A Summer Toward Accompaniment and Companionship - Using Seven Foci for Rest, Reflection and Renewal6/17/2020 And the school year is over . . . just . . . like . . . that. Summer has typically been a period of rest, reflection, and renewal for schools. This year, amidst the shifting American educational landscape caused by COVID-19, which has itself illuminated great disparities among people in our country, and a heightened awareness of institutional racism and the Black Lives Matter movement as a direct result George Floyd’s death, I find myself wanting to do more: more reflection and renewal in the form of action – and wanting to do these things in the spirit of companionship and accompaniment for and with others. Here are three questions I am considering:
As I consider these questions, my summer plans include seven foci. Focus One: Faculty & Staff Rest, Reflection, & Renewal Grounded in Mission Toward the end of the academic year, we created, planned, and implemented numerous faith formation opportunities that allowed adults at school finally to take a step back to rest, reflect, and begin to renew. These opportunities ground us in the mission of our work of Jesuit secondary education and supposed that we take a position of companionship – that we accompany one another in continuing to create community. We shifted our final on campus Ignatian Evening that would have included dinner, fellowship, and prayer, to an online opportunity for a few hours one evening at the end of May. The topic of our final online Ignatian Evening to end the year was Spirituality at Home. Twenty-seven faculty and staff participated in this optional (Zoom) night of sharing, reflection, and prayer where we reflected on the changing contexts of our lives and how this context has shaped our faith life and prayer. How did we officially end a year after two months where faculty and staff were engaged in remote learning? We did not meet in person to celebrate or reflect at the end of our year because of local physical distancing restrictions. Instead, on what would have been the last day of classes, we planned an optional online (Zoom) Ignatian Examen for our adults. Two volunteer teachers began the Examen by simply reflecting on their personal feelings of consolation and desolation about the year. These reflections led us to a traditional communal Examen, whereby we found consolation in returning to a familiar Ignatian reflection tool that we use almost daily during our on campus school year. Thirty-two faculty and staff participated in this opportunity of shared prayer and reflection. In early June, we invited faculty and staff back to our campus – for a celebration on our football field, where we honored retiring teachers and those with varying lengths of years of service. While we physically distanced ourselves and wore masks per safety guidelines, this gathering was a tremendous social opportunity for adults to return to school and to see one another, listen to one another, and just be present with one another – albeit from a distance. During this month of June, eighteen faculty and staff members are participating in one of four self-led retreats, in their own homes, with The First Spiritual Exercises: Four Guided Retreats. Our Jesuit chaplain and Jesuit scholastic provided resources and a retreat kick-off video, as well as ongoing spiritual support. And because, “The Exercises also expect personal faith to be expressed in community and communal action,” we come together as a community once a week (Thursday nights) to support one another through Zoom meetings (Hansen, SJ). Finally, a group of fourteen faculty is reading Richard Rohr’s The Universal Christ, and coming together several times to discuss the book, again via Zoom or a safe, physically distancing get-together. Despite obstacles, we accompany one another in community this summer. How do we continue to model that accompaniment and companionship for our school in the coming academic year? Focus Two: Stakeholder Input for Continuous Quality Improvement Now more than ever we need to resist living in a bubble and acting in a vacuum. It is important to continue to ask questions and gather opinions and perspectives from stakeholders – students, parents, teachers, administration, and school leadership – to keep growing in education and faith service to students and families – toward meaningful action. Servant leadership depends upon stakeholder input and collaboration to move forward in positive and productive ways. Here are some stakeholder areas of focus as we continue planning.
Accompaniment and companionship assumes that we continue to reach out, listen to, and act upon stakeholder perspectives. Focus Three: Developing and Fine-Tuning Our Way of Proceeding for the Coming School Year In planning for the coming academic year, there are many unknowns and as a result many potential “return to school scenarios.” We can plan, even though we don’t know . . . and we are doing so. Our leadership team is certain about guiding principles that drive education at our school.
We will listen to, understand, and celebrate students, especially black students and their families, by continuing to explore and improve (1) systematic institutional practices, (2) curriculum and co-curricular activities, and (3) the classroom experience (as measured by (a) listening to students, (b) through targeted class visits identifying specific cultural competencies, and (c) by identifying and addressing school trends as they relate to diversity and equity faculty conversations). We are committed to students and families and will work with students and families to deliver the best educational experience for students that we can – preparing students for life beyond high school, into college. We are committed to working with families to make this work logistically and financially.
