Spirit Magazine - Summer 2010 'The Legacy of Alan Brown'

Inside this Issue History of Southridge

Early Years

Alan’s Influence Memorial Evening Making a Difference Alan’s Legacy: Contribution Alan’s Legacy: Our Community

Summer 10 / Issue 24

Pgs 2-3 Pgs 4-5 Pg 6 Pgs 7-10 Pg 11 Pgs 12-13 Pgs 14-16

| A SOUTHRIDGE SCHOOL COMMUNITY MAGAZINE

The Legacy of Alan Brown This edition of the Spirit connects the past with the present. It explores the legacy of Alan Brown and shines a light on those elements of his influence that are still with Southridge today. The articles in this edition encourage us to think about how the Southridge of today is a direct reflection of those elements of education that Alan Brown held dear and fundamental to the essence of a great school. Southridge was as much a dream for Mr. Brown as it was for our founding parents, and the emotion, time and energy that he committed to Southridge in the early years, our foundational years, were instrumental in shaping the culture of Southridge that we share today.

Mr. Brown was the father of Southridge, and he genuinely felt it was a privilege for him to “create a school out of nothing but ten acres of farmland.” So many special qualities of our school sprang

from Mr. Brown’s deep insight, his sharp intelligence, his substantial experience and his genuine affection for his students and his school. He believed in youth, embraced their idealism and willingness to be guided by values, and he influenced our culture to such a degree that the spirit of who we are today can be easily traced to what Mr. Brown believed were the critical ingredients of a well-rounded and balanced education. Above all, he helped to define the vision of Southridge and expressed our motto, Let Every Spirit Soar, as empowering students to take hold of their own lives, while making sure that those around them were not constrained because of the unkindness of others.

I hope you will see how Mr. Brown was a true steward of Southridge. I have often expressed to our students and our faculty and staff that a noble goal for all of us would be to leave Southridge a better place for having been here; and that the next generation of students and families who attend our school would benefit from our contributions. Mr. Brown embodied stewardship and remains an excellent example of what it means to leave something positive behind. Even though not everyone involved with the Southridge community of today knew Mr. Brown personally, we have all felt the benefits of his contributions in one way or another and for that we are thankful and appreciative. As a matter of fact, our guiding principles are very much the manifestation of Mr. Brown’s dream. Thank you, Alan.

As you read the pages that follow,

A light hearted place of serious purpose.

- Drew Stephens

History of Southridge

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In 1993 a small group of parents, searching for an alternative to the Surrey public school system, began investigating the possibility of starting their own school and held a well attended open meeting where Alan Brown, retired headmaster of St. George’s School, spoke about the philosophy of independent schools. Hearing Alan describe his vision for the school that might be developed in South Surrey and how he hoped to develop the character of children at the same time as pursuing academic excellence was very motivating and inspiring so the parents began to organize and after several meetings they invited Alan to view a possible school site; excited by the property and the prospect of becoming founding headmaster he accepted the challenge.

“Alan had that one bit of unfinished business for himself: to be the headmaster of a co-educational school. For that reason I knew he had the passion and the commitment to follow this right through until the school was finally open,” said Jeff Hector, founding parent and Board Chair. “There had been a few open houses where maybe 60 or 70 people would show up to hear about independent education.

Then Alan called on a favour from

his friend, Rafe Mair, and spoke on his radio show about independent education, inviting listeners to come to the public meeting and hear about the opening of this new school.

Luckily we were in a room where we could keep opening doors to expand the space and we just kept opening the doors and opening the doors until we had around 400 people who had come to hear Alan Brown talk about his vision for the school. It was at that time that I thought: Okay, this is really going to happen.”

“Alan’s leadership in the development of Southridge was paramount to the process. We needed credibility; we had people spending a lot of money on a hope and a promise so there had to be someone who truly inspired belief. Without him I don’t know that the school would ever have got off the ground the way it did,” said James Porpaczy, staff member.

When a suitable property was finally found, Alan and the parents worked diligently to obtain rezoning, in spite of mounting opposition and weekly newspaper reports highlighting issues such as water, land usage, and sewage treatment. It took

ten hours over two nights for the presentations to council and many stringent conditions were imposed on the application, such as the construction of a sewage holding tank capable of withstanding a severe earthquake. Alan often joked that if there ever were an earthquake, the first place he would run to would be the holding tank.

