A Special Message From the Head of School and the Board of Trustees Chair J A N U A R Y 2 0 24
A MESSAGE FROM HEAD OF SCHOOL ANN V. KLOTZ
Dear Laurel Community, What a wonderful time I have had leading Laurel School. During my first visit in the fall of 2003, I knew this was the school I hoped to serve. Today, I write to tell you that I will retire in June 2025. It has been my privilege to lead the finest girls’ school in the nation over the past twenty years. Laurel has an exceptional faculty and staff, wonderful parents, wise trustees, formidable alums, and girls and little boys who fill my heart with joy. We are a school that strives to live our mission and values. As I think back over my tenure, memories of beloved ceremonies and traditions swim up: all-school assemblies when we gather in the Tippit Gym, Junior Chapel, Song Contest, Green & White Day, and Commencement. I feel a thrill at the hush in the Chapel that precedes every Senior Speech, a surge of happiness when I watch our enthusiastic fans cheer on Gators in every sport. When the little ones come Trick or Treating to Lyman House or stop to admire Seth’s annual holiday lawn display, I smile. I recall, too, the difficult moments that our community has endured together with grace and resilience. For me, school has always been about relationships and community. Learning is fundamental, of course, but so much that happens in and beyond the classroom is the result of connection and curiosity. I am glad to have been a teaching head, to have taught English and directed plays and advised a cohort of Seniors, to have shared in the day-to-day work of school with my colleagues on the faculty and staff. I love greeting children as they spill from their cars in the morning and visiting with our older girls, who come to my office for a piece of candy and a quick chat. To have mentored men and women who have gone on to lead other schools has been an honor—their success is glory to Laurel. When colleagues from other schools visit to find out more about Laurel’s Center for Research on Girls or our programming at Butler, I feel enormous pride. And I am filled with gratitude for those whose generosity has allowed us to renovate and build and dream. While our students’ public successes are cause for celebration— prizes won, publications, honors, awards and college
placement—I am proud, too, of quiet triumphs: a Ninth Grader’s perseverance in a tough class; a Middle Schooler’s kindness to a peer; a Fifth Grader who faces her fears on the Adventure Course, supported by her classmates; an Early Learner who enters her classroom without tears. During my tenure, we have developed and refined many strategic initiatives. We have been on the cutting edge of girls’ school education with the establishment of Laurel’s Center for Research on Girls, One Schoolhouse, and the Environmental Justice Semester. We’ve learned, too, how restorative practice helps students listen and build bridges even when they are in conflict. LCRG has deepened our understanding about the relationship between wellbeing and achievement for girls, about what girls need to thrive. And we have leveraged our understanding of the value of the natural world as a teacher for children of all ages and are so fortunate to have the Butler Campus as a key component of every child’s Laurel experience. Our school today has built on the work of those who came before us. We are not the school Jennie Prentiss founded, yet that which is essential endures. We value excellent teaching. We care enormously about our students and are committed to giving them an incomparable education. We are called to raise up generations who will claim their voices and use their gifts to better our complicated world. Our alums live lives of integrity, optimism, curiosity, compassion, and purpose, inspiring those students still with us at Lyman Circle and at Butler. I hope Jennie Prentiss, Sarah Lyman, Edna Lake, and all who came before me would be proud; I know those who follow me will continue the good work underway. Over the next eighteen months, I will savor my time with our students and faculty, parents and alums, doing all I can to prepare for Laurel’s next head of school, who will be so lucky to lead this remarkable school. Warmly,
A MESSAGE FROM BOARD OF TRUSTEES CHAIR MEGAN LUM MEHALKO ’83
Dear Laurel Friends, With profound gratitude for her leadership, the Board of Trustees has accepted Ann V. Klotz’s decision to retire at the end of the 2024-25 academic year. Laurel’s mission to inspire each girl to fulfill her promise and to better the world was articulated by Ann and affirmed by the Board early in her headship. That mission has been Ann’s guiding light throughout her time at Laurel. In 2004, when Ann came to Laurel with her young family, the Board of Trustees charged her with developing a curricular vision for what was then called the Fairmount Campus. The transformation of the now 150-acre Butler Campus into an experiential learning environment unlike any other in Northeast Ohio, while fully respecting our role as stewards of the land, is remarkable. Thanks to the generosity of donors who believed in Laurel and in Ann’s vision and leadership, Butler is home to amazing spaces that support a robust Outdoor Prekindergarten, Grades 3-5 and the Environmental Justice Semester, as well as many Laurel athletes. And there is more to come with the Ruhlman Family Center under construction very soon! During Ann’s tenure, renovations at the Lyman Campus included adding an elevator to increase accessibility and renovations or enhancements to the second and third floors, our Dining Room, Early Childhood classrooms, the Tippit Gymnasium and the locker rooms. The next phase of our Capital Campaign will address renovating the North Wing, which houses Grades 6-8, and Ann is committed to fundraising for this next phase during her remaining time at Laurel. While physical enhancements are critical to an institution, especially one in its 127th year, the successful future of any school also depends on a vibrant and relevant academic program. In 2007, Ann co-founded Laurel’s Center for Research on Girls (LCRG) and not only are the tenets of LCRG—resilience, self-care, purpose and ownership of learning—the pillars of our program, but schools around the country look to Laurel as the experts in how girls learn best. Stemming from Ann’s leadership, Laurel’s current strategic plan, Beyond the Circle: Empowering Girls, Changing the World, speaks to the fundamental character of Laurel and where its focus lies.
An innovator who believes passionately in the public purpose of private education, Ann established the NorthStar Collaborative, a partnership with Warner Girls Leadership Academy in the Cleveland Metropolitan School District, and just this fall, thanks to a matching grant from the E.E. Ford Foundation, launched our Environmental Justice Semester for girls in Grades 10 and 11— from Laurel and beyond. At heart, Ann is an educator who knows every child by name and who centers every decision around what is best for the girls. An advisor, drama and English teacher, her commitment to the social and emotional wellbeing of the girls and young women (not to mention the small boys!) who found their voices at Laurel during her tenure will ultimately be her greatest legacy. For many of those girls, a Laurel education would not have been possible were it not for Ann’s decision to institute tuition assistance as early as the primary years—Laurel was the first CCIS (Cleveland Council of Independent Schools) school to offer financial aid to students before the traditional Seventh Grade entry point, a prime example of her commitment to diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging. In the coming months, the Board of Trustees’ most important work will be to find a worthy successor to Ann—a new head who will embrace and continue Laurel’s mission. Board Vice Chair Carey Jaros ’96 and Board Secretary Susan Shons Luria ’85 are leading a search committee who, with the assistance of Nat Conard and Pilar Cabeza de Vaca of Educators Collaborative, will identify exceptional candidates with vision, intellect and a commitment to girls’ education, candidates with the capacity to build on Laurel School’s long held national reputation. Carey and Susan will share more information on the search process with the community next week. Change often brings trepidation. But, change also brings opportunity. With Ann’s continued support of Laurel, we will be focused on the opportunity ahead. Between now and June 2025, I know that Laurel remains in her extraordinary care. With Gator gratitude,
THE LAUREL MISSION
To inspire each girl to fulfill her promise and to better the world.
Dream. Dare. Do.
LYMAN CAMPUS 1 Lyman Circle, Shaker Heights, Ohio 44122 216.464.1441 LaurelSchool.org
BUTLER CAMPUS 7420 Fairmount Road, Novelty, Ohio 44072