The Packer Magazine — Winter 2015

The

PACKER WI NT ER 2015

Magazine

Packer’s Architectural History: Hidden in Plain Sight Learning in the Shen Gallery Thinking Deeply in Early Math Benjamin Voce-Gardner ’98, Protecting Justice in Iraq

14 THE PACKER MAGAZINE

THE PACKER COLLEGIATE INSTITUTE

Editor Karin Storm Wood

Head of School Dr. Bruce L. Dennis

Photography Karin Storm Wood and contributors as noted

Director of Alumni Dona Metcalf Laughlin

Design Karin Storm Wood Class Notes Development Office, with assistance from Jen Weisbrich

Director of Communications Karin Storm Wood Director of Annual Giving Susan Moore Manager of Development Services Jacque Jones

Board of Trustees Leadership Chair Ronan Harty P’15, P’17, P’20 Vice Chair Anne Giddings Kimball ’55 IVAc Treasurer Michael Malter P’05, P’09 Secretary Karen Tayeh

Development Associate Shriya Bhargava-Sears The Packer Magazine would like to thank Georgia and Robert Kingsley P’15 for making the photograph on pages 18-19 possible.

Alumni Association Board Leadership

The Packer Magazine is published twice a year

by The Packer Collegiate Institute, 170 Joralemon Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201. Nothing herein may be reprinted wholly or in part without the written permission of Packer’s Development Office.

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The Packer Collegiate Institute © 2015

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Packer is a member of the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE).

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President Geoffrey Brewer ’82, P’26 Vice President Sasha Baumrind ’00 Secretary Laura Elizabeth DeMarco ’63 IVAc Director Emeritus Ellin Rosenzweig ’52

The

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From the Head of School On Campus Performing Arts Athletics

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joralemon street

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Building History An architectural retrospective of The Packer Collegiate Institute reveals an institution consistently dedicated to providing facilities aligned with the best teaching practices.

Examining the School’s serial expansions also sheds light on some of the hidden, mysterious, and downright eccentric features of the campus. Plus: Ken Rush’s Packer.

A composite image of the four distinct structures that make up the School’s facade along Joralemon Street (from left to right): the Science Building (1887), Founder’s Hall (1854), Alumnae Hall (1907), and Pratt Hall (1957).

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Art Seen From Many Angles The mission of the Shen Gallery is “to enrich, diversify, and broaden the artistic experience of the Packer community” and to “provide thoughtful and challenging visual arts experiences.” But how is that mission accomplished?

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Building Better Math Students Early math instruction is more than a matter of mere accuracy. Amy Hand and Chris Natale explain how Lower School students also develop efficiency and flexibility, leading to deeper comprehension.

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From Brooklyn to Baghdad Benjamin Voce-Gardner ’98, the 103rd Founder’s Day speaker, followed his passion for justice to Iraq, where he oversaw the interrogation of detainees as a Navy JAG.

On the cover: The entrance to Packer’s newly renovated Tower, originally constructed in 1854 for the study of astronomy.

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Parent Association Alumni News Class Notes In Memoriam

In December, students in Ken Rush’s Intermediate Drawing class were among the ďŹ rst in decades to have access to the Tower, whose renovation was completed this fall.

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From the Head of School

RAOUL BROWN

T

alking about Packer’s strengths is one of the best parts of my job, and there is much to say.

Our academic program has never been stronger.

We offer a diverse and continually evolving curriculum, with opportunities for students in all divisions to learn outside the classroom. Our students are free to pursue several interests meaningfully without having to sacrifice one for the other. Our faculty is committed to excellence and is as hardworking as any I’ve ever known.

But there is more to Packer than the strength of our program. As parents who are new to the School often tell me, the excellent education they knew their children would receive here doesn’t fully capture why they chose Packer.

What draws people to our School — families as well as faculty — is the unique and distinguishing feel to the place.

There’s a genuineness to people’s interactions here, a fundamental kindness and respect. You can see it in the strong relationships forged inside these walls. Taking the time to make meaningful connections with others — and drawing understanding and joy from them — is the Packer way.

We often express this intangible feeling as “warmth.”

Frankly, like the literal sensation of warmth, it is hard to describe but easy to experience — and unmistakable. Most people who do experience Packer’s warmth want to stay and remain drawn to it.

Another unique aspect to this place, which by contrast is quite tangible, is Packer’s incredible physical space.

Author and philosopher Alain de Botton writes, “Belief in the significance of architecture is premised. . . on the conviction that it is architecture’s task to render vivid to us who we might ideally be.” More and more, I believe that Packer’s wonderful intangibles are enhanced by the tangible beauty that we are immersed in here. If architecture can bring out the best in people, what better example is there than our beautiful School?

This issue’s cover story explores the fantastic and often hidden history of Packer’s unique physical space. It’s a story that even Packer’s architecture aficionados will find illuminating.

And for those of us who have ever gotten lost trying to move from point A to point B across the campus, it will surely deepen your appreciation for the eccentricities of its layout.

You will also find an overview of the renovations we have undertaken in my eleven years as Head of School.

Tending to the bricks and mortar of Packer today is no less a duty than tending to the academic program or to the fabric of the community. I hope this issue of The Packer Magazine captures for you this enduring and important commitment. It is one I deeply believe in and am proud to uphold.

Bruce L. Dennis

WINTER 2015 | 3

On Campus

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n October, civil rights attorney Ruth Harlow P’25 spoke at an Upper School Chapel about her experience winning the landmark 2003 Supreme Court case Lawrence v. Texas. Serving as lead attorney for the plaintiff, Harlow argued that the 14th Amendment offered privacy protection to people who are gay and lesbian.

According to Harlow, the Supreme Court did not initially recognize that important civil rights — “privacy, liberty, and individual freedoms” — were at stake. Nevertheless, the Court overthrew state laws criminalizing intimate homosexual activity, reversing its own 1986 decision in Bowers v. Hardwick. This landmark case paved the way for the major advances of the right-to-marry movement over the past decade.

To capture the significance of this decision, Harlow read from the majority opinion, which was delivered by Justice Kennedy: “Two adults are entitled to respect for their private lives. The State cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime... Their right to liberty under the due process clause gives them the full right to engage in their conduct without intervention of the government. It is a promise of the Constitution that there is a realm of personal liberty, which the government may not enter.”

Though she is widely credited for winning the case, Harlow downplayed her individual role in the victory. “It is not particular lawyers or particular people that end up in front of the Supreme Court. It’s the whole country deciding

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JACK FREEDMAN ’15

Winning Civil Rights Attorney Speaks to Upper School

that its conception of justice is different from what it believed justice to be in the past. It’s really all kinds of individuals that make changes on this very fundamental societal level.”

“Ms. Harlow’s presentation was a great opportunity to learn [more about civil rights litigation]”, said Lucas Feuser ’15, who is considering a career in the law. “Opportunities like these are what make the Chapel a sacred place.”

Harlow, now a partner at Pepper Hamilton LLP, also spoke to Sarah Strauss’s Constitutional Law class and the Gender & Sexuality Alliance (GSA), a student group.

“Opportunities like these are what make the Chapel a sacred place.” — Lucas Feuser ’15 “Harlow’s talk was exemplary in the clarity and depth of her thinking, her ability to convey important truths in a way that was accessible, moving, and inspiring,” said History Department Chair Erland Zygmuntowicz.

“The students who spent the extra session with Ms. Harlow were given an exceptional opportunity to explore questions of justice, law, and social change with a practitioner who had argued and won a landmark case before the Supreme Court.”

He thanked Dr. Strauss and the GSA for organizing Harlow’s visit, calling the event “a gift.”

FACULTY NOTES

A Milestone 33 Years in the Making

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n December, 33-year Packer veteran Storm Alexander ’15, Mike’s coGeorge Boutis reached a major captain along with Kamaal Palmer coaching achievement: his 300th ’15, connected the team’s strong Boys Varsity Basketball victory. performance early in the season to Mr. The decisive game was an exciting Boutis’s coaching style. “Mr. Boutis is contest against Columbia Prep, a team old school. He has this mentality of that Packer fell to last year. Going into toughness and grittiness, which I like. the game, Mr. Boutis did not mention Individually, we may not be as skillful to his players that he was one win away as some other teams. But with Mr. from three hundred. They fought hard Boutis, you can make up for your lack to build, and maintain, a significant of skill with hustle, with making the lead from the start — to the delight of most out of what you have.” dozens of fans in the stands.

After the win — which was greeted Columbia Prep “has an aggressive with customary cheers of Mis-ter style of play,” said Mr. Boutis. “But we Bou-tis! Mis-ter Bou-tis! — Athletic did a good job breaking their pressure, Director Darrin Fallick presented the which takes teamwork. We figured out winning coach with a basketball signed how to attack it in a productive way, by every player on the team. He noted and we got a lot of easy baskets.” The that Mr. Boutis was unusually successfinal score was 68-60. ful because he had reached the 300Facing a tough competitor at home victory milestone once before, when he in his first chance at clinching the coached Boys Varsity Soccer at Packer. milestone made for “a perfect storm” of “I’m very proud of him,” Mr. Fallick a win, said Mr. Boutis. said after the presentation. “It’s great that In addition to strategy, he attributed he’s got this second milestone, and I’m the team’s win to mental toughness. happy I’m here for it.”

“I’m pleasantly surprised at what we’ve His players were proud too — and done so far. We’ve already beaten two humbled. teams that we lost to last year. The “We’re incredibly lucky. It’s an honor players are strong, and they’re hungrier. to get to do this for him,” said Mike.

They have good chemistry.”

“When you think about all the amazing Co-captain Mike Wakin ’15 agreed. players and teams he’s had over the years “This year we’re able to trust in one to accumulate all those wins, and all he’s another to do our part. We genuinely done for the program — the fact that we like to play basketball with each other.” got to do this for him is just really cool.”

Two Upper School Deans had weddings in the summer of 2014.

Loryn (Croot) Evanoff, Eleventh Grade Dean and Upper School English teacher, married Raphe Evanoff. Roman Usatin, Twelfth Grade Dean and Upper School computer science teacher, married Cynthia Haq. Third Grade head teacher Kazia Musial-Aderer and instrumental music teacher Jeremy Udeen also tied the knot last summer — to each other!

On Halloween Eve, Upper School Laptop Specialist Michael Bekman married Lisa Gesson here in New York City.

In April, Amy Hand, Packer’s new math department Chair,

welcomed baby Angus (above left). In October, Upper School math teacher Kristin Cimini welcomed baby Josette Marisol Cimini (above right).

Upper School English and Journalism teacher Amy Montemerlo ran the New York City Marathon in November. A few weeks later, the Middle School’s new Latin teacher (and selfprofessed serial marathoner) Victoria Kalman ran her 26.2 miles in Philadelphia.