On June 26, 1995, with council chambers overflowing, the rezoning proposal passed by a 5-4 vote at the fourth reading. There were now 72 days to get the school ready before the first day of classes.

“I’m going to realise a lifelong dream,” Alan said, “I’ve spent twenty five years and I have never yet been allowed to teach a girl and it’s now going to happen.”

History of Southridge ic point of view. He was interviewing students, he was testing the students, he was getting applications filled out and having references checked. He was doing all the things that would normally be done by an admissions officer – he was actually doing all of the things that would be done by all of the officers in a school, because he was the school. But Alan was happy doing it all. He was prepared to do whatever it took, and that’s the best phrase I can use in describing Alan’s attitude: he would do whatever it took, and he made me want to be a part of it.

– David Alderdice Alan was a remarkably hard-working man; he had a lot of energy and he had a lot of motivation and he was able to continually, day after day, week after week, month after month and year after year maintain that high level of energy. He saw the motivation of some of the people that were involved from the parent side and the Board side and so I think he recognized that it was a real opportunity to do something that was very much a dream of his.

In order to find meeting times that would suit the Board members, many of whom were working in downtown Vancouver, we held meetings at 7 o’clock in the morning, which Alan was perfectly fine with; he was happy to come from Vancouver and be in White Rock for those 7 a.m. meetings. He was constantly doing things that were substantially unrelated to being the headmaster of a school, but they were things that needed to be done, and if Alan didn’t do them, no one was going to do them.

While I was working on the property and the business and finance end of things, spending my entire days and many of my evenings on the telephone, talking to people and going to meetings, trying to find a piece of property and then working feverishly on the potential rezoning of this site, which turned into a huge challenge for us, Alan was very busy in my basement working on getting the school started from an academ-

It was my privilege to assume the role of founding headmaster of Southridge.

I had been the headmaster for nearly two decades of a much larger school in Vancouver, but had moved on to other career pursuits and only with considerable reluctance took on the formidable task of helping to create a school out of nothing but ten acres of farmland.

I’m really glad in retrospect that I was given this opportunity and was sensible enough, or mad enough, to seize it.

– Alan Brown

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Early Years “At this school there are no losers, there are no geeks and there are no nerds; everybody is weird. Everybody needs room to grow and room to fly.” So said Alan Brown, at the first Southridge assembly, held in September 1994, at the temporary premises in Seaview Pentecostal Assembly, setting out the high standards that Southridge still upholds today.

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“Nobody has ever said to me, “Mr. Brown, I am leaving your school because I am insufficiently challenged,” and I am not about to start now,” Alan explained about the school, “So what I say to you is we will give you challenge and we will give you support but we want a number of things from you.

Nobody gets to come to this school unless they say they want to come, unless they say they are prepared for hard work and a good deal of homework, and unless they say they will be supportive, active and energetic.”

On October 5th, 1995, after four weeks in the temporary premises, the whole of the school was dismantled and packed into two moving trucks while Alan Brown, along with 186 students, twelve faculty and many parents set out on the Great Trek to the new school, the modular building which had been erected, in a mere three months, on the spot that is now the Junior school parking lot.

Alan understood the significance of history and traditions and loved to make an event out of what might otherwise seem ordinary. Upon arrival, as the walkers were greeted by hot chocolate supplied by parent volunteers, Alan stood all of the Kindergarten students on a table and told them how proud he was of them for making the long journey on such short legs.

Alan is the only person I know who made chess cool; it was cool to be in the chess club. – James Porpaczy In the first year Grade 9 was the oldest class, with only fourteen students, because it was difficult to recruit students in the higher grades, but Alan promised those fourteen students a permanent new senior school building from which to graduate. It meant that money would have to be raised in order to construct the building; a daunting thought when there were not enough students and families to make it viable, and so the Capital Campaign was born. As the money was raised and construction began, Alan made life tolerable and comfortable for students in a crowded, modular building while focusing on the older students, constantly reassuring them there would be a new school from which they would graduate and ensuring that there would be course options as they entered Grades 11 and 12, even though that meant small, uneconomic classes. At the Senior school grand opening in 1998 all fourteen of the Grade 12 students cut the official ribbon, signifying the culmination of a promise and a dream.

The Junior students remained in the modular building for a few more years until September 2000 when the Junior school moved into their new building and in 2009 the Senior school expansion building opened, providing additional classroom and administrative space.

