The Putney School Newsletter for Parents

Dear Parents,

 The 74^th Putney School Graduation was a joyful occasion.  It was a lovely day, with families and alumni gathering to celebrate and applaud our graduates.  Reid Hoffman ‘85 spoke, and reflected back to his own graduation when Wally Shawn ‘61 was the graduation speaker. He pointed out that to keep to the 24 year cycle, a member of the class of 2009 needs to be the commencement speaker in 2033.  In helping them see how to be the entrepreneurs of designing their own lives, he advised the seniors about how to distinguish in their life decisions between painful risks, which may be worth taking, and mortal risks, which are those that, if you fail, you don’t get to play again.  He also encouraged each of them to be sure that they set aside time to work for others. 

 The weekend after graduation alumni from selected classes from each decade returned for Reunion Weekend, filling seven of the dorms.  Some of them had not seen each other for 50 years, and some had been on campus regularly since they graduated.  They sang a great deal, danced quite a lot, and talked in between, catching up on what is happening in their lives and at the school. 

 In spite of the economy, we have ended the year on a high note.  We had 100% participation in donations to the Annual Fund from both the Class of 2009 and the faculty and administration.  The school is full for next year, with a waiting list.  The field house will be finished by September, as will the new wood fired bread oven in the KDU.  Summer Programs students arrive on June 28^th, and will be on campus until early August.

 One of my projects for the summer will be to work on designing a conference on progressive education that we will hold in the summer of 2010, in celebration of Putney’s 75^th Anniversary. Putney held such a conference for our 50^th, and it is time to examine once again what great education should consist of.  Changes in the world culture, economy and environment, together with new brain research and new technologies, challenge us to redesign secondary education, and this conference will bring together some of the best minds in the country to look at this future.  If any of you have ideas or suggestions for people who should be invited to this conference, I’d love to hear from you.

 I hope that you all have wonderful summers,

 Emily

______________________________________________

Graduation 2009

Project Week Results

More March Break Travel Photos

Dear Parents,

The last week of the school year!  The campus is buzzing with students working on their final projects.  We finished a terrific set of 34 senior exhibitions last week, on topics ranging from bio-engineering, Euclid, and health care, to dance, photography and car design.  The exhibitions were well attended by students and outside guests, and each one had an outside evaluator who is an expert in the relevant field.  The depth and clarity of the work done on the exhibitions is testimony to the fact that project weeks over the years have taught these seniors how to work independently at a high level.

 Graduation is Sunday at 11:00.  All students attend graduation, and parents of non-seniors are of course welcome, as well as the senior parents.  Students should be mostly packed up before graduation, but they will need to finish packing and make sure their rooms are clean before they leave.  If you are picking up your child, please don’t whisk them away before they have cleaned up.  Dorms close at 4:00.

 During the week of May 18, parent volunteers, both on and off campus, were busy calling for your participation in the Annual Fund. Many of you were quick to show your support. As a result we saw an immediate jump in parent participation from 40% to 51%. Many more pledged to make their donation before June 30. I thank all of you who have understood how important it is that we have broad participation.   I am delighted to be able to announce that this morning the seniors announced in Assembly that 100% of them were making a contribution to the annual fund - there’s a challenge!

 I look forward to seeing many of you here next weekend for our celebrations.

 Emily

End of School Schedule  

 2009 College Destinations  

Spring Project Week Details   

Social Dance   

Spring Dance Concert  

Dear Parents,
All students and most teachers are out on Long Spring trips this week – it is lovely and warm and I envy them!  They are hiking, canoeing, climbing, and exploring. I am looking forward to hearing all the stories when they get back on campus.

I expect that many of you saw the NY Times article "Ear Plugs to Lasers: The Science of Concentration" last week. It is certainly worth a read.  Read the rest of this entry »

Dear Parents, 

Some of you have asked about the school’s response to the news about Swine Flu.  At this point there are no reported cases of Swine Flu in Vermont. The closest cases reported, in New York,  have been relatively mild.  The Vermont Department of Health is keeping a close watch and will alert us if this changes.

Because we all live closely together we already encourage the behaviors that help protect against communicable diseases.  We will be more vigilant in reminding our students to maintain good hygiene and not share food or drinks.  Because most of our students do not travel to school daily, our exposure to germs from outside of school is lower than in cities or other communities.  Please be assured that the risk is extremely minimal and email Marianne Buswell  at the Health Office if you have any questions or concerns. Read the rest of this entry »

Dear Parents,

 Spring has really come, and we are back to sitting outside, playing frisbee and lacrosse, and enjoying the light.  We are looking forward to seeing many of you here for Family Weekend, and hope to have good weather for you.  When you arrive please be sure to register at the Currier Center, where we will have your schedules and other materials.