Congratulations to all!

WINTER 2015 | 5

Lessons from Sailing Help Students Navigate Learning hen she is not in the lab overseeing students, Upper School chemistry teacher Alice Lurain might well be at the helm of a J-24 sailboat racing down the Hudson River. Sailing is a lifelong passion of Dr. Lurain, who sailed on the lakes of Wisconsin as a child.

Rather than pursue sailing as a respite from teaching, Dr. Lurain brings the two together. In fact, it was in high school and college when she taught sailing to young people that she first considered a career as an educator. Today she

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Alice Lurain is the captain of a four-person racing team, XX-Factor — so named because it is the only team in the league with a female captain.

volunteers regularly with Hudson River Community Sailing (HRCS), a non-profit that offers math-and-science-based programs in sailing, boat building, and navigation to underserved high school students.

“Sailing builds valuable skills such as team work and patience, how to stay calm under pressure, when to take chances, how to lead effectively, and how to take orders,” she says. With both her HRCS students and her Packer students, Dr. Lurain creates an environment where kids can show their enthusiasm for science.

“It always strikes me how much kids have in common in the way they think, no matter their backgrounds. I believe every kid has an innate curiosity about the world. On the other hand, in high school, there’s often a veneer of ‘I’m too cool to get excited about learning.’ Even at Packer, where learning is considered pretty cool, science isn’t always thought of as the coolest subject.”

This is why Dr. Lurain places an emphasis on curiosity as the basis for learning. “Until students ask questions, they don’t know what they don’t know. In fact, they don’t really know what they do know, and they don’t really know what’s even possible to know. So it’s essential for students to know that they should ask questions, and to know that it’s okay to be wrong.”

But curiosity alone isn’t enough. One of the essential skills Dr. Lurain aims to help her students develop, whether they’re on the river or in the lab, is the ability to maintain their curiosity when the work becomes more challenging.

She herself first honed this skill as a young sailor.

“I’m an action-oriented person. I’m not somebody who likes to sit around and dwell on what’s not going well. If something’s not going well, I ask myself, What are some strategies I can use in this situation? That’s what I try to teach my students.”

Particularly at the beginning of each year, when students are more susceptible to discouragement, she spends significant class time discussing strategies for dealing with frustration when things go wrong.

“When students start to feel frustrated, my approach is to ask, ‘How can you change your point of view? When you get to this point, what are some steps you can take?’”

As all students know, learning isn’t always smooth sailing.

By helping them navigate the obstacles, Dr. Lurain gives her students the sense that they have the ability to figure things out — no matter what. In learning that skill, she says, “there’s real power.”

John Lord, Packer’s Director his early years at Packer: of Community Service and “Teaching French was always Sustainability, is leaving the fun because kids’ interests School at the end of January dictated the class. We put it to take a position overseein French and got to work.” ing youth programming and Mr. Lord deepened students’ outreach for St. Peter’s experiences in service. “My By-the-Sea in Narragansett, RI. goal was to connect service Mr. Lord has been making St. to curriculum and our broader Peter’s his summer parish for educational program as much several years. as possible.” He often shared A former language teacher, his view that service offers Mr. Lord fondly recalled three related opportunities:

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“learning about the community, learning about other people, and learning about yourself.”

Under his leadership, “Serve to Learn, Learn to Serve” became the mission of Packer’s service program.

“Ultimately, it’s about starting patterns that make life more fulfilling, interesting, and more sustainable,” he said.

We wish him the best in his new home and new endeavors.

DAVID READY

A Model of Service Bids Packer Adieu

Seniors’ Achievements Earn Honors n October, senior William Merrill received the 2014 Child Mind Institute’s Rising Scientist Award for his lab research in neurolinguistics — the study of the brain mechanisms that control the comprehension, production, and acquisition of language. Through Packer’s Independent Science Research Program, a three-year elective directed by Erin Schmitz and Lutz Holzinger, Will has interned weekly in a lab at New York University. His research investigates vernacular language formation — specifically, acronyms made popular by texting, such as LOL (“laughing out loud”).

For Will, the most satisfying aspect of the experience has been the success of the research itself.

“I’m proud that I was able to come up with an independent project and carry it through all the way. After I got the first round of results in, I was able to see that the findings were actually potentially significant.”

A portfolio of films jointly produced by seniors Leo Gallagher and Zachary Lobel was recognized by the National Young Arts

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Foundation, which identifies and supports the next generation of artists in the visual, literary, design and performing arts. Leo and Zack won for three films that they conceived, shot, and edited together, including a short documentary about artist John Clement P’24, P’26, which was featured in the Shen Gallery this fall [see page 28]. Friends since they met in First Grade, they have been filmmaking collaborators since Middle School.

Naya Joseph and Rhamel Robinson were named Outstanding Participants in the 2015 National Achievement Scholarship Program to honor exceptional Black American high school students.

Giovanna Armstrong was named a National Achievement Scholarship Program Semifinalist.

Jack Seibert was named a 2015 National Merit Scholarship Semifinalist, and Letters of Commendation were awarded to Giovanna Armstrong, Jackson Chaiken, Jasen Chan, Isabelle Furman, Lachlan MacIntyre, William Merrill, George Platt, Mark Steelman, and George Tolkachev.

William Merrill

Leo Gallagher and Zachary Lobel

VISITING WRITERS RIVET LOWER AND MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENTS Jay Asher took the Middle School by storm at a book giveaway and signing in the Blackburne Library in December. His young adult novel, New York Times bestseller Thirteen Reasons Why, has been a hit across the country for its anti-bullying theme.

Lower School students were beneficiaries of three author visits this fall.

Award-winning author Stuart Gibbs spoke to Packer’s Fourth Grade. Gibbs is the author of nine children’s books, including the recent Space Case, a lunar whodunit featuring a 12-year-old sleuth. He shared many surprising facts about life on a real-live spaceship, which he learned directly from a NASA astronaut and personal friend.

George Hagen also met with fourth grade students to talk about his book Gabriel Finley and the Raven’s Riddle, which has been hailed as a worthy successor to the Harry Potter series.

Julie Salomon visited with the Second Grade.

Author of the bestselling novel The Christmas Tree, she described her writing process and read from her first children’s book, Cat in the City.

A Middle School Jay Asher fan flips to the freshly signed title page of her copy of Thirteen Reasons Why.

WINTER 2015 | 7

Middle School Students Consider Gender Bias n an annual Middle School tradition, the day before In the final session, students discussed the gender ramifiThanksgiving break is devoted to exploring issues of cations of a handful of video clips that they viewed together, inequity in our society. This year’s exercise asked students including several viral marketing campaigns advocating to examine gender stereotypes. equal treatment of girls and women.

The day began with an assembly in which Ramón Javier, One girl shared her personal experience of being stereoDirector of Diversity and Equity, and Kristyn Dorfman, typed. “I do a lot of sports, and I’ve had people say to me, Middle School Diversity Coordinator ‘You run like a girl.’ Well, okay: I am a girl. So what does that and Librarian, explained the distinction mean? And now that I think of it, they said it like an insult between gender identity and biological — even though I won the race!” sex. Students then participated in a “There have been many times in gym class when I’m open, variety of exercises that encouraged but a boy will throw the ball to another boy,” acknowledged them to think critically about the role a second girl. of gender on perception and behavior.

In response to a video advocating science and math educaOne exercise asked students to select tion for girls, several boys spoke from their own experience toys for a boy and a girl; to place each in defense of their female classmates. One protested the selection on a gender continuum; and basic premise of the video. “It’s not true, because there are to consider what the toys at each end so many girls who are smart.” Another boy added, “I don’t of the spectrum suggested about the think it’s that girls are ‘peer-pressured’ out of science. I think constraints and pressures placed on girls’ it’s that women are expected to do household jobs.” and boys’ behavior.

“It’s a double standard,” concluded a girl. Heads nodded in Another exercise required the girls to agreement around the room. create an annotated half-portrait of a In many ways, the students’ analysis was more sophiststereotypical girl and asked the boys to cated than the campaigns they were analyzing.

In one exercise, girls created an annotated half-portrait of a stereodo the same for a stereotypical boy.

“I think it’s interesting that these videos were not made by typical girl while boys created a Students then shared their observasocial activists. They were made by corporations trying to corresponding portrait. In response to tions.

Both girls and boys expressed transfer good messages onto themselves,” said a boy. “I think a comment on the contrast between the two groups’ drawings, one boy said frustration with the limitations that it’s wrong of companies to use these messages to get women wryly, “Boys don’t ‘do’ color.” gender stereotypes place on each sex. to buy their products.”

“We’re obsessed with shopping and Middle School Dean of Student Life Coy Dailey, who clothes,” said a girl sardonically. “We dye our hair blonde organized the gender simulation, said that the day “helped and wear pink,” said another. “We’re consistently late and advance our daily conversations about equity at Packer and lazy,” said one boy. “We’re not generous,” said another. in society at large.”

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Remembering John F. Skillman Jr., Packer’s Sixth Head of School It is with deep sadness that we share the news that Jack served as Head of School for fourteen former Head of School John F. (Jack) Skillman Jr. years, until 1982. He played a significant role in passed away on December 15 in Scarborough, ME. expanding ethnic and racial diversity in student He died in hospice, surrounded by family. enrollment, hiring dynamic and talented faculty, Jack Skillman was born on May 16, 1934, and and expanding the dramatic arts programs. He grew up in New Haven, CT. He graduated from believed strongly in quality secondary education Yale University with a B.A. in English and an and endorsed an ethos that “promoted individual M.A.T. in Teaching. and group honesty, perseverance, excellence, Jack Skillman Jack was only 34 years old when Packer’s Board responsibility, challenge, and human support and (1934–2014) of Trustees selected him to succeed Paul D. Shafer acceptance.” as Packer’s sixth Head of School in 1968. At that Jack is survived by his former spouse of 35 time, Packer had been a preemininent girls’ school for over a years, Sally (Cott) Skillman of Brunswick, ME, their three century and a women’s junior college for almost six decades. adult children, Gregory Skillman, Mark Skillman, and Lee Skillman ’80, and two grandchildren.

Under Jack’s leadership, the school dismantled the junior In accordance with the wishes of his family, those who college program and became coeducational in every division would like to make donations in memory of Jack Skillman in 1972. Jack also oversaw the purchase of St. Ann’s Church, are encouraged to give to The Packer Collegiate Institute. which was converted to the Middle School after his tenure.

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n September, after a highly successful decade and a half, Director of Development Lynn Bunis left Packer to move to Miami.

Her husband, Al Bunis, had accepted the position of Senior Pastor of Plymouth Congregational Church in Coconut Grove.

From 1999 through 2014, Lynn helped raise $45 million for the School, including $11.5 million for the conversion of St. Ann’s Church [see page 21].

