A New Look

anced and had just a suggestion of movement whilst being firmly rooted. In other words, it convincingly symbolized the school.

The folks giving final approval at Chen Design’s final pitch knew their decision had little to do with rationality–they simply knew it when they saw it! The turquoise triangle represented the school’s French Foundation. The bright red globe atop the gestural swoop of the blue triangle figurine made explicit the intersection of French American + International.

Branding International

Building on the Neustadt research and the larger strategic effort to speak clearly to our market about our school, Director of Marketing and Communications Keelee Smith was tasked with rebranding the school. In 2019 we lauched a new logo and visual upgrades to the lobbies and hallways of all seven floors of the 150 Oak main building in vivid, in-your-face, brand-disciplined color! The dynamic new look had been developed in partnership with Chen Design. As with the Neustadt, Values, and Strategic Planning projects, the new branding had been guided by ongoing stakeholder and leadership feedback.

The new logo was universally appreciated. The design went through multiple iterations, some in the “almost but not quite right” category, others mawkish fiascos. When the final version was presented it just popped. It was elegant in its bold, cheerful, unfussy simplicity. The logo’s colors and figurative composition were perfectly bal-

The logo and branding colors were another example of the school taking deliberate steps to nurture and enhance school culture with carefully chosen messaging. The vision was to cultivate a meaningful and engaging whole school community rather than disparate, sectional, or grade level enclaves. The logo further reinforced the school’s identity, this time introducing a non-linguistic, complementary graphic element.

The branding initiative also augmented the school’s marketing lexicon. “Think Internationally'' became the new tagline. The branding guidelines also framed the school as “an intellectual home for our students and families.”

Responsive classroom

The Values now informed much of the school’s intricate, interconnected ecology. Respect, Integrity, Inclusion, Collaboration and Curiosity were alive and well, especially in the “business of the business.” The five Values hold up as veritable signposts for best practice in the critical realm of student-centered, differentiated social and emotional learning.

The anachronistic, austere formality of a one-size-fitsall, teacher-center-stage classroom was long gone. The wisest and most effective teachers had always known that you can’t really teach your class unless you get to know them. The task is not the delivery of a curriculum. It is about making it stick.

At the beginning of each academic year the teacher must begin anew. The essential responsibility is the learning experience of each and every student in the class. Curious works in progress all–they arrive wide-eyed, preconfigured with idiosyncratic emotional dispositions and learning modalities. To appropriate Walt Whitman, they “contain multitudes.”

What the best practitioners knew all along was now backed up by frontier research in neuroscience. Cognition is inextricable from social and emotional well-being. Bringing differentiation to designing and executing classroom activities is perfectly doable. It is not solipsistic customization. That would be no fun, and also performatively impossible. Extreme differentiation would also sabotage the all important social dynamic–a sense of co- hesiveness and belonging in a lively class collective.

What seems necessary is a “just right” Goldilocks approach to differentiating class activities. An approach that goes way beyond teaching to the middle. One that keeps not just the liveliest and most active kids engaged, but also the quieter and dreamiest. Keeping everyone in the room as much as possible in the flow of their own stretch learning zone. Not so challenging as to bewilder and shut down learning. Not so trivial and routine as to stultify and have half the class distracted by what's going on outside both the actual and metaphorical window.

Social and emotional learning had evolved over the decades. It was now being addressed in the lower school using Responsive Classroom, a set of research-based practices that provides a shared language and approach to building an inclusive classroom culture – including teaching skills essential to peaceful conflict resolution. The program’s goal is to help students develop self-awareness and a greater understanding of others. Students learn to recognize and control their own anger and to communicate their feelings in a constructive way. These gentle steps encourage self knowledge and the beginnings of metacognition.

Habits of mind cultivated in Responsive Classroom, aligning with school Values, include encouraging others when they make a mistake or lose in a game and saying you’re sorry if you’ve hurt someone’s feelings. A heartwarmingly beautiful sign was posted stating, “You are not allowed to say you cannot play.”

Conversations about Responsive Classroom were an enlivening feature of faculty meetings and professional development days. An analogous evidence-based approach was extended age-appropriately in the Upper School with the implementation of Culturally Responsive Teaching.

Culturally Responsive Teaching takes an overtly conBiotechnologists structivist approach, intentionally connecting students’ cultures, languages, and life experiences with what they learn in school. “It’s easier for our brains to learn and store information when we have a hook to hang it on.”

That hook is lived experience. Students are in medias res. There are no blank slates in the room even when a brand new idea is being introduced. Also implicit in this approach is the transformative nature of learning. A shift in understanding literally changes who we are.

Undergirded by the school Values, Responsive Classroom and Culturally Responsive Teaching incorporated the best bits of Blended Learning and Design Thinking. Certain invaluable Mission- and Values-driven dispositions emerged. For example, a growth mindset is an inevitable consequence of healthy curiosity. Curiosity as a disposition extends far beyond what is being studied in class. It is also being curious about oneself, what others might be thinking. This not only enhances collaboration and teamwork, but also spills over into being intrigued by viewpoints from other backgrounds, places, and cultures. It encourages perseverance spurred on by the ultimate generative question–"What else is possible?"

Urban Engagement

The Vibrant Urban Campus strategic goal introduced the Urban Engagement Program. Urban Engagement complements Global Travel. It contains three strands: a high school internship and mentorship program; a salon series for adults; and schoolwide days of service in which whole families can take part. The focus is on engaging with our San Francisco community, learning with and from our city, and providing our international school students and families with opportunities to benefit from and contribute to our local community.

