Our Wildwood, Volume 47

DEAR FRIENDS A Letter from Landis

use their minds well, and to embrace the elements of our diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging work. Above all, these stories reflect our still-foundational orientation toward innovating and evolving to prepare students for their future, not our past—as my predecessor, Hope Boyd, so often reminded us. Reading about both—the present and the future—I hope that those who’ve known Wildwood School over time will see an arc, as I do, that stays true to the ethos of our school, from its founding in 1971 through its expansion in 2000, and on to the future we continue to co-create together. Please mark your calendars for Saturday, October 15th, the date we’ve set for our entire community to gather in celebration of Wildwood’s 50th anniversary, including marking its 20th anniversary as a K-12. Volunteers have already begun organizing what promises to be a fitting celebration of past, present, and future!

When Marc Frankel, a senior member of our Board of Trustees and well-known consultant to independent schools around the world, stated definitively that our Board’s pandemic focus should be developing a plan for the years after the pandemic, my immediate thought was that I simply couldn’t imagine how we’d be able to execute. Marc made that declaration as many of my colleagues and I, then still a year away from vaccinations, were spending the better part of each week in webinars and Zoom meetings about how to mitigate learning loss, keep students and employees safe, and take a crash course in public health. Yet, together with his co-chair in the effort, trustee Susan Olsen, and our Board Chair Andrew Solmssen, Marc wisely noted that the hurdles, losses, pivots, and learnings of our times created the perfect opportunity for us to emerge from the pandemic stronger than before. As is often the case, the diverse group of individuals who serve as trustees for the future of our school were right. Together, that group of leaders—which includes physicians, educators, lawyers, developers, producers, finance professionals, and those working in other professions— provided my colleagues and me with targeted support as we navigated through the last three academic years, all while engaging hundreds of members of the school community in visioning exercises to ensure that Marc’s assertion would bear out. You’ll read in these pages of the wonderful work that our students and my colleagues are doing here and now— Kayli Joy C. ‘22, Huckleberry F. ‘22, elementary science teacher Anna Boucher, and others—and you’ll also get an introduction to the Framework for the Future of Education through which our Board has charged us to operate in the coming years. Threaded throughout, you’ll read of the school’s continued commitment to teaching students to

Warmly,

Landis Green Head of School

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OWW SPRING 2022