During Lynn’s tenure as Director of Development,

Annual Giving at the School increased from $700,000 to a record-breaking $2.6 million last year. She also played a major role in increasing the endowment by $10.8 million in the recent Ensuring Continued Excellence campaign.

“Lynn has been a valuable source of advice and counsel to me and one of the people on whom I most closely rely,” said Dr. Dennis.

“Lynn was so successful because she understood that our work is about relationships,” said Dona

Laughlin, Director of Alumni. “She cared about the people of our community — past, present, and future.”

Lynn is also the mother of two Packer graduates, Gregory Bunis ’08 and Alison Bunis ’12, and her many ties to the school remain strong.

Dr. Dennis called the Director of Development position “one of the most important roles in the School.” He and the Board are conducting a national search for Lynn’s successor.

ALICE BRUCHHAUSEN SCHENCK ‘63 IVAC

Packer’s Fundraiser-in-Chief Departs after Fifteen Years

Lynn Bunis and her husband Al enjoying some Miami sunshine in November.

IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Screen Star Offers Insights on Acting The film and television actress Kim Raver P’21, P’26 led Jen Nails’s seventh grade theater class in a workshop on improvisation. A star of many hit shows, including “24” and “Grey’s Anatomy,” Ms. Raver observed every student in action, offering specific feedback and demonstrating possible approaches.

Dylan Fineman ’20, who played Rooster in the Middle School’s production of “Annie Jr.” in October, enjoyed the workshop. “She showed us different ways to do character-building. It was cool.”

Ms. Raver, mother to Leo and Luke, first and sixth graders respectively, spoke with passion and commitment about the craft of acting. She emphasized the importance of making deliberate choices on stage and committing “heart and soul” to one’s role, whether a lead or a bit part. She also spoke about the discipline that acting requires.

“She conveyed to my students that they have to take theater quite seriously if they want to be successful at it,” said Ms. Nails. “But her passion also made it clear that acting can be incredibly fulfilling in spite of the work.”

Walk into Packer’s copy center on a quiet afternoon and you might see fashion models — photographs of fashion models, that is — on the desktop screensaver of Copy Center Coordinator Raoul Brown.

A professional photographer who specializes in high-concept portraits, Raoul recently turned his lens on Dr. Dennis at the request of The Packer Magazine.

He selected three Packer locations to feature, including the newly renovated Tower. The results of that session can be seen on page 3 of this issue.

Raoul setting up a shot at the base of the Tower, with Jack Freedman ’15 assisting.

WINTER 2015 | 9

{ PERFORMING ARTS }

Middle School Choral Concert

3rd and 4th Grade Winter Sing >

Wind Symphony

Middle School Musical: “Annie Jr.”

1st and 2nd Grade Winter Sing

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Upper School Play: “The Importance of Being Earnest”

Upper School Choral Concert

Middle and Upper School Strings Concert

Kindergarten Fall Sing

WINTER 2015 | 11

{ ATHLETICS }

Girls Soccer This was an excellent season for the girls, who completed the 2014 season with a decisive 14-3-1 record overall and a 7-1-1 record in the AAIS league. They earned a 2nd place finish in the regular season of the AAIS league but were the AAIS playoff champions.

The season was one of many exciting firsts. The team defeated Poly Prep for the first time ever in Head Coach Rich Domanico’s estimation. In fact, the team defeated all four of Packer’s Brooklyn rivals — Berkeley Carroll (2-0), Saint Ann’s (5-1), Poly Prep (1-0), and Brooklyn Friends (5-1) — for the first time in a single season. As a team, they scored 56 goals and gave up only 16 goals.

“It was truly a tremendous season, marked by a team that worked extremely hard from the very first practice back in August,” said Coach Domanico. “The crowning achievement was the run that the team made in the AAIS playoffs. In the quarterfinals, we defeated St. Ann’s 4-0, in the semi-finals we defeated Chapin 2-1, and then in the championship game, we defeated the top seed Marymount 2-0. Since Marymount defeated us 2-0 in the regular season, it was very gratifying to find a strategy to defeat them in such an important game.”

Coach Domanico praised the team’s cohesion, which he attributed to the leadership of its five seniors: captains Chloe Wallack and Alexandra Johnson, plus Maddie McKnight, Lily Carruthers, and Ariel Rissman. “They created a wonderful environment and camaraderie for the team to succeed.”

He noted the maturity of the players’ style as well. “We played a very unselfish brand of soccer. Our passing game was terrific, as we advanced the ball with precision from one end

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of the field to the other. In my opinion, that had a lot to do with the relationships that developed from day one.”

Individual performances were also outstanding. Leading scorers this season were Chloe Wallack with 18 goals and 9 assists and junior Sara Van Horn with 13 goals and 11 assists.

Chloe Wallack ’15 and Sara Van Horn ’16 were Packer’s 2014 ACIS All-Stars.

Cross Country This was a season of strong individual performances, due in part to the loss of key runners who graduated last spring and the consequently small 2014 team. “They worked very hard this year,” said Head Coach Fred Benlein, who was assisted by recent graduate Stephen Manternach ’13. At the ACIS Championships, the team finished 2nd but didn’t have enough girls this year to qualify as a scoring team. At the NYSAIS Championships, the last team meet of the season, every single member of the team ran a best time.

Given that only a few of Packer’s runners had more than a year of cross-country experience, there was a lot for Coach Benlein to be proud of. “We did great as individuals,” he said.

On the boys’ side, sophomore Graham Rainsby ’17 placed first in all five ACIS meets of the season and was the ACIS champion. At the New York City-wide Mayors Cup Championships, Graham placed 5th. At the Footlocker Northeast Championships, he was the 9th sophomore in New York State and the 39th runner overall, with a seasonbest finish of 17:56.77. Emil Hottenroth ’15 placed 7th at the NYSAIS Championships and Trey Davis ’17 placed 8th.

<< Girls Soccer players after a 5-1 win over St. Ann’s, midway through their championshipwinning season. < Graham Rainsby ’17 finishing first at the ACIS Championship.

<<

Boys Soccer captain Nathan Fishbein ’16 outpaces a St. Ann’s defender.

<

Girls Volleyball “really understood how to compete as a team. They learned to cheer and support each other no matter who was on the court.”

On the girls’ side, Sophomore Isobel McCrum ’17 placed 2nd at the ACIS Championships and 28th at the NYSAIS Championships, with a season-best time of 22:35.48. Freshman Audrey Aberg was 5th at the ACIS Championships and received medals at two Northeast invitationals in freshman class races.

Graham Rainsby ’17 was named to the Footlocker All-New York Team. Emil Hottenroth ’15, Isobel McCrum ’17, Graham Rainsby ’17, and Audrey Aberg ’18 were ACIS All-Stars.

Girls Volleyball Packer’s Girls Volleyball team finished the season strong, moving up from last year to 7th place in the league. Their record was 3-6 in the ACIS league. In the first round of the ACIS playoff, the girls defeated Hewitt convincingly. In the next round, they raised a valiant fight but came up short against Spence, the eventual league champion.

Head Coach Danny Yin praised the girls’ teamwork. “The season highlight was when they really understood how to compete as a team. They learned to cheer and support each other no matter who was on the court.” He particularly noted the team’s two seniors, Nayeli Gilbertson and Tenieya Hinds. “They were both great leaders for the team.” “[Overall] the girls had a lot of fun. They are looking forward to building on the improvements of this year in the next season,” said Coach Yin. Nayeli Gilbertson ’15 and Logan Blunt ’16 were ACIS All-Stars.

Boys Soccer Continuing to rebuild from a powerhouse squad two seasons ago, Boys Varsity Soccer concluded with a 3-10 record this fall. Despite the disappointment of a challenging season, the boys played with energy and determination, winning a particularly tough game against Berkeley Carroll.

Coach Pierre praised the boys for their toughness in a nail-biter. “We were down by a goal early in the first half.

Packer tied the game towards the end of the first half. Then, right after the half, Berkeley Carroll scored again within minutes, making the score 1-2. But the boys fought back and were able to tie it up. The score held at 2-2. Then, with one minute to go before the end of the game, Packer’s offense was able to penetrate Berkeley Carroll’s defense, giving us a 3-2 victory.”

Thanks to a number of challenging but valuable experiences this seasons, Coach Pierre says that the future looks bright for the team. He predicts they will be hungrier for success, and have greater maturity and depth. “I’m already planning how to prepare them in pre-season next August.”

Nathan Fishbein ’16 and Lucas Kimball ’15 were ACIS All-Stars this season.

WINTER 2015 | 13

Clockwise from top left: a unique Middle School homeroom; glass and Gothic arches in the Belle Alenick Baier Atrium; two original wooden staircases where Founderâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Hall meets the Science Building; and the Garden exterior of Alumnae Hall, now excavated and indoors.

Building History GROWTH AND CHANGE ON PACKER’S CAMPUS

BY KARIN STORM WOOD

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indows that overlook interiors. Ancientlooking staircases that are adjacent yet inexplicably at perpendiculars. Buildings with names nobody quite knows but whose initials grace every room number. Light that streams through stainedglass windows at all hours. A Gothic sanctuary concealing jaunty angles and sheer glass walls. A prominent tower that is nearly impossible to locate from within.

How did Packer get this way?

Though its staircases do not move, Packer is justifiably compared to Hogwarts, the labyrinthine school of wizardry attended by Harry Potter. Packer’s campus indeed has a magical, and perplexing, quality. For newcomers, walking from one end of the School to another often means straining to envision a three-dimensional picture of the campus.

Almost as often, it means getting temporarily lost, turned around, or faced with an unexpected dead end.

The New York Times’s “Streetscapes” reporter Christopher Grey wrote of Packer in 2002: “A walk through the main building is like a trip back in time.” He could have just as correctly stated that it is a trip through time, spanning over a century from the Science Building to the gym.

DECONSTRUCTING PACKER The story of Packer’s physical space begins before any of the present-day structures were built.

In the early 1850s, The Brooklyn Female Academy was less than a decade old and was housed in a new Greek Revival building on Joralemon Street [see figure 1, next page]. At that time, Brooklyn Heights was a bucolic neighborhood dotted with stately homes, many with large gardens. Drinking water was drawn from public wells on street corners.

Before dawn on New Year’s Day, 1853 — five years before a water system was established in the borough — the School burned to the ground. Apparently, when the nearby City Hall bell was first rung in alarm, firefighters believed it signaled a fire from which they had

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2 Founder’s Hall, the original structure of The Packer Collegiate Institute, opened in 1854. The location of the Chapel, which occupies part of the third and fourth floors, is indicated by a white line. Note the observatory atop the Tower, where Packer’s young women once studied astronomy.

