Getting Ready!

It has been a very busy week and I am remiss with my blogging. This entry will be a little more scattered than most but will hopefully give you a sense of the whirlwind that is getting the school ready for the year. The jackhammer that has been breaking apart the ledge outside of my office for the last couple of days may have caught up with me. It will be well worth it if Ford Hall’s lower level is drier going forward!

Conveniently, eleven of us headed to the hills for two days to due some planning and discuss curriculum, faculty development and other important issues. In this photo, our Business Manager Jacques Delorme and Dean of Students Elliot Harvey debate the role of croquet mallets in teaching the proper rules on footnotes!

It was also a week of welcoming some of the new teachers who have started to arrive. Here Academic Dean Pam Blair welcomes Chris MacDonald and Van Nguyen. Chris is our new Humanities Division Head and Van will be teaching Advanced Computer Science and ESL. This coming week will see the arrival of all new faculty as we will embark on New Faculty Orientation on Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. I will be one of the new kids learning at the feet of a very impressive core of returning teachers!


Favorite Quote of The Week:
Harry Harelik ’77 writes in a letter when contemplating the opportunity that Winchendon has:

“Can we envision a school that takes a Winchendon student and really straps a jet-pack to them, kids that can enter the school undirected and leave as well educated, poised, and confident graduates?”

This concept of really empowering our students with a “jet-pack” of skills and habits is a wonderful way to think of what we do. We can get caught up in the rhetoric and often ambiguous language of pedagogy, when “jet-pack” really captures our opportunity and goals. Thanks Harry.

Have a great week.
John

Meet the Squeegee Brother and His BOGO

Last week I had the pleasure of having dinner with Alex and Raman Magay, one of Winchendon’s newest married couples. (Congratulations are also in order for Sam Johnson and his fiancée Dianna, who are getting married this weekend.)

Alex wears many hats at Winchendon including running the art program, directing student activities and community service, serving as an Administrator on Duty, helping with the men’s basketball program, working in Admissions and a variety of other things. Beyond that, he has just completed his Masters at UMass, is in his 19th year serving in the National Guard and is one of the original Squeegie Brothers (more on the latter below).

And about 4.5 years ago Alex went shoe shopping. It was his good fortune that day that he found not just a BOGO (“Buy One Get One ____” in retail parlance) but he also found Raman. Talk about a heck of a sale! They persevered in their courtship, trading numbers and gradually getting to know each other, and now Raman has her Squeegie Brother. They were married in July on the Winchendon campus in a Sikh service and live at the bottom of the hill.

So what do the newly wed Magay’s like to do? Good food seems to be one passion, and they talked about great restaurants throughout eastern MA. They took me to a terrific one in Peterborough but also said that they guarded the identity as a secret! It turns out that their caterer for their wedding is one of my favorites (Bollywood in Andover and Shrewsbury). Alex is definitely into his garden and spent time at our dinner trying to figure out the recipe for the restaurant’s kale. Education is central in both Raman and Alex’s life as Raman currently teaches second graders. And they will be really testing their marriage by welcoming four homestay students into their home this coming year. From newlyweds to having four teenage boys under foot?!!!

And the “Squeegee Brother” bit? It turns out that Alex supported himself through school with a window washing business that he founded with a friend. They called their business “Squeegee Brothers”. Alex’s commitment and passion for all that he does show through here in spades as he can still be found nineteen years later taking care of three, long time clients and their windows.

Alex, have you noticed all of the windows in Homewood??!!

No Sympathy Necessary!

This blog goes deeper into a topic that I had touched on in an earlier note but which I feel compelled to discuss further. Please excuse me for beating the proverbial horse!

One of the things that was most attractive to me as I was choosing which school to work at next was the cultural diversity at Winchendon.

I believe that it is time for boarding schools to come out of the 1960’s and truly embrace a culturally diverse student body and faculty. I can’t tell you the number of times people at different schools have boasted either in person or in their view book that they have a student population drawn from sixteen or twenty six or even thirty six countries but have then been just as quick to say “But don’t worry, we have a policy where our total international population won’t exceed 16 or 17%.” It strikes me as odd that highly educated minds haven’t figured out that a couple of token kids from a whole lot of different countries don’t really provide the other 83-84% of American kids with a truly culturally rich experience. A semi-annual slide show by the boy from Montenegro or the one student from Pakistan at a table with seven other kids from the states isn’t going to get any of these kids what they need.

I have been on this kick for a while , but I have reenergized on the topic recently as a number of school leaders have been somewhat surprised when I tell them that a majority of Winchendon’s students are from different countries and continents. I have been receiving a lot of “Oh, That’s a challenge” or “Aren’t you worried?”.

They are right on one count – it can be a challenge, but the most important things often are. It may be a bigger challenge for Americans more than most other cultures. In the early 20th century, this country was recognized to be a cultural melting pot, but since then we have become awfully homogenized. We are American and we like our ways.

