Pingry Favorites

Students Teach Virtual Summer Courses

In partnership with Big Blue Summer Academics, Alesia Paliwoda ’21 was the first Pingry student to offer not one, but two virtual courses of her own design this past summer: Introduction to Architecture and Introduction to Engineering. In the former, she asked her students to “dimension” their homes, build a model, and draw additional views (top, front, and side). Similarly, fellow rising seniors Claire Keller ’21, Caeley Feeney ’21, and Elisabeth Korn ’21 offered rising K-Grade 5 students a Summer Reading Enrichment program.

Alesia Paliwoda ’21 teaching her virtual summer courses. at right: Sketches by Valentyn Kurylko ’25 for Introduction to Architecture.

Ring the Bell

Throughout the 48 hours of Ring the Bell: Pingry’s Annual Celebration of Giving, held in honor of Dr. Pingry’s birthday, the community united in support of the School’s mission. More than 625 community members participated, raising over $1.2 million

in new gifts and

pledges for the 2021 Pingry Fund—a recordsetting level of support!

DRIVE-IN MOVIES

The PSPA (Pingry School Parents’ Association) hosted a safe, fun community event in October: a drive-in movie weekend, which included screenings of Despicable Me and Black Panther.

Climb Every Mountain...

The Middle School tackled its first strength and conditioning challenge of the year in September—a race to climb all 29,000 feet of Mount Everest, with athletics teams and activity groups earning “feet” based on a different exercise each day (burpees, sit-ups, push-ups, jumping jacks). Students completed the challenge in only four days, completing over 46,000 repetitions of exercise, and 19,000 jumping jacks in one day!

Next up: Scale the tallest mountain on Mars—Olympus Mons, a shield volcano that stands an estimated 72,000 feet tall.

Welcoming Families Back to School, Virtually

Emblematic of a school year unlike any other, Pingry’s annual back-toschool events—traditionally held on-campus in each of the School’s three divisions—were hosted virtually this fall for the first time. Despite the unusual format—each division offered a combination of live Zoom calls and pre-recorded presentations—they were deemed a success!

Grade 3 Teacher Devan Zadrozny “meets” with parents during the Lower School’s Back-to-School Night on September 24. “We’re here because of the extraordinary work of our faculty and staff who poured their heart and soul over the summer into making sure that we could be back in person. That is no small achievement, and we’re grateful for their efforts.” —HEAD OF SCHOOL

MATT LEVINSON AT CONVOCATION

Outstanding Educator

Dr. Reid Cottingham, Upper School English Teacher and Director of Teaching and Learning, K-12, was selected for The University of Chicago’s Outstanding Educator Award. Each year, newly admitted UChicago students have the opportunity to reflect on their time in school and nominate an educator who played a significant role in their education, made a positive impact on their lives, and whose influence has brought them to where they are today.

Dr. Cottingham was selected by Kaya Lee ’20. Read more in this issue about Dr. Cottingham’s co-leadership of Pingry’s collaboration with Global Online Academy.