1 The Brooklyn Female Academy building opened in 1846. Only seven years later, it burned to the ground.

just returned, and a dense fog prevented them from seeing the fire on Joralemon Street.

Two days later, the Trustees of the destroyed Academy received a letter promising $65,000 to rebuild the School — the largest-ever gift to girls’ education at that time. It was signed by the 32-year-old widow of a former Trustee of The Brooklyn Female Academy: Harriet L. Packer.

Though Mrs. Packer made the astounding gift in her husband’s memory, The Packer Collegiate Institute — which would be an all-girls institution for another century — remains associated more with her than with him. Indeed, for the past 103 years, Founder’s Day pays tribute to Harriet Packer in early November, on or near her birthday.

It was Harriet Packer who selected the person to design the new building, which came to be known as Founder’s Hall. Besides the gift itself, her choice of Minard Lafever (1798-1854), one of the nation’s most influential architects, was her most lasting effect on Packer’s physical character.

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3 Despite the eccentricities of Lafever’s design for the exterior of Founder’s Hall, the interior grid was orderly and remains largely intact to this day. However, of the three original grand staircases, only the left-hand one still remains.

Lafever’s design bore little resemblance to the original building. An imposing brick structure in the Tudor Gothic style, Founder’s Hall might be an eccentric castle, with its crenellated parapets, uneven towers, off-center gables, and its mix of squared and arched windows [2]. Or, with its mismatched pair of two-story-high Gothic windows, it might be a castle that swallowed a church. (Indeed, Lafever modeled the large pointed window above the front entrance on the doorway of a 15th-century church in Rouen, France.) Architectural historian Andrew Dolkart has called Founder’s Hall “one of the earliest and most sophisticated evocations of English-inspired Collegiate Gothic, creating the educational atmosphere of Oxford and Cambridge.’’

Despite the orderly grid dividing the building’s interior into neat quadrants [3], further surprises await. Minard’s design for a two-story-high Chapel was unusual in two respects: its wide proportions and its location on the third and fourth floors rather than at ground level.

1887

4 The independently-owned Packer Boarding House, partially visible at the far right of this photograph, stood beside Founder’s Hall until 1907.

The 1887 addition is visible to the far left.

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The initials above correspond to the buildings’ names, which are also reflected in the numbering system that is used today for classrooms and offices. For example, F405 is on the fourth floor of Founder’s Hall.

5 The 1887 addition, now called the Science Building, was covered in ivy for decades.

But the labyrinthine quality that we associate with Packer today was still a long way off. Founder’s Hall, that single imposing building, was the full extent of Packer for nearly 40 years. The so-called Packer Boarding House, where students from other parts of the state and country lived, stood to the west of Founder’s Hall, toward Clinton Street [4]. Privately owned, it was not officially part of the institution.

In the late 1880s, the School’s growing commitment to science education and physical education for girls led to the creation of a new building on the lot to the east, toward Court Street, where the home of Packer’s first President, Dr. Alonzo Crittenden, once stood. (He made his new residence in an 1884 townhouse on Livingston Street, which today is the Garden House.) The addition, designed by Napoleon LeBrun, echoed Mrs. Packer’s favored Gothic style [4, 5]. Now known as the Science Building, it housed a chemical laboratory [6], a physics classroom and lecture room, and a then-state-of-the-art gymnasium [7] to replace [continued on page 20]

6 A chemistry class in 1935.

7 A 1945 physical education class in the gymnasium of the 1887 building (now the location of the second grade suite).

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MIDDLE SCHOOL built 1869 purchased 1967 opened 2003

COMMONS built 1869 purchased 1967 opened 2003

BELLE ALENICK BAIER ATRIUM 2003

GARDEN HOUSE 1884

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100 CLINTON STREET purchased 2014

PRATT HALL 1957

ALUMNAE HALL 1907

FOUNDER’S HALL 1854

SCIENCE BUILDING 1887

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8 Alumnae Hall, seen at right in the drawing above, was built in 1907. That same year, the astronomy observatory on top of the Tower was dismantled, having been rendered useless by vibrations caused by the newly-constructed subway tunnel below.

9 To prevent the stained-glass windows on the Chapel’s west wall from being darkened by the addition of Alumnae Hall, a small light well was created between the two buildings. The exterior of those windows are now partially visible from the Upper School English office — if one knows to look up.

10 This 1910 photograph shows the garden facade of Alumnae Hall, at right. When the Belle Alenick Baier Atrium was added in 2003, that facade became an interior wall. Today, the ground-floor windows of Alumnae Hall, indicated with white lines, are part of the Upper School Office and look onto the Upper School Student Center.

20 | THE PACKER MAGAZINE

the gymnasium in the basement of Founder’s Hall. In fact, the archway between the two buildings, which still stands outside 180 Joralemon Street, was called Gymnasium Gate.

In 1903 the Alumnae Association raised funds to erect a third building, this time on the site of the boarding house, which the School purchased and demolished. Designed by the son of Napoleon LeBrun, Alumnae Hall [8–10] also echoes the Gothic style of Founder’s Hall. Blackburne Library [11] is original to LeBrun’s plan, though not much else is. The flat roof of Alumnae Hall once featured an openair gymnasium for student exercise [12], and the basement housed the School’s primary lunchroom until 2003 [13].

Fifty years later, in advance of Packer’s centennial, plans were drawn up for a four-story Gothic-style building on the corner of Joralemon and Clinton Streets, replacing the School’s walled playground. However, by the time it was built [14], the facade of Pratt Hall — so named because it was principally the gift of Katherine Sloan Pratt, Class of 1898 — had been greatly simplified. Today it is the only

11 Many furnishings in the library on the first floor of Alumnae Hall, now known as Blackburne Library, have been preserved for over 100 years.

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12 At the beginning of the 20th century, active recreation on the manicured lawns of the Garden was not allowed. But the roof of Alumnae Hall, seen here in 1911, permitted regular outdoor exercise. Today it is the location of the “Penthouse.”

13 For nearly 100 years, the basement of Alumnae Hall housed Packer’s lunchroom, seen here in the 1940s. Today it is the Middle School Theater.

Packer building with a modern exterior [15]. When it opened in 1957, its two main features — the Pratt Theatre and the second-floor gymnasium — added significantly to the School’s facilities. It wasn’t until the 1970s that the enclosed Livingston Gym was added to the roof.

Just over a decade later, Packer continued its southward expansion along Clinton by purchasing the former St. Ann’s Episcopal Church and Parish House. St. Ann’s dates back to 1869, just 15 years after Founder’s Hall, and was designed by James Renwick Jr., the architect of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan. The resources necessary to convert the church into an effective teaching space did not materialize quickly.

For several decades, only the church’s undercroft and the parish house were used, while the sanctuary stood empty except for Christmas pageants and other performances. At various points, the School considered selling the property.

Fortunately, Packer ultimately secured the necessary capital, and by 2003 the campus was again transformed. In an ambitious and award-winning $23 million renovation by

14 A worker rests during the 1957 construction of Pratt Hall. St. Ann’s Church and Parish House are visible in the background. Alumnae Hall is partially visible to the left.

15 Pratt Hall (at the far right of this composite image from 2012) houses the Pratt Theatre and main gymnasium. The Livingston Gym replaced the roof playspace in the 1970s.

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What’s Your Favorite Space at Packer?

W H E N I W A S RE A L LY YO UNG , my favorite place was the “roof gym” — just a great, simple, outdoor paved space on the top of Pratt Hall. I remember playing softball there in the springtime, which was the happiest time of the year for me.

As I got older, the Pratt Theatre became my favorite place because it was the scene of most of my best memories of Packer and my own greatest accomplishments. Many of us spent thousands of hours there doing amazing work.

The old St. Ann’s sanctuary was another favorite of ours — dark, a little scary, verboten, and irresistible!

Today, watching the kids play in the Garden, in the morning and after pick-up, is sheer joy. I want to freeze these wonderful moments in time.

I never cease to be amazed at how Packer has evolved. For instance, the school didn’t know what to do with St. Ann’s Church for years. Its transformation has been remarkable.

Last but not least: Blackburne Library has proven to be a very nice and inviting place to hold a party for alumni!

— Geoffrey Brewer ’82, P’26 President of the Alumni Association

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W HE N I W AS A ST UDENT , my favorite place at Packer was the Chapel — and that’s still true today. It’s hard to deny the magic of the Chapel. It’s a space that comforts and inspires at the same time.

Back when I was a kid scampering around the halls of Packer, I loved the wooden stairs leading up from the Lower School classrooms [in the undercroft of St. Ann’s Church]. As I recall, these stairs were very narrow and spiral, and I believe at one point they were covered with a thin, winecolored carpet. At the top of the stairs was a landing that led to the dance studio. But to the side, there was a door that opened up directly into the wide expanse of the church. In those days, the church was used only for special events like the Christmas pageant (an old-school Packer classic).

To this day, I remember the thrill of walking through that side door and into the enormous church, with its imposing stained glass and seemingly endless rows of wooden pews.

MY FAVORIT E SPACE AT PACK ER is discreet, small — a space you wouldn’t notice if you weren’t searching. There are two windows in the hallway leading from the Student Center to the main building, and through these windows you can see the Lower School Library.

More than any other space at Packer, the Ruth Blackburne Library always felt warm and inviting. As a student in the Upper School, I volunteered there, reading to kids and shelving books, watching kids discover the same love of reading that I had found. In high school, when I was having a bad day or feeling discouraged, I could always glance through the window in the hallway and smile at the learning and growing going on there.

This aspect of Packer will never change. Though the building changes — and I don’t always like it, or it doesn’t always feel familiar — the feeling of warmth and comfort won’t go away.

— Sarah Jensen ’13

— Jessica Rose ’91, P’26, P’29

WHAT ’S YOUR FAVORIT E SPACE AT PACK E R? Tell us at www.facebook.com/ PackerCollegiate

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16 In the Middle School, a contemporary structure housing classrooms and offices gleams amid colorful Gothic details. The ambitious design won a number of awards, including a preservation award from the New York Landmarks Conservancy.

Hardy Holzman Pfeiffer Associates, St. Ann’s Church was converted into the present-day Middle School, while the parish house became the Commons and, on the upper level, the Carol Shen Gallery.

St. Ann’s exterior was left largely unchanged, but the interior was significantly altered: the nave became a shell for a central stack of classrooms. Passageways on the outer edges of that stack were open to nearly the full height of the building [16]. This unusual design — in which many interior windows look onto open spaces — reflects both aesthetic and pedagogical considerations: it preserves a sense of the structure’s vast size while also providing opportunities for faculty to observe the students in their daily routines without adult interference.

Because the St. Ann’s property was not quite adjacent to the School’s existing buildings, the architects enclosed the northwest corner of the Garden (where students once played basketball), creating a glass-walled atrium to link the structures [17].

