We enter exam week with our noses pressed to the ground, focused intently on helping guide our students through final assessments, studying, and, our favorite, dorm cleaning and packing. This head-down, tirelessly-support-our students mindset has dominated our lives since Registration Day on September 7. As we cautiously lift our heads and see glimpses of the end of the term, we need to acknowledge the good, good work that has been done by so many over the past ten weeks to allow us to remain in-person. 

On the cusp of exam week, students will be looking back to reflect and collect the knowledge  accrued over the term. There will be final projects, final fall performances, and final exams. The library will bustle. Review sessions will be packed. The stairs to Learning Skills will continually creak as students transit up and down. All of this is part of a normal term, part of an opportunity for students to put forth their best work, to celebrate excellence. These are the expected takeaways from a term. But what about the unexpected? 

Each year, Proctor’s Allan S. Bursaw Chapter of the National Honor Society inducts members of the senior class as academic leaders in the community. Selected by a committee of faculty, members of the National Honor Society have demonstrated excellence in the organization’s four pillars of character, scholarship, leadership, and service. 

In between meetings and a seemingly endless to-do list, I sat in one of the green Adirondack chairs scattered about campus. I closed my eyes and let the September sun warm my face. For the briefest of moments, I was transported back to a pre-Covid fall.

Monday's assembly recognized underclass award winners from the 2019-20 school year. Due to being remote last spring, we could not present the awards in person and chose to wait until this fall with the hope of recognizing each of these students face-to-face. Now that we are back on campus, we wanted to take the opportunity to celebrate and publicly acknowledge each student's incredible effort and energy they put into their academic pursuits. Congratulations to all award winners!

July has arrived, and while campus remains quiet, planning for our return to school in September is in full swing. We know questions abound as the academic year approaches. In order to provide an open forum for these questions, we invite you to join the following faculty and administrators during our Summer Office Hours Series (all times listed are Eastern Standard Time). Each of these office hours sessions will be held via WebEx (parents and students should check email for additional links to each event), and will serve as true “office hours” where families can jump on for a few minutes or the entire time. 

Born out of our belief that our deepest learning comes from a synthesis of all aspects of the Proctor experience, the Academic Concentration Program affords students an opportunity to weave content, independent research, internships, off-campus programs, and on-campus courses into a cohesive learning experience. 

When Proctor made the decision to spend the Spring Term learning remotely, the immediate question that arose focused on our academic schedule. Would we attempt to stay synchronous in our learning? Or would that simply be too complicated with students scattered around the globe with varying access to technology? Ultimately, we realized that at our core as a school is human connection, and when we are deprived of that connection, we struggle, and a fully synchronous schedule was born.