@FCDS Newsletter - Spring 2022

SPRING 2022

@ FCDS UPDATES FROM FORSYTH COUNTRY DAY

A Note From Gardner

In this Issue:

HEAD OF SCHOOL Dear Furies,

Happy spring! What a great year 2022 has been thus far! You’ll notice in these pages that we’re back to business (mostly) as usual at FCDS. We’re keeping our fingers (and toes) crossed that the pandemic is in our collective rear view mirror. I have loved seeing everyone’s faces again!

Remembering Roger Alum Jeopardy!

Championship Serving Our Community

FCDS has been a home and served as a launching pad for some truly wonderful people. One of those people is the late Roger Fowler ’90, who left a legacy of love, friendship, and whole-hearted involvement at FCDS—so much so that his classmates are working to name the Activity Field in his memory. Read more about Roger and his legacy in Remembering Roger .

Next, you’ll meet another notable alum, Skip Long ’97, who recently was a three-day Jeopardy! champion. He’s a great guy with an incredible mind and a great story to tell! Read it in FCDS Alum’s Championship Jeopardy! Streak is Just His Latest Adventure .

Finally, our students are back in service! With Covid-19 restrictions lifted, we enjoyed two great Days of Service—one for Middle School and one for Upper School. Check out the pictures of Furies giving back.

Happy reading!

Take care and be well,

Gardner Barrier ’97

Remembering Roger Recently, a group of FCDS alumni came to the school with an idea: to name the Activity Field in honor of Roger Fowler ’90. We sat down with FCDS fourth grade teacher Kim, Roger’s wife and a 1992 alumna, to discuss her husband, his legacy, and their life at and around FCDS. Roger and Kim met when he was a junior and she was a freshman. “We were doing a play called Feiffer’s People,” Kim said. “It was a great little musical. It was sketches and monologues and playlets. Roger played the guitar and I danced.” The two started talking and became good friends, but didn’t date. “My parents wouldn’t let me have car dates,” Kim recalled.

During Roger’s time at FCDS, he took advantage of everything the school had to offer. He loved soccer, ran track with beloved coach and teacher Doug Pierce, and could be found picking up trash on the sidelines when he was a senior captain. “He did everything,” Kim said.

“He would try anything once. He was in a band, really into music, in all of the plays. Roger had friends from all areas—sports, arts, and academics. He was everybody’s brother and good friend.”

When Roger graduated from FCDS, he went to Emory University, where he ran track all four years. Kim and Roger eventually started dating and were on again, off again, but always connected. They stayed good friends, seeing each other on Roger’s breaks from Emory during Kim’s senior year. They were apart when it came time for Kim to choose a college. “I almost didn’t go to Emory because Roger was there, but my dad told me never to make decisions based on a boy,” she said. Kim joined Roger at Emory, where she played volleyball. By the end of her freshman year, there was no “off again”, and by her junior year, they got engaged. “I graduated from Emory in May and we got married in June,” she said. While Kim completed her degree at Emory, Roger started working as an assistant at the Paideia School in Atlanta where he fell in love with teaching.

After a hiking honeymoon in Greece, Kim and Roger settled in Atlanta where they both taught and coached at Paideia. Roger got his master’s degree while working at Paideia and eventually led a combined K/1 class. “Then Ella was born,” Kim said. “We never thought we would move back to Lewisville, but by her first birthday, we were back in North Carolina to be close to our families.” Roger worked in construction and property management with his father. “He was really excited to work for his dad,” Kim recalled. “Then came Grace, and then came Owen, and he had the itch to go back to teaching.”

Ella and Grace were at FCDS and Kim was home with Owen when Roger began teaching again at Forest Park elementary, where he filled in for a teacher who had left mid-year. “He got to teach a couple of months at that school,” Kim said.

In the summer of 2009, Roger was diagnosed with cancer. He worked with his father as he was able during surgeries and treatments. Kim and Roger were even making a plan to homeschool the children in order to travel together, so they had not reenrolled at FCDS for the coming year. “The people at Forsyth made it possible for us to reenroll the kids and Owen came in the 2-year-old class,” Kim said. “It was amazing because I was able to go with Roger to all of his appointments and treatments. I wouldn’t have had that experience if it wasn’t for Forsyth and the support of our family.

FCDS was a true family experience.”

Roger passed away in 2011, but he continues to live large in the memories of his family, friends, and the school community. When Kim heard that Roger’s classmates wanted to name the Activity Field for him, she was touched. “Margaret Pike and Susan Moody gathered fellow members of the Class of 1990,” Kim said. “It was so special that [Margaret] and his other classmates wanted to honor Roger.”

Roger continues to live large in the memories of his family, friends, and the school community. ... "[The Activity Field] is a perfect space for families to connect, which was really important to Roger."

She loves that they chose the Activity Field. “I love it for its location. Roger was in that auditorium, out there playing soccer, and running around the track…I love what it’s become,” Kim said. “It’s such a nice big space with kids running around at the family functions. The All-School Tailgate and Music on the Lawn are some of the best family events at the school.

It’s a perfect space for families to connect, which was really important to Roger.”