17 The Belle Alenick Baier Atrium and adjoining patio stand in the northwest corner of the Garden, above music rooms also built in 2003. Compare to picture 10 on page 20.

WINTER 2015 | 23

Transformation Amid Tradition EIGHT YEARS OF RENOVATION — AND COUNTING

N E V E R B E FO RE H A S PACKE R enjoyed a greater commitment to the preservation and renovation of its historic spaces than it does under the leadership of Head of School Bruce L. Dennis. Over his eleven-year tenure so far, Dr. Dennis and the Board of Trustees have guided the transformation

of nearly all of Packer’s facilities except the Middle School (to which a mezzanine level will be added this year). In addition to preservation work on the exteriors and upgrades to the School’s digital infrastructure, nearly every summer over the past eight years has seen significant upgrades.

2007 Girls’ and Boys’ Locker Rooms

2008 Fifth Floor Art Studio, Digital Video Lab, and Darkroom Second Grade Classroom

2010 Chemistry Laboratories

2011 Biology Laboratories and workspace for Science faculty Lower School Science Laboratory

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Entrance and Main Hall [1] Physics Laboratories [2] Admissions Office Athletics Office

2 013 Upper School [3] The “Penthouse”

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COMING IN 2015 Middle School Mezzanine Fifth Floor Classrooms Upper School Office

COMING IN 2017 100 Clinton Street

COMING IN 2018 Garden House Kindergarten Suite (repurposed) 3

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Last summer, in partnership with Hudson Studio Architects, the School undertook an ambitious project: the gut renovation of the Lower School, which occupies the second and some of the third floors of “the main building” (i.e., Founder’s Hall and Alumnae Hall). Well-lit and inviting open spaces [4] and newly configured breakout rooms, including a dedicated space for math and literacy coaching [5], have made smallgroup work and professional development

more accessible. Classrooms at the 1st, 3rd, and 4th-grade levels are now located together. Vibrant new smartboards and document cameras are integrated into every classroom, allowing for interactive demonstrations in all subjects.

“The new space has enabled us to do the kinds of teaching that we are committed to with our youngest students,” said Jansen Po, Head of Preschool and Lower School. “Frankly, it’s awesome.”

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PHOTOS: MICHAEL MORAN

ENHANCED TEACHING AND LEARNING IN THE LOWER SCHOOL

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18 Built in the early 20th century for retail and office use, 100 Clinton Street is a 12,000-square-foot property, with generous windows along its entire frontage and nearly 4,000 square feet of roof space.

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MORE C AMP US P H O TO S O N LIN E www.packer.edu/campus

19 The Garden House, a 1884 townhouse that was for many years the residence of the Head of School, will be repurposed for use by all divisions after the Preschool and Kindergarten have moved to 100 Clinton Street.

LOOKING FORW ARD In the fall of 2014, Packer’s Board of Trustees initiated the purchase of 100 Clinton Street, a property one block north of the School [18]. The building will house Packer’s Preschool and Kindergarten. “We will be able to provide more spacious and modern classrooms that are aligned with the latest research on the developmental and cognitive needs of this age group,” said Head of School Bruce L. Dennis.

Construction will begin in early 2016, and the facility will open in Fall 2017. The building will be designed in conjunction with Hudson Studio Architects, who have guided all major renovations to the School since 2010.

Because the Garden House [19] and current Kindergarten Suite in Founder’s Hall will be vacated, the purchase will also achieve two important strategic and programmatic goals on Joralemon Street: giving the existing educational program more space to operate effectively, and supporting innovative teaching practices in all three divisions, particularly interdisciplinary initiatives and project-based learning. Potential uses for the space include: flexible-format classrooms,

exhibition and presentation space, and spaces designed to support collaboration, research, and experiential learning.

There are no plans to increase enrollment.

Head of Middle School Noah Reinhardt compared the present moment to a decade and a half ago when the plan to renovate St. Ann’s moved forward. “I remember how exciting it was to imagine what we could do with that new, extraordinary space — and then to actually move in and make it home. For the first time since then, we have the chance to ask ourselves how we might use the space that will open up here.” Trustees, faculty, and administrators will determine how the space can best support and transform the educational program that Packer offers, “for generations to come,” Mr. Reinhardt added.

For 170 years, Packer has been committed to providing the best education in spaces that are both state-of-the-art and beautiful. The purchase of 100 Clinton Street may be the School’s first acquisition in nearly half a century, but it is also the latest chapter in a history of meaningful growth.

WINTER 2015 | 25

Hidden in Plain Sight KEN R U SH’ S PAC K ER

When it comes to knowledge of the School’s art and architectural history, visual arts teacher Ken Rush is beyond compare. Here he takes The Packer Magazine on a virtual tour of some of Packer’s most beautiful spaces and reveals their secrets.

have walked up the front steps since 1854, when Founder’s Hall was built.

W H A T’ S H I D D E N A T PA C K E R is really hidden in plain sight.

Packer’s campus consists of magnificent mid- and late-19th century architecture. It’s very much living today as we go about our daily affairs at the School.

Even as it has been modernized to address today’s needs, it has an unmistakeable atmosphere of tradition. The School has been very careful over the years, particularly in recent renovations, to respect the architectural integrity of these buildings.

And these buildings have a soul. That soul lies in their initial intent and design, but also in all of the students and faculty who

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INSIDE , W HE N YOU W AL K a few flights up the main wooden staircase — which, like the front steps, is original and therefore over 160

You’re sitting in the Chapel, and the pews will creak. You may not realize that in the last twenty years every pew has been rebuilt and reinforced. But nonetheless, the original wood is still what’s holding you up. Students may not find the pews especially

The Chapel’s columns are structural and made out of wood [1]. The original building didn’t use steel or iron, or certainly not much of it. It’s more or less a masonry and timber building. So in the Chapel, the columns and the vaults, and what appear to be

years old — you really have a sense of all the generations that have come before you.

So, too, when you enter the Chapel and sit down in one of the pews. It’s not just that you are sitting in an auditorium.

You’re sitting in a very special space, in a pew made out of New England white pine that was cut and installed in 1854. They are enormous pine planks, some of them up to 18 and 20 inches in width, which were stained to look as if they were walnut, or even mahogany. Details like that tell us that the School had a magnificent vision as well as some economic restraints!

comfortable today, but just imagine twenty years ago when they had no cushions!

You look around, and you find yourself within a space that was designed more or less to be the large and yet intimate heart of the School.

The Chapel is up on the third floor. It’s an extremely wide chapel, so immediately you feel the surround. You feel that people are around you and in the balcony. You don’t feel that you are isolated way up in front with everybody else way in the back, as you might if you were in a chapel with a narrow, more customary nave.

ribbing, are wooden supports that have been built out with lathe and essentially plastered. This is much easier material to work with. The vaulting is not structural, but because it is finished to look like stone, it appears to be structural. All the beautiful moldings around the school are also plaster, many of them original, dating back to the 1850s.

Some things are missing from the Chapel. First of all, the original windows did not look like the late-19th century Tiffany windows we admire today. The Gothic lancet shape of the windows is the same, but originally there were frosted glass panes that let

in a tremendous amount of light.

Two of them remain in the rear left corner of the balcony above and below the alcoves [2].

The Chapel went through its biggest change when the School commissioned the finest designer of stained glass in America, Louis Comfort Tiffany, to replace the frosted glass in the lancet windows. The Tiffany workshop created a series of windows running through the lancets — with the humanities and sciences to the south, or left, and Alma Mater, dedicated to Harriet Packer, to the north, or right [3]. To the west,

where once was another Gothic lancet window.

That window was filled in and the mosaic installed when Alumnae Hall was built right up against that front wall of the Chapel. To prevent the two windows behind the stage from losing their lighting completely, a lightwell was created between the two buildings. And more recently, the School installed exterior lighting for evening performances.

Today, one can really only see the exterior of those windows from the English Department office [see page 20].

The Tower has just been extraordinarily rebuilt and renovated, with a new spiral staircase made of steel and gorgeous solid mahogany windows. While it’s not yet freely accessible to students, it’s ready to be put to all kinds of imaginative purposes by the faculty and administration — whether to bring students up to draw or write poetry, or for quiet meditation, or maybe

When Harriet Packer made her generous gift to the School, she selected an architect whom she felt could capture the spirit and intention of what would happen within that building — which was of course the very good and progressive education of young women and girls. That same purposefulness drives Packer’s vintage architecture, as well as its improvements. The buildings have a nurturing quality that comes only from spaces that have been built to make people feel comfortable and feel glad to be there.

or front, there are three very interesting windows. My personal favorite, simply called “Hope,” is almost a pre-Raphaelite painting [4]. The other two to the front are behind the stage: a scene from Dante’s Divine Comedy and a window dedicated to a student who perished at a young age.

Facing that front wall, one may not notice one of the real treasures hidden right before us: a Tiffany-glass mosaic to the right of the stage [5]. It’s poorly lit and needs some care, but it’s a wonderful landscape dedicated to an alumna. It depicts a New England forest, with birch trees and a sliver of a lake. That mosaic lies

THE TOW E R HAS BE E N in plain sight

even for a small party. The views stretch across Brooklyn and Manhattan to New Jersey. I’ve brought several of my art classes up there to draw [7]. The Upper School Astronomy Club has been up there as well. It’s a magnificent and inspiring space.

Every time we change Packer, we need to respect those original intentions. And we have done that, even in the new science labs. Instead of being just cuttingedge and efficient, the new labs are also warm and beautiful, with the original moldings, windows, and high ceilings.

After 37 years, I know when I come to school every day, I have extraordinary spaces to receive and welcome me. And on top of that — these wonderful kids and colleagues.

since 1854, yet hidden away for decades [6]. Its interior has been closed for about 50 years.

From the 1850s to the very early 1900s, when the subway was built under Joralemon Street, the Tower had an observatory on top [see pages 16 and 17]. But the vibrations caused by trains rolling in and out of the Borough Hall station made stargazing impossible. Of course in the last hundred years, the light in the city sky has increased to the point where only on the clearest night can you see more than the brightest stars and constellations, and perhaps a few planets.

PACK ER IS FAR MORE T HAN a series of historic buildings and the work of fine architects, of course.

Packer is a school filled with children and adults — and a few old-timers like myself.

It’s full of people, and it has all of these different functions. And it works like a living organism: there’s a flow and there’s a pace.

MORE ‘HIDDEN PACK E R’ O N LIN E www.packer.edu/hidden

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LIZ TITONE

rt Seen From Many Angles in between the atrium overlook and the second floor of the Middle School lies a serene exhibition space: the Carol Shen Gallery. Passing through it at any time of year, one can encounter a variety of art forms on display â&#x20AC;&#x201D; prints, photographs, paintings, drawings, comics, or sculpture. One might also encounter a physical education, science, or English class.

