Student Engagement and Achievement
The five-state Principia Today Tour kicked off this week in St. Louis. School Principal Travis Brantingham, College Dean of Academics Dr. Joe Ritter, and I shared Principia updates. Next, we hit the road, starting with two events in Southern California this weekend.
Attendees also will hear from a current Upper School and College student. Breakout sessions will provide an overview of the range of opportunities Principia offers learners of all ages, highlighting twenty-first-century learning, teamwork and leadership, and Principia’s on-campus and global adult education programs. We hope to connect with as many alumni and friends as possible during these events. Check out the upcoming locations and dates.
Here on campus, it’s terrific to have the students fully engaged in spring semester. A group of Upper School students in the Field and Natural History and Photo 2 classes just returned from the weeklong Teton trip, a cross-curricular program that combines science, writing, and art with an on-site stay at the Teton Science School in Jackson, Wyoming.
In late January, all the Upper School seniors shared their senior speeches from the Ridgway Auditorium stage. These upcoming graduates spoke eloquently and directly from the heart. Topics ranged from experiences growing up in Rwanda to the impact of Christian Science and Principia on their lives.
At the College, four student speakers took the Cox Auditorium stage for winter convocation and shared insightful perspectives on this year’s Principia-wide metaphysical theme: “ . . . love thy neighbour as thyself” (Matthew 22:39). You can listen to a full recording of last week’s convocation on Principia Internet Radio.
Our latest solar car, Ra 9, is still on its way home after placing sixth in a field of 15 world-class competitors at the Abu Dhabi Solar Challenge last month. In addition, Principia’s team, along with one other school, received the Shell Innovation Award for the use of photovoltaic cells, and we were the sole winner of the International Solarcar Federation (ISF) Quiet Achiever Award. Named for the first solar car ever built, the award honors the team that best exemplifies the mission and spirit of the ISF. Once again, the Principia solar car team has gone up against Goliaths (well-funded engineering graduate students from major research universities) and succeeded in making a significant mark.
We are disappointed that Mikhail Gorbachev will not be speaking at Principia College this month, as scheduled, since he has cancelled his trip to the United States. Nevertheless, we have an exceptional lineup of speakers.
Tonight, Thursday, February 5, brings the 14th annual Monitor Night Live, moderated by Christian Science Monitor Editor Marshall Ingwerson (C'79). He will be joined in person by longtime Monitor photojournalist Melanie Stetson Freeman (C'79) and Atlanta-based correspondent Patrik Jonsson. Correspondents Christa Case Bryant (C'03) in Jerusalem and Peter Ford in Beijing will participate by Skype. The program will be broadcast live on Principia Internet Radio from Wanamaker Hall at 7:30 p.m. (CT).
On February 26, this year’s Ernie and Lucha Vogel Moral Courage speaker will be Ziauddin Yousafzai, an educator, human rights campaigner, and social activist, who hails from Pakistan’s Swat Valley. At great personal risk, he peacefully resisted the Taliban’s efforts to shut down schools, keeping his own school open and inspiring his daughter, 2014 Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, to raise her voice to promote educational rights. You can hear Yousafzai at 7:30 p.m. (CT) in Cox Auditorium or tune in to listen live on Principia Internet Radio.
For me, a highlight of the fledgling semester was the opportunity to play the role of Harry Truman in a Middle School history class recently. I met with four teams presenting options for foreign policy at the end of World War II. Each team developed an argument, and we all debated the pros and cons. As President Truman, I loved the interaction; as President of Principia, I was delighted by our eighth graders’ thoughtful wrestling with complex ideas.
However, real actors will be showing up later this month. We look forward to having the Actors From The London Stage in residence February 16–22. This group of actors from well-known British theatre companies will offer workshops and seminars as well as two performances of Macbeth for the School and College campuses.
The winter months are a time for settling in and hunkering down academically. Students will learn a great deal of information, but our key aim is to help them develop as thinkers. At every level, from Preschool through College, faculty will be “standing by [students] and reminding them to go deeper when necessary, to do accurate thinking—thorough thinking . . . ,” as Mary Kimball Morgan put it (Education at The Principia, p. 119). Knowing our faculty, I can say with confidence that there’s nothing else they’d rather be doing!