Take This Ride With Us: Fall 2019

Take this ride with us In the fall of 2017, Thacher publicly launched The Next Peak Campaign, the most ambitious fundraising campaign in the School’s history.

Here is an update on our progress and several stories of how the campaign is strengthening the School.

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he Next Peak Campaign touches every aspect of Thacher.

Significant improvements have already occurred in a number of areas as a direct result of the campaign. Our Environmental Sustainability Initiative, for example, is 100 percent funded, making healthy and locally sourced food, a solar array that produces more than 90 percent of our power, and water independence a reality for the School. The full funding of the Advancing Programs Initiative has resulted in a revitalized, state-of-the-art telescope making it possible for Thacher students to work with NASA on original astronomical research. The Supporting Faculty and Strengthening Teaching Initiative has funded improvements to faculty housing and the Fisher Fellows program with three fellows to date. The new Michael Kent and Joy Sawyer Mulligan Dining Hall and a more than 50 percent increase in the financial aid budget over the last four years are two more examples of how the campaign is strengthening the School.

While much has been accomplished, the climb to The Next Peak is far from over.

As we look ahead to the end of the campaign about 12 months from now, we focus on the work still ahead of us. Several critical initiatives remain only partially funded. This update is the map of the climb ahead.

REMAINING PRIORITIES

Securing Access and Affordability

Financial aid is at the center of Thacher’s strategy to be the best school we can be.

Securing Access and Affordability

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Hills We Have Summited

Why We Climb • Financial aid is the most powerful tool we have to enroll great students who will benefit from and contribute to our community regardless of their families’ financial situations.

• 43 percent of the students who apply to Thacher request financial aid. At present, 31 percent of our student body receives aid, a percentage we are working to increase.

• Thacher spends $3.8 million on financial aid grants every year.

• Percentage of students receiving aid: Up five percentage points.

• Financial aid budget: Up 50.7 percent.

• Aid as a percentage of gross tuition revenue: Up seven percentage points.

The Peak Ahead • We are 90 percent of the way towards our goal of raising $16 million.

REMAINING PRIORITIES

Building for the Future

The Creativity+ Technology Center

The Creativity+ Technology Center

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The Rough-House in 1916

Many in the Thacher community remember, or have heard of, the Rough-House, the brainchild of Sherman Day Thacher. In this one-of-a-kind structure—part barn, part jungle gym—students could test the limits of their physical abilities, take risks, and have fun. It was a place where “roughhousing” was not only allowed but encouraged and given a dedicated space. Thacher’s newest academic building, the first new academic building built on campus since 1981, aspires to offer a similarly unbounded experience, with an emphasis on curiosity and creativity.

As the new academic core of campus, the Creativity+Technology Center will serve as a “rough-house for the mind.”

Hills We Have Summited • The academic planning for the learning that will take place in the new Creativity+ Technology Center is well underway and a result of several years of planning and visits to over 30 peer institutions across the country.

• Along with other top-ranked independent boarding schools, Thacher has moved beyond the AP program. This curricular change has unleashed our exceptional faculty to guide the deep curiosity of Thacher students and help them engage with real issues and problems.

• The Creativity+Technology Center was designed by the same architectural firm as the recently-completed Michael Kent and Joy Sawyer Mulligan Hall, resulting in a cohesive, updated, and undeniably Thacher aesthetic and space.

Why We Climb

The Peak Ahead

• The Creativity+Technology Center is designed to foster STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Math), cross-curriculum, collaborative, and applied learning opportunities.

• The new Creativity + Technology Center will replace the Anson S. Thacher Building and provide much needed additional classroom space as well as dedicated group study, presentation, and makerspaces.

• New students arrive at Thacher expecting to find the robust STEAM facilities and curriculum they encountered in middle school. Our Admission Office tells us that prospective families are increasingly curious about Thacher’s curricular offerings.

• Funding for the Creativity+Technology Center has made great progress, with $4.2 million needed to meet the goal.

The new Creativity+Technology Center under construction, January 2020

REMAINING PRIORITIES

Planned Giving A planned gift today supports the Thacher of tomorrow.