Internships help students develop work skills and define their interests, sometimes with the participation of parents in the program sharing their professions. Salons highlight the rich expertise and diversity of our school community, with parents and alums sharing their work with others. Family service days at GLIDE have been deeply powerful, and a number of families continue to volunteer on their own as a result.

Exploring nature and the world

Our lower school students have always learned locally beyond the classroom. The foundations of a global mindset and international mindedness begins unhurriedly close to home. A Maternelle child’s journey to becoming acquainted with the world around them, away from home, begins in kindergarten, when students travel one hour north of San Francisco to Marin's Slide Ranch for an overnight trip. They participate in a variety of outdoor activities, including hiking, gardening, making bread, feeding animals, making s'mores, and camping in tents.

The mind-expanding voyage continues throughout the lower school years–with trips gradually increasing in length, scope, and distance from home, further cultivating autonomy and self-confidence. The adventure continues with the Strasbourg exchange rite of passage in Grade 5, third language linguistic trips in Grade 7, the Grade 8 Paris exchange (the one we started in 1986) and the gorgeous smorgasbord of Global Travel in the International High School.

One school identity

A major initiative emerging from Neustadt research and the Strategic Plan was the need to forge a “one school” identity. This was deemed essential both for coherent branding, and to provide clarity and help stakeholders anticipate the stages of the school’s international curriculum as they move seamlessly–“En Route"–through the various sections of the school.

In recent years the school established and ritualized En Route programs for kindergarten families moving from the 1155 Page campus to enter Grade 1 at 150 Oak, Grade 5 families graduating from Lower School and moving up to Middle School, and Grade 8 families continuing their bilingual journeys at International High School. At each stage, Principals focus on the excitement of the immediate changes associated with each rite of passage, but they also keep the big picture in mind, informing families about the endgame–our two baccalaureate programs!

International Program Promise endgame

During En Route sessions families learn about the two parallel programs in our International High School. The French Section culminates famously in Le Bac. The International Section (including more than half of each Grade 9 class welcomed from multifarious middle schools) leads to the International Baccalaureate (IB) Diploma.

The two baccalaureates have much in common. This is especially true since the French Bac reforms of 2019, when traditional fixed menus of studies, known as séries, were abandoned, and much greater emphasis was placed on continuous assessment throughout the final two years of school, rather than everything hinging on a dozen exams taken within a few short weeks at the very end.

The French Baccalauréat has a distinct pedigree. The Napoleonic reforms of 1808 revolutionized the French educational system—embracing Enlightenment ideals, and moving away from religious dogma and feudalism. The IB was launched in 1968. It was strongly influenced by the French Bac. It focused overtly on education for a better world. The ideals that inspired the baccalaureates when they were launched were ambitious in 1808, and in 1968, and remain so today.

Both Bacs

Both Bacs are prestigious, two-year mini-degree programs undertaken during the final two years of high school. Both Bacs are highly customizable. Students choose combinations of subjects that reflect their strengths, future college aspirations, and passions. Both Bacs culminate in a substantial research project freely chosen by the student. In the IB, the research project is known as the Extended Essay. In the French Bac it is the Grand oral presented live.

Both Bacs include philosophy. International Baccalaureate students take a critical thinking class called Theory of Knowledge. French Bac students study text based philosophy in their final year.

The Bac philosophy exam has become so iconic that the exam questions for the year are published in national newspapers. Millions of French adults look forward to this day—the questions are discussed at length in the media by public intellectuals and celebrities!

College Admission offices across the U.S. and the world build ongoing relationships with schools offering the French Bac or the IB Diploma, knowing that their students have not been burdened by busy work or rote tasks. Colleges know that French or International Baccalaureate students come already prepared for the upper level thinking, sophisticated writing, global-mindedness, and independent research skills that lie ahead. Compared to their peers, baccalaureate students tend to go to university at higher rates, go to more selective universities, and perform better once there.

The French Bac is the program of choice for our students who feel completely at home in a French approach to teaching and learning. French Bac students form strong bonds with their teachers and experience a tremendous sense of camaraderie. For these students, Le Bac is the natural culmination of a bilingual immersion journey that began in kindergarten or preschool, and not necessarily through exposure at home—many of our highest performing Bac students come from Bay Area families where French is not spoken.

In the International Baccalaureate, students have the opportunity to select six subjects unique to their interests. Students further play to their strengths by selecting at least three of their chosen subjects at higher level for in-depth study. In addition to their six core subjects, IB Diploma students also take Theory of Knowledge, and complete their Extended Essay. The Diploma experience is rounded off with the student’s personalized array of extracurricular activities blending Creativity, Activity and Service. In recent years the school has extended the menu of

IB subjects to include: Film, Psychology, Global Politics, Environmental Systems and Societies, Design Technology, Computer Science and Information Technology in a Global Society.

Senior Walk

Along with familiar PK3-12 identity rituals like the Kermesse fair, Move-Up Day, and bringing in Grade 1 reading partners at the end of Grade 5 promotion; Senior Walk has become a school coming-of-age tradition. After their celebratory senior lunch, which takes place on the day their baccalaureate classes conclude and they enter into exams, Grade 12 students make a final promenade passing through each floor. Teachers and younger students line the hallways and greet the graduates with boisterous applause, cheers, and high fives!