Skip to main content

The Book Fair Returns to the Library

With all of the excitement for the new Inspiration Commons (we already have three schools coming to see it this fall), there was something so fulfilling in seeing our book fair set up in the new collaborative hub space. Our BPC volunteers each year find new twists and titles to make the experience so special. I say all of this as someone with three daughters in the Lower School. Within 24 hours of the first day, my girls had each filled out multi page lists of all the books they wanted. For my oldest - fantasy and science fiction, middle child focused on all things animals, and youngest just so proud to have a beginner chapter book (with pictures) so she might be like her older sisters, even though I know she can’t really read yet.

My girls do love to read, and I thank the Berwick Lower School teachers, staff, and librarians for this reality. In fact, I really don’t thank them enough. Frequently my girls force us to shut off their lights multiple times in order to stop reading the particular chapter that has gripped them on a given night. I continue to believe that amidst all the distractions of screens and gaming, this passionate love of reading will be the most important skill they learn for the future. Whatever form it takes, they will need to engage with and comprehend language in all that they do. For my older two girls, it has already become intrinsic in nature: they read to calm themselves down and to assuage that insatiable innate curiosity of young people.


I am struck that we, as Berwick parents, should not take this for granted – this love of reading. I am sure that it grips some kids more than others in our community, and I am also sure my daughters will be demanding cell phones and X-boxes before too long. But we really are lucky. We are lucky that Berwick has so many great books and so many thoughtful adults who can connect individual students to individual stories. Today I walked through the library three or four times, and each time I saw Lower School students pouring over titles and trying to make hard decisions. I had a pretty full day, so I was unable to travel to the book fair with my kids. My role was relegated to arriving with the credit card later in the afternoon. I paid for my stack and tucked the nine volumes under my arm and headed for the door when I crossed paths with another Berwick parent. I commented on the tradition of the book fair and how I had been ordered to come home with a full load. He smirked and said, “There are far worse investments we could be making,” I could not agree more.

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

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

Behind the scenes

I often like to use the word authenticity when talking about Berwick Academy. I have said that I feel more able to be myself at Berwick than any place I have worked to date; it truly is a gift to feel that way. For parents, we usually focus on the teachers and coaches who make our kids’ lives so dynamic, and we forget the people behind the scenes who make the Berwick experience possible: maintenance, custodial, food, transportation, and support staff, etc. Berwick could not deliver the program it delivers without such high quality yet largely unheralded work. The same could be said of the Head of School. I am quick to point out that being a father is far more humbling than being a Head of School. There is no way on earth that I could have possibly moved this school forward without the unquestioned support of my wife, Amy. I often marvel that, in addition to dealing with a husband who can be tired and grumpy at the end of long days, she somehow has managed to catalyze the amazing...
1 comment
Read more