Read the rest of this entry »

Dear Parents,

It is wonderful to have everyone back from Spring Break, and to hear all their stories. When I hear students talk about their experiences on our school trips to Kenya and El Salvador, I am reminded again of the power of experiential education.

Read the rest of this entry »

Dear Parents,

I am just back from a 10 day trip to Asia, visiting Beijing, Seoul and Tokyo. I traveled with Libby Holmes, our International Programs Director. It was lovely to be so welcomed and so wonderfully hosted by our many families in those cities, and to see our students in their home environments. Read the rest of this entry »

Dear Parents,

     The end of the winter term is fast approaching, and was marked by Snow Ball on Saturday Night.  A long standing Putney tradition, this year it had a Cuban theme (don’t ask how that goes with snow) and the students were dressed up as if it were the Oscars. At the dinner the teachers wait on tables, and carry secret notes from one table to another. Barnes Assembly Hall was transformed from a trustee meeting space to a dance hall and back again in the space of the evening. Read the rest of this entry »

 Notes from Emily

 I am back on the hill after an arduous but wonderful time as a Klingenstein Fellow at Columbia Teachers College in New York.  It was good for me to be a student again – three courses, three papers, two presentations, hundreds of pages of reading, all in two weeks.  I still don’t have my papers back from the professors, so I have that classic feeling of student trepidation – were they good enough? Read the rest of this entry »

Notes from Emily -

This week the notes are from Ben; Emily is away.

Ahh, February.  After a long, dark December and even longer, frigid January, February can have many of us turning inside for shelter.  Yet, I’m reminded daily that this is a time to treasure, a time of crisp, silent early-mornings, perfectly groomed ski trails, and ever-lengthening days quietly promising the slow return of warmth, green grass and fresh-picked food from the fields.  For me, a confirmed warm-weather lover, February is a time to practice and promote the art of Winter Fun.  It has helped keep me and generations of Putneyites sane, happy and healthy through the cold days – here’s what it takes: Read the rest of this entry »

"Did my heart love till now? Forswear it, sight!
 For I ne’er saw true beauty till this night."

“How all occasions do inform against me,
And spur my dull revenge!”

Yes, we are doing both Romeo and Juliet AND Hamlet this weekend.  It is wonderful to see so many students on stage, as well as the astonishing competence of those who run the light boards, stage manage, and do all the back stage work.  This is teamwork at its best – under pressure, with great material, and everyone working to capacity. Read the rest of this entry »

Happy New Year! 
As we return from the holidays, we start right in with Project Week (which is actually an eleven day period).  Each student has already proposed and had accepted two projects for this time, an academic one which must be connected with a course they are enrolled in, and a non-academic one. We hope that we will see as many of you as can make it to the exhibits and presentations at the end of this time, including performances of both Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet.

After project week, we will start our second semester schedule with two special days. We will celebrate Martin Luther King Day on the 19th with a variety of topics of study, and on the 20th we will watch Mr. Obama’s inauguration together. These two days will also include time for community service locally, which is fitting for both these celebrations.  A short three weeks later, we are already at mid-semester break.  Read the rest of this entry »

From Emily -

These past few days we’ve had some of the nasty weather that hit the Northeast so hard, but we were luckier than many. We lost power for only a few hours, and although many small branches came down with the weight of the ice, there were no major disasters. As I look out my office window on this Saturday morning I can see bright blue sky and glittering trees, as well as students walking very very carefully!

