by brian p. easler
Head of School
‘Whatever it Takes’ has always been a part of who we are at WMA
A
t WMA in the spring of 2020, at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the phrase “Whatever it Takes” went from catchy slogan to a campus way of life— a community ethos. At first it was simply an unspoken necessity. The faculty and administration needed to rapidly transform our entire curriculum into an effective online platform to serve our students as well as we could for the unplanned fully remote spring trimester. They accomplished that monumental feat in about three weeks. It was truly amazing to witness, and the efforts of the whole community paid off with what was unquestionably a remarkably successful spring trimester. That was hard work, but at least the task was exceptionally clear. After that, however, we needed to begin planning for all of the uncertainty and anxiety of the forthcoming 2020–21 school year. It was then that “Whatever it Takes” became more intentional and a lodestar for our navigation through uncharted waters. Early in that time, in conversation with Chair of the Board Scott Jacobs ’75, we determined that the single most important priority for WMA was to safely open the school for full-time in-person learning—no matter what. One might wonder why this was the priority, given the complicated nature of the circumstances and the proliferation of remote learning across the
country. The answer was quite simple: Our students and their families deserved the WMA experience they had been promised. It was from this mindset that the slogan “Whatever it Takes” was more outwardly adopted. Planning for a future scenario that was still developing and so uncertain was challenging, for
sure, and much more complicated than the initial shift to all-online. Both instances demanded and facilitated a different kind of decision making style that is not common in schools—but which was critical to our success. Academic institutions like WMA are filled with students, families and staff, who are not only highly intelligent and creative, but also fully committed to the school community. They are uniquely engaged in the life of the school. The result is that it’s more than just a school ... it’s a communal endeavor. For this reason, and rightly so, most decision making in a setting like ours is reliant on sharing of ideas and options, discussion, healthy debate and consensus building—all of which are central to creating a shared sense of community. This sort of decision-making process, however, takes time and face-to-face opportunities, neither of which were abundant during the spring and summer of 2020. At times like this, when decisions need to be made quickly and definitively, and in response to rapidly evolving circumstances, a different kind of decision making is necessary: crisis decision