But the world is not American. The world is approximately 60% Asian, with another ~15% (and growing) living in Africa. Fewer than 10% of the globe’s inhabitants are from North America. And we can’t forget that stretching across these regions are the approximately 20% of the population that worships one form of Islam or another and another ~15% who are Hindu. It is challenging. It is complex. It would be easier (but not as interesting) if we all believed the same things, had the same values and spoke the same language. But we don’t.

Our children, our students are going to need to be much better than our generation at working and assimilating with people of all backgrounds. They will inherit a world where physical boundaries will play a much smaller role and many will work within multi-national and multi-cultural entities. There ability to quickly assimilate with, to be able to understand and empathize with people from different backgrounds will have a terrific impact on their overall success.

And they will have this opportunity to develop these critical skills and habits at Winchendon perhaps more so than in most any other secondary school environment in this country. One model exception that is doing this very well is the United World College, and their students consistently go to the best colleges around the world. At Winchendon, our students are becoming better writers and thinkers, problem solvers and communicators, and they are also learning to live, work and collaborate with students from all over the world.

Making this work can be a bit challenging at times, but it is exactly what we should be doing for our students.

There are some fascinating people at TED!

While I read quite a bit, I have to admit that I have recently become addicted to a wonderful new resource where I can watch fascinating speakers. If you haven’t had the chance yet, check out TED.com and the collections of speeches that are available as downloads. TED is an acronym that stands for “Technology, Entertainment and Design” and is the web presence for a gathering of a thousand leading global thinkers that takes place in Monterrey, CA each June. The participants come from all backgrounds, from around the globe and offer a wide variety of perspectives. Speakers are given a maximum of twenty minutes to make their point, with some being as short as four to six minutes. The topics cover the spectrum from global issues to education to science and the arts. I have yet to listen to one that wasn’t intriguing in some way and several have bowled me over. A great place to start is with their “Top Ten” list, several of which I have watched twice now. Jill Bolte Taylor, Ken Robinson and Al Gore’s presentations all ones required a second viewing from me.

You should be able to click on this link to the top 10 list at TED...

I hope that you enjoy.

Winch - It's About the People - Elisa

From time to time, I also hope to use a Winchendon Views entry to highlight different members of the Winchendon community as I get to know them. This week, I literally pestered Elisa for a few minutes, and she let me know so as we got to the end!

Name and hometown: Elisa Morales – Puerto Armuelles, Panama

Winchendon Connection: Elisa has known Winchendon since she was little as her uncle Mike and aunt Brenilda live on campus. Mike Burns teaches and is the head coach of our Men’s Varsity Basketball team. Elisa initially came for one year, graduating with the class of ’06, but wasn’t ready to leave and came back to graduate again with the class of ’07. She considers herself to be part of both classes.

After graduating from The Winch, Elisa moved on to Green Mountain College where she is studying biology in a pre-med program. Her goal is to become an optometrist. She hasn’t decided yet whether she would prefer to practice in the U.S. or Panama.

And she still hasn’t been able to leave Wichendon! This summer she has been working as part of the administrative team at the school, regularly filling in as the friendly voice on our end of the main phone number, working in the business office and helping keep the various groups of campers coming and going smoothly.

When I asked her to reflect on her times as a student at Winchendon, Elisa credits Mrs. Blair with helping her become a much better writer. And she really lit up when recalling her memories of ice skating and attending basketball and hockey games as favorite activities. When pressed for other most memorable moments, Elisa cited the last math test of the year when she finally got the highest score over a group of guys who had dominated the test results for the year. I thought that academics weren’t supposed to be that competitive…!

Elisa and I also discussed her favorite book (La Vida Que Olvida) and her favorite music (U2 – Beautiful Day), the latter interest which we share. I will have to look for an English version of La Vida Que Olvida. When it came to current events, Elisa’s mind is on the elections at home in Panama.

Elisa showed either her true dedication (I have to try to believe this) or more likely her boredom with our chat when she closed our discussion by stating, “Mr. Kerney, you are interrupting my work.”!

Thanks Elisa for your work this summer, some good laughs and sharing some thoughts about you and Winchendon. Good luck this fall back at college.

A Silver Lining in the Tough Conversations

Last evening I was out for a beautiful ride on the road back from Ashburnham and was reflecting on a couple of tough conversations that I had to have during the day.

One of the challenges of this time of year as a school administrator at a popular school like Winchendon is having at least once a day to explain to an anxious student or family that we don’t have any spaces available for this fall. Unfortunately, this conversation is generally with someone who has come to believe that Winchendon is the best environment for them and one where they will thrive.

While these conversations are hard and can be draining, there has also been a real silver lining for me as I listen to make sure that I understand what people think is special about Winchendon. It is very gratifying to hear from students and parents who have been here why they are so anxious to return and to also hear from those that have not yet been here but hope to come on the impression of Winchendon they have gained.

I am also pleased that they are all citing consistent factors with a focus on the strong faculty support, the personalized approach and the attention to building strong academic habits. For those that have been here, they also talk about Winchendon being the place that they can do and be their best.

All of this just takes the sting out of what are otherwise hard conversations and makes me appreciate all the more being associated with this terrific school.