The Shen, as it is known by students and faculty alike, is a teaching gallery. It exists to offer students and faculty in every division alternate platforms for engaging in learning. Through the efforts of Elizabeth Eagle and Ken Rush, visual arts teachers who serve as Gallery Coordinators, the artworks that come to the Shen are selected in part for their resonance across a variety of disciplines. During visits to the Gallery, students are encouraged to discover interdisciplinary connections between visual art and their studies in the sciences, the performing arts, world languages, mathematics, history, and literature. In a sense, the Shen Gallery offers 28 | THE PACKER MAGAZINE

LIZ TITONE

MUSEUM EDUC ATI ON EXPLAINED

BY LIZ TI TONE

students field trips within the walls of their own school, with an emphasis on interdisciplinary learning.

Faculty have the option to bring a class to the gallery to meet the artist when he or she is “in residence” at Packer, or to consult with Packer’s in-house Museum Educator, Liz Titone, who creates lessons that help students engage with the exhibitions intellectually and experientially through the lens of a particular discipline [see “Museum Education Explained”].

This fall’s two exhibitions brought a great deal of activity to the Shen Galley. The massive curvilinear steel sculptures of John Clement P’24, P’26 were featured in Fresh Eyes, curated by Ms. Eagle [1]. Fresh Eyes was a first, and highly successful, foray into large-scale sculpture. A wide range of classes came to explore and interact with the imposing pieces, from physical education, art, and math in the Lower School, to FreshArts and physics in the Upper School. John Clement also hosted students during a two-day residency.

Clement’s sculptures generated a strong response across the student body, and even inspired interdisciplinary collaboration in the form of a sound and movement installation to be performed in Clement’s warehouse-sized studio in Queens this coming spring [see “Interdisciplinary Learning Takes Flight”].

Following Fresh Eyes was The Ride Together: A Brother and Sister’s Memoir of Autism in the Family, an exhibition of the comics of Paul Karasik [2], a cartoonist and a former

As Packer’s Museum Educator, I work with the wide range of exhibits that come to the Shen Gallery to create out-of-the-classroom learning experiences for students at all grade levels. With each group of students that comes to the Shen, I start with a specific question, from which we collaboratively build a deeper, more contextualized understanding of the art. The conversation or exercise relates directly to an aspect of the students’ regular curricular work.

Designing curricula for exhibitions appeals to the part of me that loves to solve problems and satisfies my creative itch as an artist. As anyone in education can testify, teaching is a hugely creative process.

I often start my research several months before the show is announced to the faculty. I generate themes to explore through activities that are appropriate for learners of all ages, and propose my ideas to various faculty. Sometimes I distribute a list of themes that the exhibit can illuminate for students.

At the basis of nearly all museum education is visual literacy. Through sight we unpack the information around us, parsing it and making sense of it. Hands-on guidance in this discipline builds students’ confidence in “reading” visual clues and adds to their analytical skill set.

The experiences I design for the students draw upon a combination of literacies — verbal, visual, and kinetic — to help them process and

engage with concepts that might otherwise remain somewhat abstract.

Because the subject matter changes with each exhibition, so do the demands on my knowledge.

Sometimes my learning curve even parallels the students’. To design the curriculum for the show Mysteries in Science, I had to study a number of physics topics. Starting from scratch in this way is often useful: it makes me sensitive to the students’ perspective. In this case, our group discussions about the art evolved into a collection of principles of gravity that the students used to create collaborative paintings.

Another example of an interdisciplinary lesson was “The Human Animal Project,” created with Eric Weisberg. We began by studying characteristics in an exhibit of animal engravings. Each of Mr. Weisberg’s ninth grade students imagined a character from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest as a specific animal, then created a silhouette of it, guided by Ken Rush, to incorporate into an original piece of writing based on that character.

Ideally, the experience of engaging with art opens up a perspective or insight that might not have been available to the students otherwise.

With a seventh grade French class, I asked students to describe a piece of art to a partner who could not see it, while the partner created a sketch based on that description. The challenge of communicating the visual details in a second language struck a chord with the students, one of whom reflected: “This really made me think how difficult it is for people for who[m] English is not really their second language. They just know [enough] to pass the test... and to communicate with people in this city.

It made me realize how difficult that must be.”

Interactions with art can inspire new ideas — and can make familiar ideas resonate in new and powerful ways. That philosophy is at the heart of museum education.

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ELIZABETH EAGLE

I NTERDISCI PLI NARY LEARNI NG TAKE S FL IG HT

BY ELIZABETH EAGLE John Clement discusses the effects of force on his sculptures with students in Chris Williams’s AP Physics class.

After exploring the comics of Paul Karasik, students in Todd Johnson’s English class draw frames depicting the dream that drives Lennie and George in Of Mice and Men.

M OR E O N L E A RN I N G I N T HE SHE N www.packer.edu/shenlearning

visual arts teacher at Packer (he taught at the School from 1982 to 1989). The memoir that Karasik co-authored with his sister Judy formed the centerpiece of the exhibition.

Large- and small-scale reproductions of the book’s graphics ran along all four walls of the Gallery. They depicted Paul’s experiences growing up with their older brother, David, who had autism.

Eric Weisberg’s ninth grade English classes who visited the show compared the visual storytelling techniques of comics with narrative devices in literature. Nitya York’s and Todd Johnson’s seventh grade students, in the middle of their unit on Of Mice and Men, came to explore the similarities between Karasik’s portrayal of his relationship with his brother and that of Steinbeck’s odd-couple protagonists, George and Lennie. Liz Titone, who designed and led the seventh grade visit, asked the students to take inspiration from Karasik’s comics to draw a panel depicting Lennie and George’s elusive dream: to “live off the fatta the lan’!”

The mission of the Carol Shen Gallery is “to enrich, diversify, and broaden the artistic experience of the Packer community” and to “provide thoughtful and challenging visual arts experiences.” This fall, its mission was fulfilled in every respect.

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Interdisciplinary work is very important to me as an artist, educator, and gallery curator. Creating a platform for students to reach further, think more deeply, and experience the arts through a different lens, are reasons why the Carol Shen Gallery is so successful and important as a teaching gallery.

The John Clement exhibition had so many entry points for interdisciplinary learning. The connections felt endless. Even in my early conversations with him, I knew that the formal elements of John’s work, the mass and scale — not to mention the story of his becoming an artist — would inspire Packer students.

Then I visited his studio, and I was struck by the space. It’s a cavernous, unheated industrial warehouse in Long Island City. Light pours in through small holes in tin walls that rattle in the wind. Bright orange and green pop out where John’s completed installations stand. Large steel tubes lie on the ground in an array of shapes. Tools are placed neatly on walls, sketches illustrate the artist’s process, forklifts await instruction.

I was struck by two questions: What is an installation? and, How might students — through sound and movement — create an installation inspired by John Clement’s work?

I asked John if we could bring high school students to his studio and let them absorb this creative energy to build their own installation. He responded with a resounding “Yes!” Esther Harris, the Upper School Choral Director, and Mandy Stallings, who teaches Advanced Dance, jumped on board. The students all visited the Shen, and some of them met with John during his residency.

Then, on a cold November day, Ms. Stallings, Ms. Harris, and I went to his studio with 48 choral and dance students. For two hours, they soaked up the space and interacted with John’s work. Then, in shifting groups, they improvised through dance, rhythm, and song. It was thrilling for us to watch.

Over the next several months, the students will collaboratively develop an installation to be performed at John’s studio in the spring (when the weather is warmer!).

Giving these students the opportunity to be creators of their own installation, offering them a chance to respond to John’s work with an artistic creation of their own, is a powerful example of what interdisciplinary learning can be.

A CONVERSATION WITH J OHN C LEM EN T P ’ 24 , P ’ 26 What was your experience of the two-day residency at Packer? I always learn a lot about my work by talking to people about it. The way my life is structured, I’m always working. I’m never out of the studio for that long unless I’m on vacation with my family. To sit amongst the work in an educational setting for two whole days was a great experience. I took away a lot.

What struck you about your interactions with the students? Interestingly, they mostly asked the same questions whether they were in Kindergarten or high school.

They asked hard questions, like ‘Why did you do that that way?’ My answer was, ‘Well,

I don’t know, that’s just the way I did it.’ So I started thinking about my motivations, and my vocabulary. Now [nearly two months later] I’m working on three brand new midscale pieces that are going in a different direction than my Shen Gallery work.

The kids also asked how I became a sculptor. But there isn’t a very simple explanation.

It’s interesting: high school students are contemplating who they are and where they’re going. Often they think they have to know at a young age what they want to do. But for many people, [discovering that] is a lifelong process.

My goal wasn’t to influence anyone to become an artist. But I did try to suggest to the older students, ‘Don’t paint yourselves into a corner. You don’t want to be one dimensional.’

What’s your impression of the students’ sound and movement installation so far?

It took me a while to get over the initial shock of having so many people in the studio! But it’s going to be really fun when it happens. The process feels very organic and fluid. I don’t think anybody knows exactly what shape it will take yet, but I’m really looking forward to it.

Why did you agree to it? When I was in high school, I didn’t know any artists. For Esther’s and Mandy’s students, this experience might stay with them. And knowing that Packer students can pursue experiences out of the classroom like this encourages me. My kids are in the Lower School now, but this kind of opportunity can only gain momentum over time.

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Building Better Math Students Problem-solving steps and math facts can be forgotten.

Deep understanding cannot.

By Amy Hand and Chris Natale

n early-math classrooms of the 1970s and 80s, many of us were taught to gain fluency with basic number combinations (i.e., addition facts and multiplication facts) simply by memorizing them. As a result, our answers were evaluated as merely correct or incorrect, sometimes without great attention to the depth of our understanding.

In our early math classrooms today, rather than rely on the process of memorization, we ask kids to build “computational fluency,” a framework first articulated by Susan Jo Russell in “Developing Computational Fluency with Whole Numbers” (2000). This fluency has two important components in addition to accuracy: efficiency (completing work in a way that is organized and streamlined) and flexibility (choosing a strategy that makes the most sense for a particular problem). Our Lower School classrooms focus on all components of fluency.

Efficiency and flexibility are built primarily through the use of visual models, which are essentially pictures of operations. One example of a visual model is this multiplication array that a student used to solve 42 x 38:

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When completing an operation using a visual model such as this one, students construct important ideas that we ourselves did not encounter until Middle School, such as the distributive property and the commutative property.

Consider how students in Third Grade might use a visual model to find the number of window panes in the picture to the left. The facade has two windows, each with several smaller panes. As students study the lower window, they recognize it as a four-by-four array. Knowing that the first and second rows are each four panes across, they see that they can determine the total number of panes in the lower window by thinking about (4 x 2) x 2—in other words, doubling to get 8, then doubling again to get 16. Thinking about 4 x 4 as 4 x 2 x 2 is an example of flexibility, and it’s about as clear an example of the associative property as you can ask for.