Early Years

“Hardworking business people and others, who have a vision for their children, and are willing to make sacrifices for their children, built this school. But why did we do this? Why did the parents do all this? Why did I do it? I’ll tell you why I did it: because I think running a school is more fun than going to the zoo.” So said Alan Brown at an early assembly, eliciting laughs from the students who respected him because he was always honest and open and he would not hide his true feelings about their actions or about their potential. He learned the names of each and every student, taking the time to get to know them as a person, and more importantly, the person he thought they could become. He had a genuine concern for students, not just for them to be accepted into the best schools or to get the top marks; he wanted to bring out the best character in each of the students. He never walked past a single student without acknowledging them, expecting the same in return, a human connection that is often lacking in the busy world we live in today and this approach has been continued by others, including Marc Ayotte, who learned this from his mentor Roger Wright at Colling-

wood, who in turn learned it from Alan Brown.

The motto of our school, Let Every Spirit Soar, means that every one of our students is empowered to take hold of their own lives, and at the same time to make sure that those around them are not constrained because of the unkindness of others.

– Alan Brown The vision of the school is an educational institution with a strong value system collecting together in one place a motivated staff eager to teach, and motivated students eager to learn.

All accept a responsibility for both self and community development; self-discipline is the key to Southridge student life. All substances of abuse, particularly tobacco, are rejected by our students on the basis of personal commitment. Above all, perhaps, we honour forthrightness, courage and truth.

Those who are cynical about young people have failed to observe that youth, including today’s youth, are idealistic at heart and very willing, if correctly approached, to cherish ancient values.

If not as thoroughly as their elders may wish, at least as well as those elders themselves did in their own youth!

Possibly the most significant challenge young people face today lies in the importance of ingenuity, resourcefulness, courage, willingness to fail, adaptability, risk assessment, and above all, energy. The demands of the marketplace may not require brashness, but they do insist upon self-assertion. There are new imperatives: take the initiative. Move forward. Find a passion and follow it.

All these qualities, we now see, must achieve a new parity of esteem with the older virtues. Taken together and mixed with a fixed moral rudder and new technological aptitudes, they will form a personal platform upon which our students may stand firm in the new age.

– Alan Brown, Southridge Spirit issue #1, winter 1997 Alan embraced technology, but even he might not have predicted the pace with which technology has changed education. Laptops for all students from Grade 5, SMARTBoards in classrooms and countless tools for enhancing learning have kept Southridge students and faculty motivated.

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Alan’s Influence

6 Alan believed unfailingly in young people and their ability to create a better world.

From the outset we asked certain commitment from out students; that they would treat each other well, that they wouldn’t smoke, right through to graduation and that they would tell the truth, no matter what. For our part, if they tell the truth, ‘if they die for it’, we find a way to ensure they don’t die for it.

While no commitments are kept by all students all the time and lapses certainly do occur, the results have been remarkable. This is, in effect a truth telling school, non-smoking (or so we are assured), whose students to a substantial if imperfect degree give each other room to grow intellectually, spiritually and psychologically.

– Alan Brown You could hear a pin drop when Alan was speaking to the students in the first assemblies. He had a passion for teaching and a way of inspiring great things in his students and teachers. Today, I take my students out for walks around our amazing new campus and tell them a little bit about what the school was like when it first started. They like the stories about the mounds of mud that

prevailed while the permanent building was going up and the cows and horses that grazed in the nearby fields. I show them the stone in front of the Senior school that is dedicated to Mr. Brown; I tell them that he was the one who first spoke about the 3 Ts: Truth, Tolerance and Tobacco and about his belief that a sense of trust is vital within a community and so that is why we have no locks on student lockers today. There are so many things we will remember about this great leader. He will be missed but remembered by many.

- Samara Ridley-Thomas Alan believed in character education before it was trendy. Telling the truth was very important; he held high expectations for behaviour and was very concerned about the emotional well being of each student and truly wanted every spirit to soar. His relationship to the students was the most important aspect of education and that is why he wanted to know each by name.

- Rowena Raber What I remember most is that he often said, “Always tell the truth, even if you die for it,” and this is something that I will never forget and has stuck with

me even fifteen years later. I remember in those early years how he would occasionally leave a $20 bill around the school and wait for it to be turned into the front office, and to my memory it was always returned. I remember feeling so proud of my school and my peers for creating and supporting such a truly special place to go to school.

