Windows Into Shore

Living the (Community) Code

Lee Carey
Director of Admissions & Secondary School Placement

There is a frequently shown TV ad that distracts me from its advertising intent by the social message it weaves: see the good, do the good.  It's the ad where the neighbor who saw a colleague clean up a workroom mess turns around and helps with the massive leaf pile next door, and so on.  It tugs at me every time.  Not that I am unkind, not that I don't know how and when to offer assistance.  But there is a difference between knowing these things and reflexively doing these things.  Most know and recognize good behaviors, the Golden Rules, if you will, from an early age.  We are taught them, made to practice them.  They do make us better, more functional citizens. 

At Shore we strive to live by our Community Code.  It grounds us and reminds us of what it takes to allow ourselves and others to get the most out of life within a school community and hopefully well beyond.  Most days we live the Code well: doors are held, classmates are included, new ideas are welcomed.  When we haven't had our best day, there are people to remind us of how we can do better tomorrow.  But there is something powerful in seeing the Code be truly lived by children around you. 

I watched at lunch last week as a middle school student made three earnest attempts in a single lunch period to coax a solo diner to a table of classmates.  Despite being thrice rebuffed, a group then resolved to move themselves to the solo diner.  As I visited the playground with a prospective eight year old student and his parents this week, we were invaded by a boisterous recess crowd of fifth graders.  As we deepened into adult conversation, my student visitor bravely ventured to a swing across the playground.  Suddenly, there she was, a fifth grader towering over my young visitor, leaving her peers and coming to ask if he'd like to join the 4 square game. 

Inspiration for us all and true moments of living the Community Code.  

Red Flags or Red Herrings?

Lee Carey
Director of Admissions & Secondary School Placement

Last week, a review of Susan Engel's Red Flags or Red Herrings? Predicting Who Your Child Will Become landed on my kitchen table.  Working in independent school elementary admissions, I encounter lots of anxiety from parents about whether they have been doing the "right things," certainly to get their children ready for school, but also for life.  I work with parents of adolescents, too, as they journey into secondary school placement.  They muse often about what else they should push their child into to look better prepared in the eyes of prep school admissions officers.  What to do with all this angst? 

Clearly the answer is to read this book.  Dr. Engel (and her considerable research) champion the view that every child is born with immutable traits that remain constant over a lifetime. Regardless of home or school environments, the dreamy stay dreamy, the analytic devour the facts, the optimistic ones bring us sunshine, and the hot-tempered keep us on our toes.  Shore's legendary elementary teacher, Debbie Parkhurst has always said, "you know, they all start school with their bags packed.  I can tell you by the end of Kindergarten what they will be like as students, teenagers or even adults." 

We have many things to offer them, of course.  We stretch their talents and nurture their citizenry in school.  Chores and the occasional disappointments of life build their coping skills.  Team play and solo projects prepare them for greater-world encounters.  But still, the artists gravitate to the studio, the leaders have a hard time softening their elbows, and the shy are happiest when they can reflect on paper (or online!).  In the words of our Anita Barbato, beloved former Lower School Head at Shore, "Such as I am, I am a Precious Gift."