Such flexibility manifests even in the First Grade. With the help of tens frames, pictured on the next page, many first graders recognize

32 | THE PACKER MAGAZINE

that they can compute 7 + 5 by thinking about 7 + 3 + 2. The associative property rears its head again!

7+5

=

7+3+2

=

10 + 2

Back in the Third Grade, the teacher asks how the lower window might help us calculate the number of panes in the upper window.

Kids turn and talk to one another. Raised thumbs appear around the classroom, signaling ideas the students want to share. Noting that there is just one more row of panes in the upper window, they have realized they can add one more row — 1 x 4 — of panes, giving them 16 + 4 = 20 total panes in the upper window. In mathematical terms, what they have uncovered is that knowing 4 x 4 can help them calculate 5 x 4; they do not need to start the latter problem from scratch.

There’s a real elegance to this strategy, which would be represented symbolically as 5 x 4 = (4 x 4) + (1 x 4).

Meanwhile, on the other side of the classroom, another child studying the upper window has seen that two columns of 5 can be doubled to get four columns of 5 — in other words, that (5 x 2) x 2 = 5 x 4.

Presenting a problem using a visual model ensures that many entry points are built into its structure. Consequently, varied strategies can lead to accurate results.

As students develop their ability to abstract, they will look at these windows and see simply 4 x 4 or 5 x 4. But until that automaticity is developed, these strategies provide kids with an efficient means for finding the answer as well as deep experience with important mathematical ideas.

So what are the benefits of taking the above approaches to operations?

The simplest answer is practical. When students are given a series of steps to solve a problem without understanding the machinery behind those steps, it is likely they will forget those steps if they don’t perform them for a while. For instance, Middle School students who have learned to “cross-multiply” proportions without deep understanding often mistakenly compute cross products when doing simple multiplication with fractions (a context in which the cross products would not be meaningful).

Consider an actor learning his lines: if he understands his character and the scene, learning the lines is a challenging but doable feat. If instead he tries to memorize the lines without knowing how character or scene fits into the story — or worse, if he is trying to learn

the lines in a language he does not speak! — the task is solely one of arbitrary memorization and therefore is far more difficult. More succinctly: problem-solving steps and math facts can be forgotten; deep understanding cannot.

Supporting a variety of problem-solving strategies also allows teachers to reach a much more diverse group of thinkers. As you might expect, not all students find the same strategies intuitive. When multiple approaches are taught, each student can employ the strategy that resonates most. As they have more experience with varied approaches, they become more flexible and gain an ability to use multiple strategies effectively, choosing whichever one is most efficient for a particular problem.

Another benefit concerns the relationship between learning operations and learning algebra. Basic arithmetic and operations are commonly misperceived as wholly distinct from algebra. But in fact, a strong understanding of basic operations is precisely what lays the foundation for strong algebraic reasoning. Take the following equation, which we would typically ask eighth grade students to solve: x +3=x 2

A common error among algebra students is to multiply both sides of the equation by 2 without multiplying the 3 by 2. Students who have internalized their understanding of the distributive property by learning how to apply it to whole-number multiplication, however, are far less likely to make that mistake when they study algebra. These students would be much more likely to “see” that doubling requires doubling both the x and the 3.

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Understanding how number properties such as the distributive property apply to numeric operations, therefore, allows students to understand how those same properties apply to algebraic operations.

In her 2014 book Building a Better Teacher, Elizabeth Green refers to two paradigms regarding mathematics: “answer-getting” versus “sensemaking.” Which paradigm do you want your students to experience?, she asks. Do you want them to learn that doing math means accepting and memorizing procedures provided by a teacher? Or do you want math to mean figuring things out, understanding why an answer is correct or incorrect, and genuinely solving problems?

Guided by Packer’s mission directive that students “think deeply,” we emphatically choose the latter.

Amy Hand is the Chair of the Math Department. Chris Natale is the Math Coach for Kindergarten through Sixth Grade.

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From Brooklyn to Baghdad In 2007, Benjamin Voce-Gardner ’98 was a law school graduate with a taste for activism. Two years later he was a military lawyer overseeing the interrogation of detainees in post-Abu Ghraib Iraq. At the 103rd Founder’s Day, he shared the story of his unconventional career path.

Benjamin Voce-Gardner ’98 deployed in 2008 to serve as a command judge advocate (JAG) at the Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center in Baghdad. In that capacity he provided legal advice and oversight; assisted in drafting U.S. policy regarding detention and interrogation; and worked with American and Iraqi prosecutors to collect evidence for cases in Iraqi criminal courts. Ben received the Joint Commendation Medal, Iraq Campaign Medal, the Navy Commendation Medal, and the Navy Achievement Medal (twice).

He is currently a litigator at Zuckerman Spaeder and a Lieutenant Commander in the Navy Reserves.

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“

t was 4 or 5 a.m. one morning in 2008, half way through my tour in Iraq. I’m working the night shift in my office in Baghdad. Suddenly we feel and hear mortars landing in the distance. I knew they weren’t aiming for me because I was working in a prison complex, and the people firing these mortars didn’t want to kill their buddies.

But they were firing at the base where I slept, which was about a mile away from where I worked.

“I remember this particular morning because I had a bit of an epiphany, which was, ‘What the hell am I doing here?’ followed, oddly enough, by, ‘I’m glad I’m here.’”

With that dramatic scene-setting, Benjamin Voce-Gardner ’98 opened his remarks as the 103rd Founder’s Day speaker. One of Packer’s oldest traditions, Founder’s Day began in 1911 to honor the memory of Harriet Packer. Each year, the Founder’s Day Chapel provides an opportunity for students to hear from a distinguished alumna or alumnus. On the morning of October 29, Voce-Gardner told Upper School students the story of his unconventional path from high school student atttending Packer to U.S. Navy JAG working in a detention center in Baghdad.

“Packer is where I started to develop my passion for the world outside of what I knew.” Citing the classes of George Snook, Ken Rush, Eric Baylin, and Linda Gold (“may she rest in peace”), he spoke of how Packer gave him “a sense that the world was much bigger and more complicated” than he first thought. “I developed a passion to get out and explore.”

But Voce-Gardner’s career path was not clearly laid out in his mind from the beginning. In college, he “had absolutely no idea” what to do with himself. His desire to explore led him to a study-abroad program in South Africa, where he learned about the peaceful dismantling of Apartheid via the government’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

“As I perceived it, the rule of law in South Africa was more powerful than racism, than historical hatreds, than the desire to inflict violence on people who had held [black South Africans] down unfairly. I’m not saying that these things didn’t exist. But for the most part, the rule of law won... What could have been a violent transition of power was a shockingly peaceful one by historical standards.”

Voce-Gardner’s experience in South Africa solidified his determination not only to pursue a career in the law but to practice law in the public service, at least for a while. His goal was never to score “a corner office at a large and prestigious law firm.”

The September 11th attacks occurred during Voce-Gardner’s senior year of college, prompting him to consider the military. But a “shockingly honest” Navy recruiter told him to do what he really wanted first — attend law school — and then apply to be a JAG, or Judge Advocate General. In other words: become a military lawyer.

“I didn’t really know anything about the military, so [going to law school first] seemed like a pretty good idea,” he admitted.

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But while Voce-Gardner was in law school, two infamous events seriously tarnished the U.S. military operation in Iraq, causing him to question his commitment to the military: the Abu Ghraib prison scandal and the “Torture Memo,” a Bush White House document justifying “enhanced interrogation techniques” including waterboarding.

“I was truly ashamed of what our military and our government were doing.” But he still believed he could fight the good fight — the kind he had seen unfold so successfully in South Africa — from within the military. He resolved to stick to his plan. “The idea of being a JAG became incredibly appealing,” he said.

Two years later, Voce-Gardner was accepted to the JAG Corps, and in 2007 he began what was expected to be a three-year tour at the Naval Legal Services Office in San Diego. But because so many higher-ranking JAGs were in Iraq and Afghanistan providing legal oversight of the U.S. military, “the realization that I was going to Iraq sooner or later was starting to sink in.”

Voce-Gardner shared his deep concerns about Abu Ghraib and the use of waterboarding with his executive officer in the JAG Corps.

She suggested that he work at the Joint Interrogation and Debriefing Center ( JIDC) in Baghdad. The JIDC had the same mission as Abu Ghraib: detaining high-value detainees — “the really bad guys” — and getting vital intelligence out of them.

Things fell into place. “Here I was, being offered an opportunity to have an impact on one of the issues that had motivated me to join the Navy in the first place” — the lawful treatment of detainees.

With only one year as a JAG under his belt, Voce-Gardner deployed to Iraq. As a military lawyer at the JIDC, which held “twenty-two hundred of the most dangerous guys in Iraq,” he oversaw interrogations of detainees. “[They were] the worst of the worst, which meant they had a tendency to have the best information.”

His job was to talk to the U.S. interrogators — “who were basically kids, between 20 and 24” — before they questioned detainees.

“We would go through their planned interrogation: why they wanted to do it, what their methods would be, what information they thought they would get. Then I would stand on the other side of a one-way mirror and make sure that everything was going according to plan. We would do that four times a night, seven days a week. Then the day shift guy would come, and it would just keep going. And we did good work.”

Voce-Gardner described in detail an operation he was particularly proud of: breaking up a terrorist group that had trained 18 women to detonate themselves. It was run by a woman and her five sons.

“The sons would find a woman who had lost a family member to American, or British, or Iraqi government forces. Four of the sons would find her: target her, beat her, and, frankly, rape her. Then the fifth son would come by, dressed as an imam, and he would find her in a ditch... He would say, ‘You’re impure now, but I can help you. I can help you get into heaven.’”

Voce-Gardner also visited with George Snook’s and Eric Kelley’s history classes. Students engaged him in a lively and candid conversation about his experiences in Iraq, excerpted below:

“The single most effective tools are really that committed to that interrogators can use something, or you are really when trying to extract valuable misinformed. For the most part, intelligence from guys who want we found that these guys were to kill us, are Otis Spunkmeyer really misinformed.” muffins and calls to their wives.

“We didn’t want Al Qaeda guys An interrogator’s job is to hanging out with guys who become their best friend. And were in prison because they once our interrogators did that, didn’t know any better. The they would get an incredible first thing we would do was ask amount of information. Giving them if they wanted to watch a them something in their life movie. If they chose Titanic, we to look forward to is a much knew that they were a terrorist. more useful method of getting Terrorists tend to consider the intelligence you want than themselves warrior-poets, and beating them. People will tell consider Titanic a beautiful you anything to get you to stop love story. But if a guy said beating them.” he wanted to watch 300, we “If you’re a guy who has decided knew that guy was just an idiot to blow yourself up for a greater hanging around with nothing cause, one of two things is better to do. That was not the going to be true. Either you guy making the decisions.”

