TEACHING DEPENDABLY, IN AN UNDEPENDABLE WORLD

A letter from Judith Guild

This edition of Brimmer Magazine focuses on the qualities of our faculty and the underlying principles that further excellence in the classroom. As I reflect back on over 30 years of teaching and learning as an educator, I am reminded of the work of Robert Fried, Deborah Meier, Grant Wiggins, Ted Sizer, and Tony Wagner. The research and scholarship of these education-reform thought leaders helped shape Brimmer’s foundational philosophy and principles. Also part of our foundation are the generations of alumni who speak of their mission-focused education built on a personalized and student focused environment, a rigorous and relevant curriculum, a global and volunteer-focused program, and an academic foundation that intersected with character development.

Those influencers of the past certainly shape our faculty’s work today, but so do current and evolving research. Brimmer’s academic leaders and professional development bring in research on methods and delivery of instruction and on the cognitive development of young thinkers. A strong foundation in best practices coupled with a faculty who have a progressive mindset for today’s classroom is a recipe for amazing success stories.

Without question, the pandemic tested our commitment to the foundational principle of providing a student-centered, personalized learning environment. As the concerns for health and safety took center stage, we made the decision in late summer to accommodate our learners in school, at home, and in a combination of the two. Our educators were determined to work around the obstacles, so we could continue with our mission to individualize the learning experience and meet our students where they are each day. You will read in the following pages how we created success despite the challenges we faced.

The social conflicts within our own society pressed our faculty to do what is intrinsically important. They kept content learning their top priority while also keeping it in perspective. Providing a quality education as a top priority also meant paring content with context and focusing on the essentials as we managed multiple distractions and barriers to success. Robert Fried writes about this in his book The Passionate Teacher, when he states: “What students need from their teachers is to keep the content in perspective: to keep the balance between identification, understanding, synthesis, and creative application, so that the material of the course is not repetitive and tedious, nor so limited and concentrated as to leave out knowledge that students will need in order to do further work in the subject.” During the pandemic, this approach to teaching became more relevant than ever before.

Brimmer’s faculty know the importance of being good role models. Over the past year, our faculty have not only had to manage keeping their students safe physically but also emotionally stable and thriving. The national landscape of extremist behaviors, hate speech, anti-Black, and anti-Asian racist acts of aggression required a steady, value-centered faculty who were equipped to answer an array of difficult questions. Students need their teachers to be dependable, and our faculty committed themselves to learning how to teach dependably in an undependable world. Brimmer’s Core Values served us well this year as a reliable compass when conflict arose. Making the decision last summer to add the Core Value of Equity—and then forming a yearlong theme around the concept—created a dependable foundation for this work throughout the year. Students talked about respect, responsibility, honesty, kindness, and equity with their teachers as they embraced the need for new safety mitigation strategies and as they questioned the inequities the daily news revealed to them. As outstanding role models, our faculty did not let external strife or those challenging topics interfere with providing a place where love and joy could abound.

In the pages that follow, you will read about how Brimmer’s faculty is passionate about their work of evolving their methods and delivery in support of student growth. They not only came bravely to work each day to tackle the challenges in front of them, but throughout the summer and in their free time they studied and learned new ways to make learning easier, better, and more accessible to their students—whether those students were in person or at home. It is a great honor to work alongside a committed, talented, and passionate group of adults who put the wellbeing of children first in all that they do. ■

Our educators were determined to work around the obstacles, so we could continue with our mission to individualize ’’ the learning experience and meet our students where they are each day.

Middle & Upper School Music Teacher Max Holman leads a piano lesson with sixth graders.