Silhouette Spring 2020

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ilhouette S

COLUMBUS SCHOOL FOR GIRLS

VOL. 59

W e l c o m e To C S G ! A Note From Dr. Graham Cameron Tiefenthaler, XII

CSG’s Upper School is happy to have Dr. Kellen Graham to fill our Upper School Director position starting July 1, 2020. Dr. Graham attended Lafayette College where he majored in English before furthering his study with a PhD from Temple University. He taught at Temple for over a decade before transitioning to his position in upper schools. He taught English literature at the Haverford School in Pennsylvania and then took a position at the Cannon School in Concord, North Carolina. He has led them as the Academic Dean of the Upper School for the past few years. We are so excited to welcome him into our community and are ready to share our traditions, love of learning, and enthusiasm with him! "Dear CSG Upper School, My wife Virginia and I can’t wait to join the CSG family! We are called to the school’s mission,

Dr. Graham will serve as CSG's US Division Director beginning in the fall. Photo Courtesy of Ben Simon.

its commitment to student-teacher relationships, its vibrant learning community, and, above all, its remarkable girls and young women. The collective energy, kindness, and dedication of everyone at CSG inspired us during our campus visits and made us feel at home. All of you, especially seniors, are in my thoughts during this unprecedented time. I’m amazed by your courage and resilience. I am also grateful to our innovative, hard-working teachers, who have not skipped a beat in moving us to virtual teaching and learning. When we return to campus, I believe we will come back stronger than ever. Getting to know you and building relationships is my top priority. Please stay tuned in the coming weeks for details about how we can connect this summer. In the meantime, please know how grateful I am to serve as your next Upper School Division Director. I’m so proud to be a Unicorn! Go Unies!"--Dr. Graham

Senior Day: Behind the Scenes

Ahlam Jallaq, XII

As we near the end of the school year, Senior Day is fresh in our minds. From the secrecy of the theme to the excitement of being able to wear free clothes and eat sweets during the day, Senior Day sets the tone for Spring Break and the final months of the school year. To learn more about planning Senior Day, I spoke with this year’s planning head, Greta Schoettmer, XII. Greta said that the most enjoyable part about being Senior Day head is “seeing all of the awesome ideas that the senior class has come up with.” She goes on to say, “I just get to organize who does what and then watch all the amazing ideas come together and see my class start to make Senior Day actually happen.” As a senior, I agree that Senior Day has been a way for the seniors to bond as a class and to each contribute in a small way to put something together that will be fun for the whole school.

The first step to planning Senior Day is deciding on a theme. Collectively, we chose for our theme to be Monsters Inc. Greta says, “I think that there was some disappointment from a couple seniors here and there because the theme we ended up choosing wasn’t their first choice, but the one we went with had over twice as many votes as the next most popular idea.” Although there was a little initial disagreement, Greta did such a great job delegating and planning that we all enjoyed the process! Additionally, Greta continued to say that

“making compromises is the best way to [resolve disagreement], but there [weren’t] many situations we had to resolve anyways, which I’m super thankful for.” Senior Day is always a fun and exciting time of year. However, this year’s Senior Day held special meaning to the Class of 2020 as it was our last time being together as a grade and our last time being together as a school. We worked to start Spring Break as well as distance learning off on a note of positivity as well as fun!

Class of 2020 on Senior Day. Photo Courtesy of Dr. Profe Miller

ISSUE 4

Spring 2020

Distance Learning: Pros and Cons Ruthie saar, x

COVID-19 is preventing us from seeing our friends, families, and doing our normal every-day activities. One of the precautions we are making here at CSG is online schooling to protect everyone in our community. But what is it really like to be distance learning, for both the students and faculty? What are the pros and cons of this new format, and is it preferred over our traditional ways? For CC McLarty, IX, being home all the time and managing her own schedule is a big adjustment. She likes waking up whenever her heart desires and doing her work at her own pace. But she recognizes that there are some difficulties: “It’s harder to get in contact with teachers because normally, I could just go and see them. Now I have to email or ask on a group Zoom.” She admits this can be intimidating. She also feels that online school is hard socially because she can’t see peers that aren’t in her classes. However, she thinks it has been a good experience so far and finds that she has a lot of free time to spend. She prefers “normal” school to online school any day because “being without [her] friends is the worst.” Ms. Miranda appreciates that “we’re staying safe and doing our part to flatten the curve of COVID-19 cases.” She says, “We’re all still learning something, even if it’s just how to use Loom and Zoom.” She enjoys being with her two dogs and showering them with hugs. While she thinks our safety is key, she can’t help “feeling as though [she’s] in a constant state of panic.” She also finds it harder to develop lessons for online school: “It takes me 2-4 times as long to prep for a class. I know what I want to do, but trying to be clear, concise, and meaningful with the work I’m giving my students takes a lot of time.” Although she has had to modify her classes, she thinks some of the elements of online school will stick. She explains, “I’m getting the hang of Google Forms [...] and I’m liking the ‘comment bank’ on Google Classroom.” While it has been a big change, she believes that normal school will always beat online school, especially since there aren’t any CSG lunches at home.

Mara Sims, XI, enjoys not having to get dressed every day and sleeping in, yet she admits she feels overwhelmed: “Keeping a regular school schedule is hard because there are some assignments for ACE classes due on BDF days [and vice versa], as well as more work for some classes than usual.” Additionally, she yearns for the parts of school that we took for granted. “I also miss things like sitting in the Unicorn theater for announcements and cramming into classrooms for class meetings. We can’t do any of these things online.” As a junior, she won’t be able to partake in certain customs, like launching rockets in physics class or filling in the seniors’ seats in the theater. It makes her sad that Student Council elections weren’t run like in the past. She pointed out, “A bunch of the little traditions that signal the end of our school year and the beginning of our time as the school's new leaders will either have to be moved online or eliminated altogether.” Many others may feel this same disappointment, but at least we are ensuring our safety in quarantine. Mr. Hartshorne agrees that in-person school is preferred. To him, nothing can beat being physically in classrooms and meeting with students, as he says that “having class over the computer simply seems colder and less personal.” He explains how forming bonds with faculty and students over a screen is much harder than it is in person. Furthermore, teaching science is not an easy task, especially online. Mr. Hartshorne described, “I’ve also needed to go into the lab to record lab experiments in order to have the students get as close to a lab experience as possible.” Without hesitation, he revealed that recording and editing videos can be a burden, and giving out tests is challenging. Needless to say, many of us would much rather return to normal school than stick with online school. Despite the unexpected finish to the school year, we can take this period to spend precious time with our families, sleep in, and become experts in online platforms we didn’t know existed! When we return to school, the appreciation and gratitude for our regular lives will be more prevalent than ever.


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