Thacher’s planned giving program, known as the Boot Hill Legacy Society, remains a key piece of The Next Peak Campaign and will ensure Thacher’s longterm sustainability.

Planned Giving

Why We Climb • Planned giving of today is building and sustaining the Thacher of tomorrow. Planned gifts made by individuals 68 years or older will immediately count toward the Planned Giving goal.

• Planned gifts provide an easy way for our alumni, parents, and friends to secure their legacy in support of The Next Peak Campaign without having to gift assets immediately.

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The Peak Ahead • We are 44 percent to our participation goal of 125 Boot Hill Legacy Society members.

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Impact Spotlight

The tangible and intangible benefits of The Next Peak Campaign for Thacher can already be felt on campus.

A Lasting Impression through Planned Giving Thacher learns of gift from Dr. John M. Erskine CdeP 1938—a bequest estimated at $500,000 Thacher alumni consistently report that the excellent education offered by the School—its unique programs, campus, and culture—has made a lasting impact on their lives. We, along with generations before us, understand that excellence is perishable. That’s why we continue to train our sights down the trail, where the next peak, the next uphill climb awaits. And that’s why Casa de Piedra has always been guided, supported, and bettered by its community.

In fact, alumni sometimes surprise us with a bequest that shows us how influential Thacher was in their lives. This was the case with a recent gift from John Erskine CdeP 1938.

Dr. John M. Erskine graduated from Harvard Medical School after leaving Thacher and completing his undergraduate degree at Harvard. He spent two years as a doctor in the Army of Occupation in Japan, returning to Harvard for additional years of study at Massachusetts General and the Peter Bent Brigham Hospitals. He moved back to his home in San Francisco and became a part of the teaching and consulting staff of California Pacific Medical Center and a professor of surgery at UCSF where he taught students on a weekly basis for many years. Dr. Erskine became a pioneer in vascular surgery and was influential in creating and operating an artery bank in 1955 for the processing of arterial segments until synthetic grafts became available a few years later. When he wasn’t in surgery Dr. Erskine retreated to the mountains of the West and the Sierra Nevada. He enjoyed backpacking with friends each summer and developed an intimate knowledge of the southern Sierra including walking the John Muir Trail.

We like to think that Dr. Erskine’s time as a Thacher student helped to nurture his lifelong passion for the sciences, for helping others, for exploring the mountains of the West, and for leaving this School stronger than he found it.

Water Independence Glickman family makes gift to complete the funding of our water independence and conservation initiatives In recent years, the Ojai Valley’s water concerns have been elevated by prolonged drought. Lake Casitas dipped to 35.2 percent capacity resulting in a Stage 3 Drought Declaration in 2016. Facts and events like these highlighted Thacher’s need to continue to conserve water and to secure dependable water resources in order to ensure our long-term viability and sustainability.

To guarantee Thacher’s water supply, the School set forth several carefully planned initiatives in The Next Peak Campaign. These initiatives strove to better steward the precious water resources we have on campus, to guarantee In 2019, the Glickman family stepped a sufficient source of potable water to meet our forward to take Thacher’s Water domestic needs, and to benefit our fellow Ventura Conservation Initiative across the finish and Southern California neighbors by using less of a line by establishing the Glickman Water shared resource.

Conservation Program. This gift made it possible to complete the final two stages In 2017, the parents of the senior class created a of the water initiatives spelled out in Senior Parent Gift to kick-start this fund, providing The Next Peak Campaign. the funds necessary to take timely and immediate steps on several of the initiatives.

Global Citizenship Marvin H. Shagam legacy lives on through San Francisco symposium on China On January 11, 2020, close to 100 members of the extended Thacher community gathered in San Francisco to engage in a discussion with respected China experts Dr. Joseph Felter and Dr. Orville Schell about the future of China and its relationship to the United States. This gathering was made possible by the Marvin H. Shagam Program for Ethics and Global Citizenship and funded by a generous bequest from long-time faculty member Marvin Shagam’s estate as well as gifts from Marvin’s admirers. The Marvin Shagam Ethics and Global Citizenship program brings speakers to Ojai, endows programs, provides travel opportunities, and will create a designated space in the renovated Hills Building that will house the Marvin Shagam Ethics and Global Citizenship Program.