Dr. Larry Weiss was a central part of all the school’s sesquicentennial celebrations, including the allschool photo on the steps of Borough Hall (with PAT co-president Eisa Ulen Richardson), Commencement for the Class of 2018 (with graduate Isabel Ullman), and many more.
As one of their first projects, Committee members brainstormed and agreed on a community-related word or phrase, along with a quotation, to be printed on every month of the school’s printed academic calendar. The chosen words are peaceful, reflective, embracing, open, integrity, diverse, nurturing, intentional, truth, loving kindness, and joy. In combination with the quotations and outstanding artwork of students, these words bring the calendar to life and will provide all of us with inspiration, encouragement, and expectation as we navigate the new school year together. The vision and practice of BFS, particularly as they are informed by Quakerism, were frequent and important subjects of reference during last year’s very successful Sesquicentennial celebrations. Over the past 150 years, what has it meant for BFS to be a Quaker school? Beyond the SPICES acronym (Simplicity, Peace, Integrity, Compassion, Equality, Stewardship), our learning community renewed a focus on the ways in which Quaker vision and practice inform what we are and will become as well as what we have been.
ongoing commitment to Quaker education remains as important today as it has ever been over the past 150 years. We, as members of the wider Brooklyn Friends learning community, all share the centrally important work of preparing our students for lifelong learning, knowing and speaking truth, and acting conscientiously to make a positive and meaningful difference in the world. I will always be most deeply grateful for the opportunity to work with and serve the students, faculty, staff, and parents of Brooklyn Friends. My 46-year career in secondary and undergraduate teaching and administration began at BFS in 1973, and 32 of those years will have involved work in Quaker schools and colleges by the time I retire in 2019. With your support, I look forward to the spirit of renewed commitment to the values and practices of the Religious Society of Friends in 2018-2019 and beyond. In friendship,
I firmly believe that the quest for truth, honesty, understanding, compassion, active and meaningful service to our wider community, inclusion, equity, friendship, justice, beauty, and joy that animates our
Summerl 2018 BROOKLYN FRIENDS SCHOOL JOURNAL 3