November 2019 Issue

Page 1

CHRONICLE the harvard westlake

Studio City • Volume 29 • Issue 3 • Nov. 13, 2019 • hwchronicle.com

BACK TO BACK TO BACK By Lucas 12, Lee the By Casey The field hockey team finished Kundefeated im for a third consecutive and season

and won its third consecutive

LLos indsay Angeles Field Hockey Association (LAFHA) Championship. The team has W u Demo-

not lost or tied a game since the 2016 season I n and has won four consecutive rleague e -championships as well. s p oThis n s e year, the senior captains contosisted aof midfielder Rachel Brown ’20, Photography cmidfielder o m - cand r a tChronicle ic pEditor l a i n tAstor Wu ’20 and forward Sam f Yeh i l e’20, d who led the team to the title. by “The an captains did all the small adetails n o n - to make sure everything was yrunning m o u s smoothly and worked to keep P a r t yand motivated all wthe h iteam s - focused tleblow• Continued on D2 er Aug. PRINTED WITH PERMISSION OF ASTOR WU

Slattery appointed Head of Upper School beginning 2020 By Luke Schneider Following a months-long, nationwide search, Upper School Deans Department Head Beth Slattery will assume the position of Head of Upper School, effective July 1, 2020. Laura Ross, who currently serves in the position, will become Associate Head of the school simultaneously. Because the school conducted such a comprehensive process, Commons said that

promoting internally seems illogical but was the best decision due to Slattery’s qualifications. “It wasn’t a choice of convenience,” Commons said. “It was a choice of conviction.” The school’s search committee found Slattery’s expertise particularly notable, President Rick Commons said. “At each stage in the process, [Slattery] stood apart for her deep understanding of student experience, broad background in secondary and

higher education and abiding commitment to the mission of Harvard-Westlake and the people in our community,” Commons said. During the application process, Slattery’s interview helped set her apart from a highly-qualified applicant pool. “She left the office, and we all looked at each other in the search committee and said, ‘Wow, she just gave the best interview we could have imagined,’” Commons said.

BRUSH FIRE: The Getty Fire blazes behind Brentwood homes, forcing widespread evacuations in the middle of the night.

— Rick Commons President

white’s

“Every question we asked her, she didn’t just give the answer that was at the back of her head because she works at Harvard-Westlake; she gave an answer that made us believe that she could make this school stronger and better and more unified.” During her 13 years at the school, Slattery has demon-

strated the ability to communicate effectively with students and parents, Commons said. “She knows how to relate to students,” Commons said. “She knows what is on the minds of sophomores, juniors and seniors graders because she spends all day meeting with [them]. She also knows

was safe to open at 5 a.m. the morning of the fires, Commons said. “The Getty Fire never threatened the property of either campus,” Commons said. “But then we [took into consideration] the community and who was evacuated and how difficult it might be for people to get to school because of the road closures or because of the evacuation.” The administration is considering options to address the increased frequency of fires, including incorporating “fire days” in the new late-start block schedule to be implemented next school year, Ross said. After monitoring the air quality and the fire’s impact on the community, the school

decided to open the following day, while recognizing that students would have difficulty attending school and completing their work. “I think it varies department by department, teacher by teacher and class by class, but in general, teachers were asked to be flexible and understanding, knowing that some students were evacuated and that they did not have access to their computers or their beds to get a good night’s sleep,” Commons said. “So I think if this were to be something that we encountered more regularly, then we would have to come up with policies, but at this point, I think it is just practices that involve understanding, kindness and an ability to be [as] flexible as possible.”

• Continued on A7

Getty Fire prompts community evacuations, campus closures

By Casey Kim

JULIAN ANDREONE/CHRONICLE

[Because Slattery worked at Harvard-Westlake], every question we asked her, she gave us an answer that made us believe that she could make this school stronger and better.”

Both the middle and upper school campuses canceled classes and all school activities Oct. 28 due to the Getty Fire, which threatened homes in Bel Air, Westwood and Brentwood, according to KTLA. Members of the school community received the closure announcement via the school’s emergency notification system. The school’s Crisis Response team, which includes President Rick Commons, Head of Middle School Jon Wimbish, Head of Upper School Laura Ross, Head of Athletics Terry Barnum, Community Health Officer Milo Sini and other faculty leaders, discussed whether school


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