The mother would then take the woman into her care and enroll her in a bogus madrassa, where the woman would then be convinced to train as a suicide bomber.

“Once we found out [the group’s tactics], we dedicated ourselves to getting these people off the field. We worked hard to do it, and [our success] was really due to the efforts of the analysts and interrogators that I worked with. It made me incredibly happy to support them.”

In closing, Voce-Gardner appealed directly to the students assembled in the Chapel. “I hope that my story encourages you to consider pursing an unconventional path. Choose to give some portion of your life to serve an organization, an idea, or an ideal that you really believe in. Find your passion and go out there and find a way to do it. You won’t regret it.”

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Parent Association { PARENT ASSOCIATION }

The Parent Association and Packer’s administration thank Pumpkin Patch Chair Vanessa Muskopf P’26 and Games Chair Sarah Abramowitz P’17, P’19 for the wildly successful 2014 Pumpkin Patch. The Packer community also thanks the dozens of parent volunteers for weeks of creative effort and preparation. See you next year!

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A Different View on Learning Differences

Food Matters: Pointers for Parents

n October the PA Learning Support Committee invited psychologist Deborah P. Waber, Ph.D., to speak about her research and clinical experience in the field of learning differences. Dr. Waber is the author of Rethinking Learning Disabilities: Understanding Children Who Struggle in School and the director of the Learning Disabilities Program at Boston Children’s Hospital.

Dr. Waber began by noting that there is no universally accepted definition of what constitutes a learning disability.

She then shared the central framework of her work: that “learning disabilities” arise not from a problem within a child but rather from developmental interactions between the child and the demands of his or her environment. She urged parents not to pathologize learning differences, but rather to see them as points along a continuum of normal learning styles.

Waber acknowledged that some of those learning styles are not effectively supported by the standard “industrial” model of education. However, she assured parents that children with learning differences can flourish with the appropriate alignment between each learner and his or her learning environment. Despite the heavy cognitive demands that today’s information explosion places on children, Dr. Waber noted that corresponding advances in technology have expanded the opportunities for instruction that is tailored to each child’s individual learning style. And as research into learning differences expands, teaching strategies become increasingly sophisticated and informed, which leads to more impactful support.

Waber cited long-term case studies showing that encouragement and support for children with learning differences help them develop their strengths and find their own niches.

She added that adults who received such support as children were well prepared for their professional years — which, for many of them, felt less challenging than their school years.

The event, which was attended by several dozen parents across Packer’s three divisions, was an informative and encouraging experience. “Dr. Waber’s ‘person and environment’ framework presents a wonderful opportunity for us as educators, parents, and classmates,” said parent Claire Nitze P’24. “It expands the conversation — it’s not only about a diversity of learners, it’s also about a diversity of effective supports and teaching strategies.”

n November 19, the PA Food Committee hosted a panel discussion entitled “Food Matters: Feeding Our Families, Our Students, and Ourselves.” The panel featured members of the Packer community: Packer parents Min Ye and Morten Sohlberg P’16, owners of Smorgas and Blenheim restaurants and Blenheim Hill Farm, and Kate Galassi, professional food sourcer and founder of Quinciple (who attended Packer through the Middle School). Nancy Easton from Wellness in the Schools also participated.

Moderated by Patricia Willens P’18, a news editor for WNYC, the discussion was wide-ranging and informative. Panelists praised “real” and “heritage” foods for supporting student health as well as for their unique, delicious flavor. (“Have you ever tried the Newtown Pippin apple, Queen Victoria’s favorite?”)

All the panelists agreed that good nutrition supports student learning, and Nancy Easton noted that test scores have been shown to rise with more healthful eating. The panel also clarified terms such as “sustainability,” “cage-free,” “pastureraised,” and “natural flavoring.”

The evening’s primary focus was nutrition issues relevant to time-pressed working families, with each panelist offering practical advice. To simplify shopping, Kate Galassi suggested that families note the ten foods they eat the most and find stores or farmers-market vendors that clearly describe where those foods come from and how they are grown or produced. Families should also develop their own shopping guide according to the priorities that matter most to them, whether it is food that is pesticide/chemical free, non-GMO, local, or (the two criteria at the top of Kate’s list) antibioticand hormone-free. Another practical suggestion was for families to make and post a list of snacks that children are allowed to have, and put them in easy-to-access parts of the fridge and cupboard.

Questions from the audience yielded two final tips: If you want to lessen your impact on the environment, the best thing to do is to eat less beef. And when you have no choice but to eat processed foods, particularly snacks, choose items that have no more than five ingredients.

Perhaps the lively Q&A was fueled by good on-the-spot nutrition: the audience had been treated to samples of carrot-butternut squash soup and vegan celeriac-potato soup.

Both were prepared and served by Middle School students.

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SAVE THE DATE On Wednesday, April 15, at 6:30 p.m., the PA Learning Support Committee is sponsoring a talk

by Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck, Ph.D., author of the bestselling book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. Dr. Dweck’s research examines how mindset plays a critical role in learning and student achievement.

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WINTER 2015 | 37

{ ALUMNI NEWS }

Representing the Packer of Today

Westchester/Connecticut Luncheon Draws Alumnae Alumnae from eleven different classes gathered in June to renew friendships over lunch at Centro on the Mill in Greenwich, CT. Jean McKee ’49, who was unable to attend Reunion last April, was presented with the 2014 Alumni Award of Honor for her career as an appointee of Presidents Ford, Carter, Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and Clinton.

Susan Borgia Szudora ’72 IVAc, Alice (Aliki) Staikos Teichgraeber ’49, Edith Flaacke Pescatello ’41, Carolyn (Punchy) Roehl Blish Kaess ’42, Jean McKee ’44, and Dr. Kenneth Kaess Senior Class Representatives to the Alumni Board, 2014-15

Sue Pittoni Coan ’57 Co, Natasha Chefetz Nordahl ’86, Shari Wolf Ruckh ’83, and Marisa Pucci Duffy ’77

Young Alumni Gather in Williamsburg Alumni from the classes of 1995 through 2010 attended a midsummer party, generously hosted by The Shanty, a bar and distillery in Williamsburg owned by Bill Potter ’99.

Katie Kuntz ’04, Peter Meleny, Samantha Wasko Dodds ’04, Colin Laughlin ’04, and Anastasia Sofianou ’04

Aneil BharathSingh ’07 and Michael Dolmatch ’07

Emily Kessler ’15 (left) has attended Packer since the Junior First Grade. She is the leader of Packer’s Kids Walk for Kids with Cancer team, a representative to the Student Council, a Peer Supporter, leader of Sabores Latinos (the Spanish culture club), and the Yearbook’s Senior Editor. She has played varsity softball for three years. Emily attributes her transformation “from a shy five-year-old into a confident member of the community” to the teachers and friends who have helped her over the past thirteen years.

Although Chloe-Kate Abel ’15 (right) did not enroll at Packer until Sixth Grade, she knew when she went to her first Pumpkin Patch that she wanted to attend the School. As she got older, she realized there was “so much more to Packer than bouncy houses and donut competitions.” Today, Chloe-Kate writes for Packer publications, leads four clubs, and is President of the Student Council. She studies Arabic outside of Packer through a scholarship from the State Department’s National Security Language Initiative for Youth, and hopes to work in the foreign service.

Matt Dillon ’03, Norah Rexer ’03, and Joanna Neufeld ’03

Are you an Alumna or Alumnus of Color?

Erica Coren ’06, Robert Hand ’07, and Jeremy Shiffres ’07

Front row: Emily Dannenberg ’02, Lucy Baumrind ’02, Melanie Closs ’02, Danielle Kirschbaum ’02, Walter Binger ’02, and Daniel Voce-Gardner ’02; Back row: Rebecca Chovnick Beck ’02, Sydney Streets ’02, and Will Kuntz ’02

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Andrew Coren ’01 and Max Moondoc

Packer’s Alumni Office is looking for graduates interested in mentoring students of color at Packer.

Please contact Dona Laughlin, Director of Alumni, at (718) 250-0229 or dlaughlin@packer.edu.

The

PACKER

Magazine

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From the Head of School On Campus Performing Arts Athletics

2003

joralemon street

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Building History An architectural retrospective of The Packer Collegiate Institute reveals an institution consistently dedicated to providing facilities aligned with the best teaching practices. Examining the School’s serial expansions also sheds light on some of the hidden, mysterious, and downright eccentric features of the campus.

A composite image of the four distinct structures that make up the School’s facade along Joralemon Street (from left to right): the Science Building (1887), Founder’s Hall (1854), Alumnae Hall (1907), and Pratt Hall (1957).

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Art Seen From Many Angles The mission of the Shen Gallery is “to enrich, diversify, and broaden the artistic experience of the Packer community” and to “provide thoughtful and challenging visual arts experiences.” But how is that mission accomplished?

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Building Better Math Students Early math instruction is more than a matter of mere accuracy.

Amy Hand and Chris Natale explain how Lower School students learn efficiency and flexibility as well, leading to deeper math comprehension overall.

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From Brooklyn to Baghdad Benjamin Voce-Gardner ’98, the 103rd Founder’s Day speaker, followed his passion for justice to Iraq, where, as a U.S. Navy JAG, he oversaw the interrogation of detainees.

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Parent Association Alumni News Class Notes In Memoriam

PACKER

THE PACKER COLLEGIATE INSTITUTE 170 Joralemon Street Brooklyn, NY 11201

ADDRESS SERVICE REQUESTED If this publication is addressed to an alumna or alumnus who no longer lives at home, please notify the School of her/his new address by visiting www.packer.edu/contact or calling (718) 250-0228.

ALUMNI EVENTS IN 2015 Art Auction Preview Thursday, February 26 @ 6:30 p.m.

Washington DC Area Alumni Lunch Monday, March 2

133rd Reunion Friday and Saturday, April 24 & 25 to join the Reunion Classes of the 0’s and 5’s at Packer this April. In the afternoon on Friday, April 24, visit classes, stay for cocktails, and then see the Upper School musical, Godspell. On Saturday, April 25, take a tour, listen to a student panel, attend a faculty master class, go to Chapel, enjoy a terrific lunch, and finish with a basketball game (as a player or a fan): Alumni/ae vs. Packer Students! www.packer.edu/reunion

133rd Reunion Friday and Saturday, April 24 & 25 Alumni & Child Ice Cream Social Wednesday, May 6 @ 3 p.m.

ALL ALUMNI ARE INVITED

Long Island Alumni Lunch Wednesday, June 17 More information at www.packer.edu/alumni