To: Blair Parents
From: Chan Hardwick
Date: January 4, 2007

Welcome to the Spring (Semester). I write to give you a general report on the Blair community at this mid-year point as well as to comment specifically on a few items which will likely be of interest to you. I want to start by wishing all Blair families a successful new calendar year, and particularly on the immediate months leading to graduation or the end of the current school year. (For the faculty and me, the “new year” always starts in September, but the new semester is always a fresh beginning.)

a. The consensus of the faculty is that the December student review meetings revealed one of, if not the, strongest student performances we as a community have experienced. While there are inevitably some student academic records that fell below our expectations and do need attention in this new semester, the significant majority of Blair students are performing at commendable levels of both academic achievement and individual effort. The faculty sense is that Blair students are setting loftier goals and are thus making a more concerted assault on the higher end of our grading scale, leading to higher class averages and more uniform achievement. (The ironic downside of this success is that students with good, respectable academic averages are finding themselves in the bottom half of their class.) Nevertheless, we have no intention of changing our grading system nor arbitrarily trying to bring grades down. We do not rank our students, and college admissions decisions are increasingly reflecting a positive read on our students’ strong academic performances. Therefore, this current success would seem to reflect an academically responsible and responsive group of young people, who deserve our support. That said, boys and girls who have improvement to make can expect to find themselves the objects of various strategies devised by their teachers and monitor.

b. The early admissions season was a bit confusing this year, as the Harvard/Princeton/Virginia decisions to drop early admission programs for 2007-2008 may have influenced the patterns of overall early admission. In the past, many colleges and universities would lock in nearly 50% of their freshman class through early decision programs. Certainly some schools still do that, but it appears that others have cut back significantly in those admissions offers, so deferrals seem to be up and outright denials are up as well---at least according to unofficial/anecdotal “chatter.” While some Blair applicants undoubtedly got caught in this trend, we were pleased that our seniors generally fared better than news we are hearing from some other schools. In particular, some very prestigious academic colleges clearly admitted Blair students on the basis of their course work at Blair, a fact which underscores the legitimacy of our evaluation of our students. Again, we shall continue to guide and support enthusiastically all our seniors throughout the process, and please--if you are the parent of a senior-- be in touch with the specific college counselor assigned to your child if you have any questions or need to sort out any remaining issues. In sum, it is a very competitive admissions environment, but we are pleased that Blair seniors are getting responsible “reads” from the colleges with whom we work.

c. Yesterday the faculty gathered for our annual mid-year seminar on a topic of interest. This year our guest speaker was Dr. Richard Hersh, former president of both Hobart-William-Smith, and then Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut. Dr. Hersh is presently involved in an assessment project (non-profit, privately funded by the Council for Aid to Education)) which allows colleges and universities to evaluate what its students actually gain in terms of skills and abilities (connected to writing, reading, and problem solving) over four years of education at the college. One contention that Dr. Hersh has is that because faculty are, generally speaking, not engaged with their students, undergraduate education in the United States is underwhelming. According his work, only 20% of the over 200 colleges and universities in the study have student scores that rise to a successful level over four years. Conversely, schools like Blair provide remarkable consistency in providing an educational environment where students learn and grow---which is why quite a few of our young alumni return to Blair saying that college was not always as academically rewarding as their Blair experience. (Of course, college was rewarding in other ways!). From the experience of developing and implementing this test (called the CLA--College Learning Assessment), Dr. Hersh was able to cite several qualities of good schools (and colleges): timely assessments (i.e. tests, quizzes, papers), timely feedback on student work, high expectations by faculty, faculty flexibility in responding to differences in student learning styles, strong and focused administration, integrated and coordinated curriculum, and the sense in the community that the faculty cared about the students, both as learners and as people. Blair is considering joining other schools (Lawrenceville, St. Andrew’s to name two) to explore employing a high school level assessment modeled on the college test. I shall keep you updated on that discussion.

d. Easter this year falls early in the spring term calendar, and we are going to treat the holiday as we have in the past when this happens: to allow for individual family decisions about student leaves, but not to convert the weekend into a Long Weekend (which will come later in the spring, thus breaking up the term into approximate halves). This means that we shall not observe the religious holiday with time off, but will have a Good Friday Chapel Service, and Easter Vespers on Sunday, and will allow students who wish to go home to do so without academic penalty; classes will be held on Saturday. (This is also the policy for Passover, which comes earlier in the same week.) This decision to carry school on through the Easter Weekend only occurs every fifth or sixth year, but does work from both the logistical and community sense, giving students flexibility and structure.

e. Graduation this year will continue to be held mid-week in late May, specifically on Thursday the 24th. We found that timing to work well last year, and received generally positive responses from our parent body as well as the students and faculty. Although it has only happened once in my time, there is always the possibility of rain at such events. In the past we have set up the ceremony in the gymnasium, an experience which was reasonably dry but led to restricted access because of seat limitations (which is not a factor outside). In two years we may have the problem resolved with the completion of a new, large activities facility that should begin construction this summer. However, until then and having looked at possibilities of broadcasting the ceremony into another venue, we are more likely to choose to have the ceremony outdoors even in the rain, as long as there is no dangerous lightening. People may get wet, but no one gets turned away, and many colleges/universities follow this protocol because of the size of their crowds.

f. Finally, and again, welcome to the Spring Semester! As I sit in my office on January 4th and look outside the window, I see nor feel not the slightest hint of snow, students are walking around in light sweaters, and the grounds are green and moist. It is an odd beginning to the semester, but we have many productive, purposeful weeks ahead before real spring arrives. Stay in touch!

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