How would you sum up term one in a word or phrase?
“I would say eager anticipation.”
What do you think went well during Term 1?
“I’ve done a lot of work with my team on improving the way we can monitor our students’ attendance and intervene if we see that there’s issues. We’re more capable of doing that than we’ve ever been before. So those were two big initiatives we had coming into the year, and I think at the end of quarter one, we’ve made a lot of progress on both. That’s exciting for me.”
What do you think could be improved or continue to be worked on? And what are some of your big goals as this year continues?
“I feel like coming out of the pandemic, we weren’t doing enough to celebrate, to give seniors and our whole school some kinds of social events or other school-wide celebratory events or class-wide events. We’ve developed a few of those things like the pickleball tournament and then the s’mores night, but those are the kind of things I think we can probably do more of. Additionally, we have a lot of work we’re going to be doing with our staff to look at how students might learn differently now than they ever have in the past. How to engage students and keep students engaged in 2023 is very different than it was even five years ago before the pandemic. Student engagement is a high priority.”
The multipurpose field, pickleball and tennis courts have been opened as part of Gonkplex so far. In what ways have you seen the impact of Gonkplex on the student body?
“I have enjoyed hearing kids get excited about when we’re opening any of those things. It’s fun to see families be able to watch their kids really up close on a top notch facility and under the lights in front of their fans and friends. For example, we’ve had a few events here in the last few weeks where there’s a playoff game in the gym where our volleyball team is playing, and some kids are watching that game. When that game finishes, they’d go over to watch a playoff game out on the multi-purpose field for the field hockey team. I give a great deal of credit to students for being patient and flexible during this period of time. I think at some point we won’t really remember some of the pain points because we’ll have a new stadium, amphitheater, lacrosse wall and basketball court.”
This year there’s a big emphasis on student attendance. Why is this important for a school and are there upcoming new policies regarding student attendance? Do you think the policies have been effective compared to previous years?
“Student attendance in the whole country and probably the whole globe coming out of the pandemic is the biggest concern for educators. What we uncovered last year was that students’ class attendance, or what we call period attendance, was not great. We’re just looking to have students come to school every day, come prepared, do their hard work. We miss them when they’re not here. It’s hard to get them caught back up when they’ve missed time. Also, we’ve not had a real good practice of communicating really accurate attendance to families, so parents weren’t totally aware of their child’s attendance in our school in the years past, and we’re already doing a better job of letting parents know about that, and we have more tools that we’re going to unveil over the course of the year.”
What do you think students and teachers should be most excited about going into the rest of the school year?
“I’d hate to be the guy who’s only ever talking about the athletic complex, but it’s been such a heavy lift and a lot has happened so quickly. Every few weeks we’re unveiling and opening a new piece of it, so that’s something I’m excited about; I think it’s the intersection of having this nice facility that we’re reopening, but also that we’re establishing some new traditions and things that never existed.”
“We’re going to have an event to honor Mr. [Dick] Walsh (the former athletic director the old field was named after) as we’re reopening one of these fields.”
“For the seniors, when they were freshmen I was starting that year, so I feel a real excitement about seeing this senior class graduate. I feel like we went through a lot together and to see them graduate on our new field is going to be fun for everybody.”
What will you be doing over Thanksgiving and what are you thankful for this year?
“My family and I are going to New Hampshire to see other family. We are really into food and my wife is a wonderful cook, so I really look forward to that, and I’m thankful that people around me are happy and healthy.”
Is there anything else that you would like to add?
“It’s been a successful year. I think the senior leadership has been very strong. It has set a nice tone for the rest of our students, and one of the themes I’ve talked to senior leaders about is to use this year as an opportunity to establish a few new traditions that may be made to last forever and ever.”
