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FROM
THE HEAD
P
o f s ch o o l
Perhaps the truest measure of a really fine school can only be calibrated
over time, many years of time. Viewed through this lens, success is to be gauged not by a criterion such as where graduates go to college, important as this most
certainly can be, but by what they do after that, for the rest of their lives.
The investments that we make in our students at Hotchkiss, both the material and the less tangible, must bear dividends over a lifetime. That is why we do it, and that is why generations of graduates support our endeavors in all manner of magical ways. The people celebrated in these pages, different as their lives are or have been, are emblems of this type of productivity. Whether they are young, older, or deceased, they represent good works and deeds that have the legs of longevity. John Humphrey, John Hersey, Henry Alford, Adam Sharp, Rocio Mendoza, and Ned Goodnow: a roll that includes these amongst many others rings out like a gong. Scholarship, compassionate internationalism, humorous creativity, innovation, civic commitment, and inspiring philanthropy: all are strong and valuable qualities, exemplified by these graduates. What is it that we do here, in a few teenage
years, to achieve such lasting impact? I cannot comment on the ways that worked in the past, but I can describe some of the modes in which we are trying to nurture and sustain such motivation now. For me, they are essentially qualitative. Here are a few, drawn from many. Touch, the finger on the pulse, is one. Another is to be unfailingly an optimist, to see the good in all. Pessimism, and focusing on the negative, seldom work well in the education, the drawing out, of young people. Collaboration and participation is a third. Closeness, not distance, is a fourth. Learning through direct experience is a fifth. Dare I use the word, yes, I must: love, is a sixth. And to return to something like touch, breathing, not constricting, is a seventh. In a boarding community such as Hotchkiss, all of us need to see ourselves as leaders in different ways, in varying capacities. I like the image of a leader as a conductor. Otto Klemperer said that the best conductors are
those that allow an orchestra to breathe. Students and teachers in schools should breathe freely if they are to use and create opportunities to grow. Too many schools are asthmatic. But conductors of another type assist the flow of electricity and heat. In schools, leaders are channels for the passage of energy. They need to practice and promote conductivity. There is a third type of conductor that has less to do with coordination or flow and more with gate keeping. Conductors on buses and trains check that fares have been paid and that passengers are comfortable, seated correctly and comporting themselves appropriately. Leaders do this, as well. Oh yes, they do. Giving the quotidian its due is essential. These are some of the school ways through which we set ourselves up for lives of compassionate and enduring action: breathing, releasing energy, and paying attention to daily, domestic detail. In dedicating a recent Hotchkiss holiday to Ned Goodnow, I did so not for the endowment that he has given us but for the example that he has granted us. I chose my adjectives carefully in describing Ned to our students in auditorium: humble; generous; gracious; patient; smart; attentive; and devoted. Had I had more time to think about it, I might have been more succinct. Roberta Jenckes, who wrote this magazine’s profile on Ned, chose just three: service; loyalty; love. A true measure, verily.
LEFT: At a campus conference in the fall, Malcolm McKenzie listens with faculty members to the discussion underway.
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