- Emily MacDougall (04) Alan made us better – even when we were either too young or too (momentarily) stupid to admit to it, or moreover, wiling to accept it…. He taught us, all of us, to believe in our school – to believe in ourselves, regardless of the odds.

– tribute to Alan Brown by Alex Tsakumis, past pupil of St. George’s School, published in the 2010 edition of The Dragon

Memorial Evening

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Alan C.M. Brown

July 3rd, 1937 - December 23rd, 2009 On April 23, 2010, the Southridge community invited friends, colleagues and past pupils of Alan Brown along with Alan’s family to join with them to celebrate the memory of a truly great leader. The speakers shared memories of Alan and spoke of how he influenced their lives while those who had never met Alan were left in awe of this remarkable man.

Memorial Evening I remember the very first informational meeting at Ocean Park Community Hall and how Alan stayed to answer questions from interested parents. Someone jokingly said to Alan, “Is there any way we could perhaps talk you out of retirement and you could come on as our headmaster?” Alan’s face said it all. We now had the credibility to ensure our success. Until then it had been a case of if we build it, hopefully they will come. We now knew that they would, with Alan Brown at the helm.

My daughter, Lindsay, was a member of the first Grade 8 class. She is still amazed at how much she learned and still keeps with her today from her time with Alan Brown. She told me, “He was a students’ headmaster. He was there for the student and always in our corner; he motivated us and always had our back. He empowered us and instilled in us a sense of purpose and self worth.

His door was always open. He was a true visionary; even when we were in that basement of Seaview he kept our spirits up with what would be.”

- Kim Ketchum, founding parent and Board member

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We are in the business of behaviour modification.

The development of strength of character and integrity are the most important responsibilities we bear; all else is subordinate to it. Without integrity, nothing good can flow.

- Alan Brown in a St. George’s yearbook

Alan had no background in counselling; he had none of the tricks of that delicate craft, but Alan understood mentorship in the best way, as a kind of intuition, an implacable impulse, a bright thread running through the fabric of his nature and he got it just right. He listened, and offered honest feedback and even at times shared some of his own story, offering guidance to many youth.

- Ross Laird, St. George’s alumnus and current Southridge parent I go out into the world a better person for having been here. The school that Mr. Brown helped to create reaches far into the future and hundreds of students like myself will continue to learn in fun, innovative ways. They will become more globally aware and service minded; they will become leaders who change the world. I never had the opportunity to meet Mr. Brown but I will always be thankful to him for creating this place that has provided so much to so many.

- Rowan Laird, Southridge Grade 11 student

Memorial Evening Alexa Mordhorst, whose sister Emily was one of the Kindergarten students who made the Great Trek on her short legs, remembers Alan Brown from her own Kindergarten year.

Like Alan, she too has a dream. Alexa’s dream at the age of five, a dream that she still has today, is to become a plastic surgeon. Although no longer with us, Alan’s influence may help her in achieving this dream.

Alan was an intellectual by training but by necessity a visionary. He was the youngest headmaster of St. George’s at the age of 33, recruited into the job at a tough time: the late 60s and early 70s when students were rebellious and anti establishment and Alan was

credited with redirecting the school. The no locks on lockers was a vision of Alan’s because of an incident after a rash of locker break-ins one day in St. George’s. Rather like the pink t-shirt today that signifies a stand against bullying, the whole class took the locks off their lockers and soon the rest of the school followed suit and there were no more break-ins.

I am now teaching plastic surgery through the university and my resident, who I have been mentoring and had as a partner for two months, is Sally Hynes. We have had a wonderful time working together and recently, after volunteering to help Southridge with career counselling, Alexa Mordhorst joined Sally and me in the office to learn about plastic surgery. The connections run deep and when you think of

six degrees of separation I know Alan would be scribbling on a napkin trying to prove this mathematically.

When I moved back to BC with my young family we wanted to be a part of Southridge without even knowing it, just because of Alan. The vision that Alan brought here I immediately saw with my son. I came here for Alan and what he could do and what Alan’s legacy is now giving my kids.

- Rod French, St. George’s alumnus and current Southridge parent

My first impression of Alan Brown was of an intellectual and passionate visionary who very clearly held honesty, integrity and respect for fellow human beings in the highest regard.