Keeping in mind these guiding principles, we are developing scheduling options that include on campus learning, facilities adaptation, on campus guidelines and safety measures, and remote learning. Finally, we have working leadership teams on areas that focus on (but are not limited to):
While the process for fine-tuning and developing our way of proceeding is grounded in guiding principles, it is dynamic, generative, expansive, and creative. Focus Four: Professional Development Summer Seminar In direct response to faculty needs as identified by end of year faculty survey results, we have developed a four-day Professional Development Summer Seminar happening on our campus and streaming live that includes the following sessions:
Each session includes resources, a brief context-setting piece, conversations, and work time – allowing teachers to learn about and integrate specific strategies into their existing courses. While the Summer Seminar will happen in our Innovation Center, we will also provide live streaming sessions, making information available to colleagues across the country in our Jesuit network of secondary schools and beyond. The Summer Seminar is a creative response to faculty and a resource for successfully teaching into 2020-2021. Focus Five: Our Curriculum Design & Review Process (CDRP) Continues When the pandemic forced us into remote learning, our school was on the threshold of forward-thinking curriculum work, immersed in our Curriculum Design & Review Process (CDRP). This work included the development and implementation of a clear CDRP, which included ongoing curriculum writing and revision by departments and the formation and work of a CDRP core leadership team and core initiatives:
As we move into 2020-2021, how will the pandemic, our experiences with teaching and learning, as well as our continued commitment to explore companionship, accompaniment, and reconciliation with black students and families around the issue of systematic racism change the landscape of our work and our curriculum? Focus Six: Resuming Faculty Teams With New & Emerging Questions In addition to teaching, coaching, and moderating clubs and events, our teachers have had a commitment toward working on adult teams to support one another and provide ongoing resources and services. How will these teams continue to meet and what are emerging questions?
Faculty teams are positive ways in which we live in companionship and accompaniment. Focus Seven: Our Work with Diversity & Inclusion Our school has been committed to working toward a more diverse and inclusive learning community. Our director of diversity & inclusion is responsible for leading this work with students and adults on formation programming and advocacy/awareness. In our admissions, in our financial aid, in our school resource allocations – we are doing more to listen to the experiences of students and families, examine how and why we operate the way we do, and make institutional changes. One feeling of consolation I have had over the years is that we have been working on the work, we know that the work is ongoing – not perfect – and we are happily uncomfortable, realizing the work is never finished. While retreating this June, I have developed a habit of daily prayer that concludes when I ask for particular graces or desires – things for me to think about and pray over during the day:
Today I realize how my current “asks” for specific graces and desires align to the current and evolving conversations and protests about race in our country. How does this awareness propel me – from where I am – toward action in solidarity? As a white privileged male, I can do more to listen to the experiences of black students, black parents, and black teachers. I can do more by educating myself through professional development organizations and opportunities, and I can do more to work on the work as an ally. Here is a dated but practical piece that continues to guide me in this work: For Our White Friends Desiring to Be Allies (Ariel). And here is an important reflection I have also been using: An Open Letter to My Fellow White Americans (Malone, SJ). Finally, here is an important piece that helps shape my way forward: When Black People are in Pain, White People Just Join Book Clubs (Johnson). In that piece, I am challenged to think and act in new and different ways, when Johnson writes, “It will be found in your earnest willingness to dismantle systems that stand in our way - be they at your job, in your social network, your neighborhood associations, your family or your home. It's not just about amplifying our voices, it's about investing in them and in our businesses, education, political representation, power, housing and art. It starts, also, with reflection on the harm you've probably caused in a black person's life. It may have happened when you were 10, 16, 22, 36 or 42. Comforting as it may be to read and discuss the big questions about race and justice and America, making up for past wrongs means starting with the fact that you've done wrong in the past, perhaps without realizing it at the time: in the old workplace, neighborhood, classroom, softball field. Maybe even the book club.” We have more work do. I have more work to do. Here are some initiatives that currently excite me:
Teacher responses to this particular thread have been collected and analyzed to yield perception data trends and resulting tangible questions as we think about planning for ongoing institutional systemic changes:
This list – of specifics as they relate to diversity and inclusion conversations and reflections, as well as the seven components for my summer work – is merely a start to reflection and action. It is not exhaustive and it is not perfect. As I am want to say, “these are in DRAFT forms.” This summer, I am grounded in working on the work. I know that the work is ongoing, not perfect. I am am comfortable realizing the work never finished. Note: images used in picture https://www.istockphoto.com/illustrations/face-mask?mediatype=illustration&phrase=face%20mask&sort=mostpopular https://www.shutterstock.com/search/body+temperature https://www.vectorstock.com/royalty-free-vector/black-washing-hands-with-soap-icon-isolated-on-vector-30831233 https://www.burohappold.com/articles/social-distancing-in-the-workplace/
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Pete MussoAssistant Principal, Curriculum & Instruction Archives
May 2022
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