Ella, Grace, and Owen all approve as well. “They are so happy,” Kim said. “I had to talk to them first to make sure they were comfortable. The grief hits us, but they are thrilled and honored,” she said. “Owen said he thinks it’s awesome that he’s going to walk out to the soccer field and see [his] dad’s name.”

If you would like to learn more about the Fowler Activity Field, please visit https://bit.ly/FowlerField.

Grace ’20, Kim ’92, Ella ’18, and Owen ’24

FCDS Alum’s Championship Jeopardy! Streak is Just His Latest Adventure Question: This ’97 FCDS alum recently won three days in a row on Jeopardy! and went viral on Twitter by describing himself as a stay-at-home uncle. Answer (in the form of a question, of course): Who is Skip Long?

After his stint on the game show aired, Skip visited FCDS to talk to Middle and Upper School students about his life and experiences on the show, also taking time to meet with former classmates and appear on senior James Snyder’s For What’s Ahead podcast.

But who is Skip Long? His curriculum vitae reads like a formula for wellroundedness. After graduating FCDS in 1997, he earned his bachelor’s degree in English from Clemson, then attended Naropa University in Colorado. There, he studied actor-created physical theater. “It enabled me to do the thing I was interested in doing,” he said. “I’m very interested in live theater as a transformative experience.”

Skip Long continued In addition to acting in Winston-Salem and Chicago, Skip has been a cellar master and assistant winemaker, a sommelier, and a family entertainment complex manager. A certified EMT, he is currently working on his nursing degree. And of course, no description of Skip would be complete without mentioning his stay-at-home uncle gig.

When the pandemic hit in early 2020 and schools went virtual, his sister, a veterinarian, needed full-time care for her daughter Alison. Skip quit his job and stepped in to take care of his niece and guide her through the online school experience. “I was there to create space for my niece to grow,” he said. “You have to be consistent. Your presence is more important than the fun uncle stuff. The consistency and the patience I had to learn.”

“I love how he completely embodies our core value of curiosity. Everything he’s done in his life, it’s because he authentically followed his curiosity.”

- Head of School Gardner Barrier Skip’s head wasn’t turned by his brush with fame. “It’s glory for a half second. It’s ethereal,” he said. “You’re the main character but it’s time limited. Very fast, and then it’s over. You have to be in a positive place where you’re comfortable with yourself when the focus goes out.”

Skip had auditioned for Jeopardy! in 2020 and took a follow-up test and Zoom interview in the summer of 2021. In October 2021 he got the call to go to Los Angeles for a November 30 taping. To prepare (something he’d already started), he intensified his study with Sporcle playlists, the New York Times crossword puzzle, and 45 minutes of Pilates every day. “It does take time,” he said.

“Your brain absorbs information much better if you can develop a relationship with it. It’s not just learning lines of facts.”

Five days before taping, he stopped “cramming things into [his] brain” and went off all screens. When he got to L.A., taping began the next day. Skip arrived at the studio early in the morning with five costume changes—one for every episode that would tape that day. At the studio, he waited with 60 people he didn’t know on the set of Wheel of Fortune. “The first episode started taping at 10 a.m.,” he said. “I didn’t want to be called first, so of course I was called first.”

The first game went by in the blur. “It happens so fast.

You play, you change clothes, get hair and make-up, then go into the second game. The process itself is a whirl.”

Although Skip appeared on four episodes of Jeopardy!, the experience itself was very brief. “It was lived in a matter of hours,” he said.

After the first game, he wasn’t worried. His main goal had been to come in at least second on the first game to break even on his trip. After he won, the rest was just icing on the cake. His strategy? Go for it! “Being bold on Jeopardy! is strategically in your favor. It’s performance under pressure,” he said. “Once I won the first game, it didn’t matter to me. One tiny thing can make it go wrong. It’s in your favor to be bold.”

Gardner ’97, Skip ’97, and John Danforth The FCDS Experience Skip came to FCDS in 1994 and graduated in 1997. He played baseball with Coach Tim Shoaf earning All-State honors his senior year, did theater with director Peter Funk, and was in the service club led by John Danforth, who decided that Skip would also emcee all-school talent shows. “They were all school, so I had to be appropriate,” Skip told James Snyder in For What’s Ahead. “You had to use the right amount of sarcasm for Upper School but be supportive for the little kids.”

“He’s a cool cat,” said John. “He always was.”

Friend, fellow baseball player, and Head of School Gardner Barrier enjoyed catching up. “Skip has always been interesting and kind,” Gardner said. “I love how he completely embodies our core value of curiosity.

Everything he’s done in his life, it’s because he authentically followed his curiosity.”

Fun fact: Skip may be the only boy to ever get a technical foul during a girls’ JV basketball game. How? He showed his support by banging two garbage cans lids together during the game.

Serving Our Community Winston-Salem Rescue Mission

A Bed and A Book

Family Services

H.O.P.E.

Second Harvest Food Bank

In February, all Middle and Upper School students participated in our annual Days of Service. We partnered with eight local organizations to volunteer our time, energy, and skills. Students gained more understanding and compassion by supporting the needs of our local community. They were special days for learning and community building!

Sixth Grade Reading Buddies

Empty Bowls

Humane Society

5501 Shallowford Road Lewisville, NC 27023

www.fcds.org

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