But although these traits do very accurately describe Mr. Brown, it was not until he unexpectedly pulled out his crazy drag queen / hobo costume and sat in the dunk tank at the country fair or acted out his own rendition of Monty Python’s Dead Parrot sketch at our Christmas feast that I realised what Mr. Brown was all about and how lucky we all were to have him as our headmaster. What I valued most about Mr. Brown was these seemingly paradoxical characteristics: how he could be so light hearted, so fun loving, so approachable and yet still maintain such order and discipline in the school.

In the same way that Mr. Brown loved a challenging math problem or a clever riddle he appreciated the logistics of a well thought out prank. For example, one April Fools’ day when the boys in my class moved the classroom from our portable building and replicated the entire contents on the roof Mr. Brown told them that they had to run laps round the field – punishments were often related to exercise – but was heard commenting under his breath about how brilliantly they had pulled off that stunt.

He added levity to a lot of the rules yet you could negotiate with him; he always appreciated a good debate. He took the time to get to know students outside of the school, inviting the Grad class to his home on one occasion to watch the fireworks. When the original Southridge class of 99 embarked on the Great Trek with Mr. Brown as our leader we really did not have any idea of how great it was going to be.

Sally Hynes (Higgins ‘99), a member of the first graduating class. Sally gained both her undergraduate and medical degrees from Queen’s and is now completing a program in plastic surgery through UBC Faculty of Medicine, Division of Plastic Surgery.

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Memorial Evening Mr. Brown opened a door which led to a world of opportunities for me. There are a lot of things that Mr. Brown said to me while attending Southridge that have had a profound impact on my life.

The morals and principles which he so strongly believed in have been ingrained within me because he made me believe that I could be someone special and make a difference in this world. The most profound learning experiences from Southridge were not found in the classroom; they were found in the teachings of our role model, Mr. Brown himself. His vision created a school where students were not only pushed to excel academically but to develop a passion for lifelong learning. He created a place where we were encouraged to be unique and expand upon our strengths as individuals and also role model our behaviour for everyone within the community. We were taught to shape our relationships based on the values of truth, tolerance, respect and compassion.

After Southridge I went to McGill on academic and athletic scholarships and bursaries and pursued a degree in education then obtained a graduate diploma from SFU in education. Now I am a teacher in Surrey and many of my philosophies and beliefs are based upon the teachings of Mr. Brown. I try to be a positive role model for my students and encourage them to live for their passions while becoming lifelong learners. – Kristin Leuszler-Hazzard (00)

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The newly created Alan Brown Memorial Endowment Fund will provide financial aid to assist deserving girls who, without this support, would not otherwise be able to attend Southridge, beginning in the 2013-14 school year. The extent of the initial aid offered will be determined by the total dollars provided to the fund by June 30th, 2013. The pledges so far come primarily from current and past Board members who wish to honour Mr. Brown’s legacy and contributions to Southridge. As of May 31st, 2010 the total pledged is: $1,064,000

Making a Difference One of the lasting impressions for me of Mr. Brown was the fact that he shaped who I became as a person. I don’t know if I could say that I would have smoked a cigarette had I not been here, but I certainly know that having his guidance along with that of my parents, means I can say now that I have never smoked a cigarette in my life, and I don’t know if I could have said that, had it not been in part for Mr. Brown.

- David Dyck (01) In 1998 Brittany Compton, a Grade 9 student interviewed Alan Brown for Ridge Ramblings, the student newspaper, and wrote the following: “I am sure you all know about Mr. Brown’s annual, famous lecture on smoking: the one we all fell asleep in. He had been doing that lecture for 22 years in his assemblies and is dedicated to get it through our heads by graduation time. So, when we are older and not addicted to cigarettes, think of why you are not addicted and the answer is Mr. Brown.” Brittany, who graduated in 2001 and now works for Mars Canada in Toronto, was at a work session eight months ago where she was asked to describe someone who stands out as making an impact directly to her life, and her example was of Mr. Brown and the Southridge community.

The memory I cherish most about Alan is not for the fact that he hired me, but for the little riddle he created for my last name so that he and others would remember how to spell it correctly. When Alan introduced me to the students in my first assembly at Southridge, he told the staff and students that he needed to find a way to remember how to spell my last name and he came up with: Kings

Need Iron, Horses Need Iron, Ski. It was so simple and yet brilliant. The next day on the whiteboard in my classroom, some students had drawn a king on a horse with a person skiing next to him and from that day forward, most students and staff actually could remember how to spell my last name, which was a very rare occurrence in my life. So what Alan had done for me was more far reaching than I think he ever knew.

