The night before school starts I almost never sleep.
Excitement at seeing all the students back on campus, anticipation about the extraordinary experiences that await us in the year ahead, and a small – but healthy – dose of anxiety conspire to keep me up late into the night.
You might think after experiencing 35 first days of school in my life – both as a student and then as a teacher and administrator – that the opening day would lose some of its luster. But year after year I find myself in the wee hours of the night staring at the ceiling, picturing the students and families that I will see, and going through mental checklists in the hopes that nothing has been forgotten.
The first day butterflies usually don’t fully subside until I’m standing in front of the school at the start of our first Flag. Looking out at the students, teachers, and parents, a sense of calm comes over me right before I speak. At that moment, there is nothing more I can do – the year is starting whether I’m ready or not – and I can start being and doing – and stop planning. It is one of my favorite moments of the year.
As I write this, however, we are not quite there.
We have just completed a dynamic week of faculty meetings, and faculty and staff are putting the final touches on their classrooms. During the meetings, we looked at the important pieces of Vision 2015 that we will be focusing upon this year, including the development of JK-8 learning outcomes, the implementation of a one-to-one iPad program in grades 5-8, the building of a better Middle School by applying to modify our conditional use permit and increase our enrollment, and the development of the Center for Teaching Excellence, an innovative teacher training and professional development program to be launched in Fall 2012.
We also reflected a bit upon our shared summer reading, The Element by Sir Ken Robinson, and were inspired and challenged by a presentation from nationally renowned psychologist and educator Rob Evans. Dr. Evans challenged us to think about how we can create a culture that allows the difficult conversations necessary for genuine collaboration and growth. I will share more details about each of these topics in the months ahead.
We have added a number of talented and dynamic members to our faculty and staff this year. New members of the administration include Lower School Head Stephanie Deitz and Technology Director Don Orth. New faculty members include MS English teacher Julia Rubin, MS math teacher Shushan Sadjadi, science teacher Christa Flores, 4th grade teacher Kate Hammond, Kindergarten teacher Katie Florio, JK/K PE teacher Michele Richards, and librarian Kelly Scholten. New staff members include Receptionist Lina Saleski and Staff Accountant Holly Earlywine. See the separate article below for more detailed biographies of each of our new hires.
While we have been hard at work preparing for the year, I hope that you have completed the back-to-school tasks that we shared with you in early August – filling out emergency forms through Magnus Health, buying uniforms, ordering lunches, signing-up for extended care, and coordinating transportation among other things.
This year, I would ask that you once again work with us to be good neighbors and to mitigate the impact of traffic in our neighborhood. We urge all families to either carpool or use one of our two shuttles, limiting the number of cars that travel on and off campus in the morning and the afternoon.
In addition, we ask you to carefully monitor your driving in the neighborhood. Please remember to:
- drive 15 mph on Upper Marchmont
- come to a complete stop at all stop signs
- avoid using cell phones when driving through the pick-up/drop-off
- follow the directions of our on- and off-campus traffic monitors who are working to ensure traffic flows smoothly and that safety remains our top priority
Parents driving on campus will notice we have repaved a section of the parking lot, and have added an extra stacking lane as well as an additional drop off/pick-up spot in front of the Administrative Building. These changes are part of our continuing efforts to keep traffic from backing up onto Marchmont Road.
I suspect that Tuesday night I will not be the only one who has difficulty going to sleep. My own children have been chomping at the bit to get back to school since mid-August, and I have heard similar things from Hillbrook parents and students as our paths have crossed around campus and in Los Gatos during the past few weeks.
All of us – parents included – feel that mix of excitement, anticipation, and, yes, some anxiety that will likely peak as we struggle to get to sleep Tuesday night and then as we make our way onto campus on Wednesday morning. New students and parents of our JK and K students, of course, will feel it somewhat more intensely, but even our veteran 8th graders and their seasoned parents undoubtedly are feeling a little bit of unease.
Like any transition, the beginning of school will have its share of ups and downs for each of us. We all need to remember that it takes time to adjust and that the first few weeks are never without their hitches. Patience, good will and a sense of humor will help us all ease through any slippery patches in the weeks ahead.
Last year, my oldest daughter, Lily, moved across the campus from 2nd to 3rd grade. At the time, the transition did not strike me as particularly significant. After the third day of school, I asked her how it was going. She looked at me in all earnestness and said, “It’s going okay, but I’m still trying to figure out the 3/4 playground. I just don’t quite know how to play on it yet.”
The comment reminded me that every year is a transition – and that the challenges are not always what we expect as parents or teachers.
After 35 years in schools, I know enough to know that I can’t predict exactly what will happen on the first day of school let alone throughout the year. That, of course, is what makes education such a rewarding profession. Children and schools are predictably unpredictably, which is part of the magic. I know I wouldn’t want it any other way.
Sweet dreams, Tuesday night. I’ll see you at Flag.