Read the rest of this entry »

Notes from Emily -

As students return from Thanksgiving, we have only two weeks until they head off again for Winter Break.  It was this quirk of the calendar this year that caused us to put Project Week (which is actually 10 days long) in January this year.  Students have already proposed, and mostly had accepted, their projects for January, and we’ve seen a wonderful array of topics.  Some are group projects, but most students have proposed something that they are particularly interested in working on solo, with a faculty advisor. The project week process involves planning, persuasion, self-scheduling, self-monitoring and evaluation, and above all self-discipline. It gives students that rare commodity, time, to dig deep into something that fascinates them.  Some titles from this winter’s batch, to give you an idea of the range:

  Read the rest of this entry »

Notes from Emily -

Education is a social process; education is growth; education is not a preparation for life but is life itself.   ~John Dewey

John Dewey argued that the purpose of education should be to prepare students to be good citizens of a democracy. Progressive schools have always believed in the power of experiential education, and most of them encourage their students to be active participants in the political process.  Many of these schools, however, have difficulty in creating political dialogue that reflects the national discourse, lacking a sufficiency of right wing students.  Putney is no exception, and more frequent debates are between Democrats and those to the left of the Democrats.  That being said, however, I judge that the highest political value held in our student body is respect for individual differences and beliefs. The Republicans here are lionized and sometimes get more than their share of air time simply because the students think it’s cool when they speak up.

  Read the rest of this entry »

Election day is upon us, at long last. We’ve had students traveling to New Hampshire to canvas and doing phone bank work locally. (Vermont is not a swing state, and therefore not attracting much attention.) We’ve watched the debates and had assembly presentations on the candidates. Election night we will all gather in Calder Hall with games and food and stay up late. We’ll have a late start to school Wednesday morning so we can all catch up on sleep.  Whatever the outcome, we know that this is an election our students will remember to be able to tell their grandchildren about.

For those of you interested in reading more about how adolescents grow up, and what the pitfalls and promises may be, I recommend an excellent article from Independent School Magazine, The 4 S’s of Adolescent Success.  Read the rest of this entry »

Dear Parents,

     It was lovely to see so many of you here this past weekend, and to share our Harvest Festival with you.  I hope that you feel you got a good sense of what your children’s lives here are like. One parent, who took his daughter’s dish crew duty, suggested that in addition to attending classes and activities, all parents should take over jobs so they can fully understand the Putney experience. Even if you did no dishes, we are most grateful for all you did to help set up for Harvest Festival – it made a great difference, and helped the busy weekend go smoothly and cheerfully. If you were not able to be here for the weekend, feel free to be in touch with your child’s advisor for an update if you have not already. Read the rest of this entry »

Dear Parents,

Life at Putney is all about balance – balance between work and play, between the individual and the community, between freedom and responsibility. We also try to find a balance between our creation of a focused community somewhat removed from the distractions of typical teenage life and a community engaged with the realities of the world. For the last few weeks we have been talking a lot about what’s going on ‘out there’ and students are striving to understand it and know how they can and should respond. We’ve watched the debates together, talked about the economic crisis, and discussed the role political action should play in a high school. I have been pleased with the maturity and thoughtfulness I’ve seen students bring to these questions. Read the rest of this entry »

Notes from Emily

The school year is well underway.  Students are settling into their routines, figuring out how to manage their time, and getting to know each other. We typically take only half a class into the 9^th grade and the other half come new as sophomores, and we have quite a few new juniors, so almost a third of the student body is new each year.  It’s great to see new friendships forming and the new maturity and interests of returning students combining with the freshness and curiosity of the newcomers.  I can tell you that the admissions office is coming in for quite a lot of congratulations this fall, as we think the new students are a wonderful group.

I hope you have all received your invitations to Parents Weekend and Harvest Festival. The schedule is available on the website as well.  It will help us plan meals and other things if we know who is coming so please rsvp@putneyschool.org.  Please put your child’s name in the subject line, and let us know what part of the weekend you will be able to be on campus.

We are still looking for some families willing to host international students during the mid-semester break – please would you be in touch with Robyn Scarth if you can do this. rscarth@putneyschool.org.  Thank you!

You should also have received your instructions for how to access your child’s reports and other information online in our new NetClassroom system.  If you had trouble logging in, please try again now, as we have fixed a bug with some of the passwords. If you continue to have trouble, please be in touch with Lucy Matteau at lmatteau@putneyschool.org.

All the best,

Emily

 For more pictures see Orientation Hike on Mt. Monadnock

Notes from Emily 

We are gathering together back on the hill.  Of course many of us spend the summer at Putney, but in the fall the migration back to campus starts in mid-August and continues over two weeks until we are all here.

First the new teachers arrive and get oriented, and then the whole faculty assembles for a week of meetings and preparation. Then the students leaders come back (36 of them) for leadership training and preparation, followed by the new international students, and then other new students. Finally returning students arrive, and we are complete. In the process the culture of the school gets handed down, and the new culture of the new year is established. It’s an exciting time, and full of wonderful energy. Read the rest of this entry »