– James Knihniski Many people have made a difference in the lives of others and Southridge has been fortunate to have invited guest speakers who demonstrate this. In the last year Stephen Lewis spoke at the school’s 15th anniversary celebration, inspiring the attendees with his speech on the power of community. Greg Mortensen addressed a packed crowd in the Senior school gym and afterwards received a contribution to his Pennies for Peace project for building schools in Afghanistan and Pakistan from a group of Junior school students. Hannah Taylor, a Grade 8 student from Winnipeg, spoke to the school about how she began the Ladybug Foundation five years ago to support homeless people and a group of Junior school students, who have supported this charity for a number of years, sold wrist bands to raise awareness of homelessness.

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Alan’s Legacy: Contribution He made people want to make him proud. You wanted to make choices that would reflect well on you in his eyes. Somehow he found a way to get through to people that made them want to be better people.

– David Dyck (01)

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to join him in supporting this student for her Grade 10 - 12 years. In typical fashion, Alan would not ask for leadership without first demonstrating his own.

Alan included you in the process and he made you feel you could accomplish your goal, no matter how lofty. He persevered. If he knew that something was right and right for the school he was wiling to do whatever it took to get there, and that’s what a leader does.

Today Southridge offers a full tuition, five year, renewable bursary for a new student entering the school in Grade 8 while the Carol E. Levy Endowment will fund a full tuition, three-year renewable bursary for a new student entering the school in Grade 10.

– James Porpaczy

Letting every spirit soar does not mean everybody can do what they want. It means allowing everybody to be what they are, it means accepting everybody, but spirits can only soar if we do it together.

– Rowena Raber He always brought out the best in the kids. He didn’t believe in lowering standards and he talked to us about always raising the bar, and they would rise to it. And he was right, that’s exactly what happened, whether it was just in simple things like the amount of hard work they did, or homework.

– Jeff Hector Everyone had something to contribute and it didn’t matter what it was as long as you did contribute and you were following your passion. I think that is what he felt was more important.

– James Knihniski

Alan insisted upon Southridge including a bursary student from the time the doors were opened.

While the original bursary students were supported from operating funds it was his dream to have the school build endowment programs to support both bursaries and scholarships and he was always on the lookout for students who could enrich the school. In 1997 he was made aware of a female student athlete who wished to attend Southridge but whose family did not have the necessary financial means. Undaunted, Alan picked up the phone and asked five Southridge families

Alan’s Legacy: Contribution

David Alderdice is a founding Board member, past Board Chair and current Treasurer

As I was involved in helping to get the school off the ground in the beginning, and doing it motivated by wanting to have this kind of school for my kids, I came to realize the bigger vision that Alan was so eloquent at expressing and describing. And it made me want to be part of it. It made me want to feel that I was contributing to something much bigger than just something for my own family. And it really was something where I’ve felt that I was making a difference.

It was an opportunity to make a difference, and that’s something that Alan saw the school as being a vehicle for; it being possible to develop character in the kids, and some of the skills and training necessary for those kids to go out in the world and make a difference.

We were a university preparatory school and without the academics being successful, you had no possible future.

You wouldn’t have students and you wouldn’t have a school. But I think in many ways Alan felt that the development of character in students was even more important because schools have a unique opportunity to deal with young

people when they’re in their formative stages. And so we have a very strong emphasis on character development in the school today.

– David Alderdice

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Alan’s Legacy: Our Community

The amazing thing is what happened when all our parents got together. In 25 years of dealing with independent schools I have never seen anything like the level of parent support and community support for an independent school like Southridge.

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– Alan Brown

Alan was so inclusive, it was so important to bring people into the community and he always talked of the school being a family. A lot of people still describe it more as a family than just a community. Alan was instrumental in developing that notion and I think that kids coming into the school get that feeling when they walk in for the first interview. We often get the comment from parents that they can’t believe how everybody seems to get along, that nobody goes without friends in the school. Perhaps that is Alan’s greatest legacy; not the great halls, or the buildings, or even the fields, it’s more in the character of the students.

