Dear Calhoun families,

Welcome back! And to those 65 families (and 91 students) new to the Calhoun community – welcome to Calhoun!

I hope you all had wonderful summers and that our students are excited for the start of the new school year. Last year at this time, we were launching Calhoun’s 125th anniversary celebration. This year, we're looking to the future, with a whole range of new initiatives that have kept us busy this summer, and I'm more excited for this opening of school than I have been in years.

At our 81st Street campus, we're unveiling transformational new teaching spaces for the Upper School, renovated science labs for the Upper and Middle Schools and new Smart Boards for all divisions. Partnering with Verona Carpenter Architects, we designed these spaces to preserve our commitment to our open floor-plan design while incorporating new technologies to enhance acoustics, lighting, ventilation and flow. The design adds a brand new science lab to the 7th floor, and adds faculty and student lounge areas on the 4th floor. We’re thrilled by the opportunities these renovations open up to enhance the learning experience for all of our students.

Planning has also continued through the summer for our upcoming merger with Metropolitan Montessori School (MMS). As we announced last spring, this merger will create a dual-track early-childhood program – the first of its kind in NYC – for preschool through third grade. Students will begin in either the Montessori track or Calhoun's "Open Inquiry" track (more on this nomenclature in a moment). As children's learning styles evolve, families and educators might decide that a different track is more appropriate – and that shift will be possible entirely within Calhoun. This unique new program will launch in the fall of 2023, and I'll be keeping the community informed about all the various elements of this exciting initiative, including opportunities to welcome the MMS community to Calhoun.

As we end our 125th anniversary year, we also bid goodbye to our special 125th anniversary logo – and unveil a new logo for Calhoun. The new logo – which you can see at the top of this newsletter – is drawn from the anniversary logo and adds a tri-color "C" incorporating different shades of green. These three colors represent different dimensions of our school – past, present and future, perhaps, or Lower, Middle and Upper School (can you think of other triads? Let me know!). 

More philosophically, our new "C" reflects our commitment to recognizing and celebrating the diversity within our community, and the different dimensions of our own identities. It also represents the openness of our curriculum – for example, the way we draw on elements of Montessori, Reggio Emilia and constructivist pedagogies to serve our youngest learners.

This last point – the openness of our pedagogical approach – is reflected in the new language we are introducing to describe our curriculum: Open Inquiry. Grounded in progressive pedagogical principles – student-centered, inquiry-driven, experiential, community-rooted and values-based – we want to capture what makes Calhoun's educational approach distinctive and effective. While many schools now use the "progressive" label, most still expect students to conform to the curriculum. At Calhoun, we are Open to evolving the curriculum to best serve our students. We are Open to drawing from different disciplines and approaches to allow students to better engage with the materials. We are Open to different modes of assessment that allow students to show mastery over core principles. Our classrooms are Open to the whole community.

In computer science, open architecture hardware or software is built around a set of standards that invites extension by and collaboration with users. I see our educational approach in similar terms – built around strong standards (defining our core academic expectations) and still open to modification, adaptation and improvisation by teachers and students. Traditional educational approaches are less adaptable – expecting all students to learn at the same pace, with similar tools, and show mastery in the same way. They are more like walled gardens – suitable for some students, but not all. Calhoun is a partnership – between school and family, and between teacher and learner – aimed at ensuring that each student is seen as an individual. 

This brings me back to our logo. If you take the "O" from Open and actually open it, it becomes a “C.” The letter C gathers you in, like an embrace. Let us start this new year embracing the future and all the exciting changes ahead.

In my last message in June, I urged you all to be Open to new things – to emulate our kindergartners, foster a growth mindset and learn something new this summer. I had my own project in mind, and I'm pleased to report I made some progress.

Since my college days, photography has been a passion of mine. Last fall, I chaperoned an Upper School Art of Birding elective on an excursion to Central Park, and I brought my camera. Two hours later, I was hooked. So this summer, I decided to do a deep dive into birding and bird photography, opening a door to a world I am finding both challenging and rewarding. Bird photography requires patience and luck, and also demands that you learn enough about your subjects to understand where and when to find them.

After dragging my son along on a dawn walk through an Audubon reservation, he described the experience as "real life Pokemon Go." Like that craze from a few years ago, the drive to "collect them all" can be overpowering; the downy woodpecker shown here was captured in a garden on holiday in Nova Scotia. I've posted some other shots on Instagram at @steve_birdphotos.

What new skills or projects did your students – or you – take up this summer? Send me an email and fill me in. And, as we begin the year, please know that I am always interested in your comments, questions and concerns. Don't hesitate to write and let me know what is on your mind.

In partnership,
Steve