From the Head of School
         to Benjamin School Parents

Summer is undoubtedly poking at you to move closer and closer toward the start-of-school.  Administrators and office staff have been back on campus since August 4, literally racing toward the first day of classes on August 24.  I hope the summer break has refreshed and renewed all the members of your family in a way that brings energy and enthusiasm to a new academic year.  We ask a great deal of our students and you, their parents, here at Benjamin. By choosing this school, you have selected a rigorous preparation for your children.  Your partnership in our efforts to provide the best experiences for them is critical. I have just stated the mantra of independent schools all over the country. Said another way, the partnership between home and school is essential to the success of children. I join the faculty and administration in thanking you for your brand of parenting—productive involvement in your children’s lives.  We live in a country where more “independent school parenting” is sorely needed.  My colleagues and I are delighted to be in partnership with you for the sake of the future.

There are so many exciting additions to our program for the current year that any attempt to enumerate them fully in this letter would be tantamount to herding a house-full of cats and not leaving one sprawled on top of a cupboard and another under the bed!  Not wanting to have to do that, of course, I will be as minimal as possible in this message, hoping that you will begin to revel in the richness of your children’s experiences by observation as the year reveals itself.  Our vision for TBS embraces the 21^st century schoolhouse, preparing our students for a world very different from the one you and I have known.  Educators refer to the requirements for success in this new reality as “fluencies.”  The advancing technologies of our time have isolated the category of communication as a fundamental fluency in order for your children to compete in their looming adulthood. Advanced public speaking, effective writing, ability to ask good questions, and ability to distinguish quality from quantity have all been identified as essential 21^st century skills.  These have long been areas of focus in our curriculum.  Dedication to the value of communication in our students’ future is seen as well in our commitment to a vibrant world language curriculum.

Spanish and Mandarin Chinese are studied by our W.O.W. (Worlds of Wonder 3-year-old program) children and continue sequentially throughout the early grades of the Lower School.  Students in that division who are not in those grades may choose before-school classes in Mandarin as an enhancement beyond their already scheduled language.  A new Mandarin teacher was hired for our Middle School which will allow morning sessions for 6^th, 7^th and 8^th grade students who are interested this year in studying such a critical world language as an enrichment to their regular curriculum.  The intention is to offer Mandarin the following year to all Lower and Middle School grades as a world language option during the school day, in addition to Spanish and French.  Upper School has now reached its fourth year of study in Mandarin, offering students that option among three—Spanish, French and Mandarin.  Our commitment to world languages and cultures is steadfast and necessary as we prepare our students for the century in which they will live and work. 

Wireless infrastructure is scheduled for completion on the Lower School campus as that division joins the Middle School and Upper School in an “anytime/anywhere” cyber learning environment.  The Middle School enters its second year as a laptop community in which each student carries his or her own laptop as a tool for learning.  Lower School students will have significant exposure to COWs, or Computers on Wheels, and as students in all of our grades, will have access to the World Wide Web, when appropriate, anywhere on campus.  The Upper School laptop program continues to flourish, with all students in those grades carrying his or her individual computer.  Technology training for teachers has been enhanced in depth and breadth in all three divisions, consistent with the applications required of our students in the different grade levels.  We have sought the expertise of professionals to create a top end TV Studio, video production and broadcasting curriculum for our Upper School.  Construction, infrastructure, hardware purchases and program design will be the work of the current school year.  Students will begin to select courses starting February for school year 2011-2012 in this media-rich, peer-based collaborative learning environment.  Middle School has put in place a methodical integration of technology in the various academic areas.  With the hiring of an expert in the field of instructional technology, that division’s web design course will now include broadcasting, streaming video production, podcasting and other student-driven 21^st century genres in communication.

The integration of course content sparks relationships between and among ideas of otherwise considered unrelated and isolated areas of study.  Mrs. Quaid, our Lower School Head, and I wrote a letter this summer to Lower School parents describing an expansion of the Benjamin Math Program to include a variety of methodologies for easier and quicker acquisition of difficult concepts for some.  Real-life applications drive this curriculum and are at the core of the changes we see in the 21^st century schoolhouse.  And, technology will play a fundamental role in more and more of the approaches used to teach children who are in settings such as The Benjamin School, where preparation for life in a heretofore unknown world is at the center of our efforts.  Here at TBS, we base many of our programmatic decisions on the plethora of brain research now available to the educator for more effective and efficient teaching strategies.  A new strings program will serve Lower and Middle School students who wish to include this life-long skill in their repertoire of interests.  In short order, orchestral programs will sprout and migrate to the Upper School.  Learning to play and subsequently practicing a strings instrument has proven to be brain-enhancing, as has learning a non-Western language for individuals living in this part of the world.

New and highly trained teachers to the Upper School will bring invigorating depth and expansion to social studies, world languages and the arts.  Lower and Middle School students will be greeted by new faculty with different areas of expertise to add to the already stellar experiences characterized by those divisions.  All students will continue to be exposed to the value of working collaboratively toward a common goal and to learn tolerance and understanding.  They will strive to accept and give constructive criticism, exchange ideas and opinions, resolve conflict, build consensus and respect one another.  Colleges and universities are reporting these same requirements in this new millennium of higher education.  The 21^st century demands cooperation in the professional workplace.  We at The Benjamin School are committed by mission to prepare our students for their future, not for our past.

There is so much more worthy of conveying; however, I am sure that you are growing weary of my trying to herd all the cats together for your collective view.  TBS is an extremely exciting and dynamic place, a school where the future is always in sight.  Please join us in celebrating all that has been done here in the past fifty years, and ride with us into the future where so much still awaits your children.  This 50^th anniversary year, more than others that have come before, will offer so many opportunities for you, our parents, to join us, your faculty, as we commemorate the rich past of this school and behold in amazement the future that unfolds for Benjamin students.

Watch for 50^th anniversary celebration events!

With much appreciation for your faith in us,

Robert S. Goldberg
Head of School