– James Porpaczy

We are concerned that our young people are true to themselves and true to their community, that they have a strongly developed character, a sense of integrity, that they are forthright, unfailingly truthful, and above all that they are considerate of each other.

– Alan Brown Everybody knows about the absence of locks on lockers and that is a big deal because there is more to it than that; it means that people trust each other and that they can be truthful and those are foundations of this school. This one thing covers so many aspects of the school and what we believe as a community.

– Joh-anna Mordhorst, founding parent

Trust was so huge to Alan Brown and the fact that we still don’t have any locks on our lockers is by far number one to me. When my family had some hardship with my son in Childrens Hospital there was so much outpouring of support from this community and I think it was because of the base that Alan had built all those years ago. Alan was almost like a grandfather. He knew everybody’s name and he loved talking in the hallways. His presence was always known.

– James Knihniski Trust is the fabric that holds any community together, and if you asked me what was the thing that Alan was most proud of, I would say having no locks on the lockers.

– Drew Stephens

Alan believed in a community within the school, not just buildings and people but an actual sense of community and that there was a connection between all of us.

– David Dyck (01)

The Southridge community spirit is evident today in regular events such as the Welcome Back Picnic, the Terry Fox run, Hoops for Heart, the Country Fair and TREK. The volunteer committee helped spirits to soar by serving hot chocolate on a cold winter’s morning at drop off while on the occasion of Marc Ayotte’s birthday the senior students showed their appreciation with a cake.

Alan’s Legacy: Our Community Make no mistake. I am a believer in traditions. In that I cannot be outdone.

But being without them at our birth gave us an opportunity rarely ever enjoyed, namely to prevent old, outworn and plain bad traditions from taking root in our new school, and to present as natural and attainable new traditions that would have been difficult if not impossible to create in more entrenched environments.

From the earliest days, one of the things Alan worked very hard at doing was trying to establish the identity of the school. He knew how important it was to have traditions and he was a master at coming up with these things. The feast is a wonderful event that we have around the Christmas season when everyone is tired and busy and the staff and students are looking forward to the holiday. It is a wonderful event with a variety show that highlights a lot of the talent and sometimes the craziness of the kids.

Alan had no reservations about getting up in front of the school in a chicken suit, or some other ridiculous outfit, falling on the floor and crawling around with Kindergarten kids, and then getting up and boogieing and dancing with the older kids. Alan was a showman; at times he was amazing.

– James Porpaczy

In the end, traditions are very much part of the glue that keeps us together. It is important, however, to remember that we must not use our traditions to breed in us a feeling of being excluded from or better than those who do not share them. Rather it is to say that the things we do, that are peculiar to us, are comfortable things, unifying and strangely uplifting.

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– Alan Brown Traditions started by Alan

• Baked goodies for the staff

• Casual day

• Welcome Back Picnic

• Senior Feast

• Junior Breakfast

• Standing when teachers enter the classroom

• Assemblies

• Public Speaking competitions

• No locks on the lockers

• The Wednesday newsletter

• Cap on the number of students

• Motto: Let Every Spirit Soar

• Ceremonies to open and close the school year

Today, fifteen years on, these traditions are ingrained in the fabric of the school.

Alan’s Legacy: Our Community What I particularly like is the friendly atmosphere in the halls. It is a marvel to me, sometimes, that children are as enthusiastic, outgoing, forgiving, and just plain happy as they are. A world without children would be like a rice pudding without the raisins – just plain intolerable.

– Alan Brown

May Southridge continue to prosper.

Of course it will.

– Alan Brown, upon his retirement in 1999 Fashioning a community out of strangers, Mr. Brown created a story we might believe in and challenged us again and again to stand up for honesty, justice and truth. Every high school student should be in the presence of this kind of inspiration and strength. He will be missed, but not forgotten.

- Kathryn Willms (99) Alan’s legacy is the sense of community that he built here. His biggest contribution to Southridge was in leaving his values and principles here.

– James Knihniski

For more information about Southridge School, please contact us at:

T. 604.535.5056 F. 604.535.3676 www.southridge.bc.ca

2656 - 160th Street, Surrey, B.C. V3S 0B7

Editor Design Thanks Photos

Dorothy Podmore Steve Culley, mgdc culleycreative Contributors Alan McInnes, Adriana Galesi and Southridge Archive material

Send us your news at alumninews@southridge.bc.ca