On a quiet Sunday afternoon, filled with final exam preparations, we reflect on the past two days and all that transpired within our remarkable little community. Starting on Friday morning with the arrival of our Board of Trustees on campus for the first time in two years, we enjoyed a 48 hour sprint that included our final Fall Term classes, a Holderness Day pep rally in assembly, Fall Term Art Show, Dance and Jazz/Rock Ensemble performances, and a full day of competitions for Holderness Day 2021. 

This week Proctor’s Admissions Team will welcome more than 45 families to campus for tours and interviews. Last week was a similar schedule, as was the week before. On Saturday we welcome more than 30 students from Prep at Pingree to campus to learn about boarding school and Proctor’s educational model. As each family or student tours campus, they see Proctor in action on any given day. They see students in motion: classes, assembly, lunch, afternoon program, extra help sessions, study hall, weekend activities. What they don’t see, however, is any preconceived notion they might have had of what a boarding school should look like based on their watching of Dead Poets Society. 

Each fall, the trails throughout the Proctor Woodlands are littered with acorns that threaten a rolled ankle even among the most nimble of hikers. As winter snows recede and spring temperatures catalyze the annual rebirth within the 2,500 acres of land Proctor calls home, some of these acorns will sprout and grow into saplings. 

As parents of young children, we were often reminded not to blink, reassured that while the days were long, the years were short. In the midst of sleepless nights, incessant changing of diapers, and tantruming toddlers, this advice fell on largely deaf ears. But now that our kids are older, well, we blinked. 

As educators, we engage daily in the unending balancing act of providing our students a sense of freedom and a sense of connection. While the pendulum of independence swings back and forth within a culture depending on the prevailing norms of the time, what we know at Proctor is that the adolescent brain biologically craves independence, and yet is only able to pursue that independence when surrounded by a nurturing community.

The ramp up to student arrival can feel prolonged, but when we finally have our entire community together for that first assembly of the school year, it is electric. 

After a year of hybrid classes, quarantines, mask etiquette, and fear of the novel situation of a global pandemic, we feel a little more settled entering this school year because our community has embraced the individual responsibilities required of addressing a global challenge. We have the same opportunity to teach individual responsibility as it relates to the pandemic of climate change and climate justice.