more

Arts Underground

One of Berwick’s great strengths is its arts culture, and I have always felt that there is both a public and private face of this culture. The public face includes our amazing concerts, our ambitious productions, and the various art shows we produce throughout the year. The private face tends to include things like private lessons, coffeehouses, assembly performances, murals painted on walls, and unexpected artistic expressions that emerge on campus throughout the year. One of the great traditions I will miss at Berwick will be the annual recital week in April. So many of our students hone their craft on private music lessons throughout the year in the hopes of having a public performance at this time. Simultaneously, we have a week of performances in the theater and in Chip Harding’s coffeehouse lair – the space he likes to refer to as his “smoldering ruins,” referring to the carnage left there after every Middle School electric guitar class. This year, for my second and final time, I...
Post a Comment
Read more