FROM THE RECTOR

Optimistic Work and Shared Values

Gratitude, optimism, and excitement are three words that have been my constant companions throughout the summer.

We are a healthy and thriving School for terrific young people from around the country and the world, coming off the largest number of student applicants in our history. We are planning carefully to welcome and support this diverse group who has faced a wide range of COVID-related challenges. We are eager and ready to kick off the fall term. While I don’t want to get too far into the work of the new year, I also could not be more delighted that we will roll out the School’s revised mission and embark on the optimistic work of strategic planning in support of it.

When we talk about educating students at SPS, we are drawing from the Latin origins of the verb “educare” — to bring forth — and, as it describes our purpose as a School, to bring forth what is best in each other. We come together on the grounds to educate each other as we face one another across the Chapel, across seminar tables and lab benches and practice fields, and in dining halls and common rooms — bringing forth the best in each other, the inspiration and motivation in growing up as whole, ethical, spiritual, healthy people who share the values of respect, integrity, and kindness.

We come together as a School to be in dialogue with one another, to engage and contribute rather than to consume. That is how we build our understanding and our intellectual stamina. It is about making and kneading the dough rather than just eating the piece of toast that is handed to you.

And when we talk about bringing forth the best in each other, it is not just the best achievement or the best grades or even the best ideas. It is about the personal best within each of us — the ethical best, the creative best, the curious, the empathetic, the imaginative best. The person we can be at the height of our most beautiful powers, whatever those might be, and however we each differ in their display. Becoming educated is about connection and production, inspiration and motivation.

Bringing forth what is best within us provides the framework to build and sustain a purposeful life, one that is committed to something bigger than our own needs or wants or goals — the contribution that will make us ethically worthy to have walked the world in our time. Our individual and, ideally, lifelong service to the greater good.

When one thinks about this fulfilling work, it is easy to think about the upcoming year with gratitude, optimism, and excitement. I very much hope they prove to be highly contagious.