From a 2004 Saklan Monthly

 Being proactive and responsible parents, you ask this question often, which we appreciate. It is a timeless topic, and it is one we the faculty returned to at a recent faculty meeting, prompted by a short pamphlet we read on the topic.  After our faculty's rich conversation, during which I took copious notes, I prepared the following for list of suggestions for our students' parents.  Enjoy. 

Saklan Graduation Dinner Address, June 2008

A week ago I saw REM in concert, and I listened to Michael Stipe sing the following lyrics: “I’m overwhelmed, I’m on repeat, I’m emptied out, I’m incomplete, You trusted me, I want to show you, I don’t want to be the Hollow Man.”

Graduates, I don’t want you to become hollow men or women. Since Saklan hosted Dr. Madeline Levine a year ago as a Parent Education speaker, her words of warning have haunted me; too many kids today are unhappy—and, she asked, what is ultimately more important than our happiness, well being and sense of fulfillment?

Research review paper, prepared as a Klingenstein Visiting Fellow, Columbia University Teachers College, January 2008 

We seek to understand methods school-leaders can use to stimulate, foster and encourage curricular innovation by teachers in order to find out how school-leaders can better generate on-going curricular innovation in their schools so that student learning can continue apace with fast changing world and with fast changing fields of brain-based learning.  

Graduation Dinner Address, June 2006

Recently in the New York Times, columnist David Brooks wrote his own interpretation of what lies at the root of much of today’s global unrest: “People want others to recognize their significance. They want to feel important and part of something important.  Some people believe we are motivated by greed for money or lust for power. But money and power are means to get recognition. They are markers of success, and success makes us feel important and causes others to pay attention when they walk in the room.

Saklan Monthly, April 2007

Saklan Graduation Dinner Address, June 2007

Saklan Monthly Head's Column, Fall 2007 

Saklan students love learning as scientists. Our second graders, who have been learning about dinosaurs by role-playing paleontologists—a word which they can spell, by the way—conducted a 30 minute “dig” in our school's large sandbox.

From a 2005 Saklan Monthly

From a 2003 Saklan Monthly

“The clearest way into the Universe is through a forest wilderness,” John Muir wrote more than a century ago. Today it is true that the best path for students into understanding the broad world is via vigorous exploration of it. Yosemite exalts the soul, inspires the imagination, and provides a phenomenal setting for educating students in natural history, geography, American History, botany, geology, and much, much more.

Graduation Dinner Address, 2005

I know there is a metaphor in the fact that the new building has come into the middle school on the very same day we graciously escort out our graduates.  It may be that your departure creates such a void, such an empty space, that we have had to go to extraordinary lengths to fill it.   It may be that the legacy you leave behind of intellectual achievement and student leadership contribution is so large that we needed more space to accommodate it.   Or it may be that you graduates have been so magnetic—so charismatic and so welcoming—that you have by your own virtues expanded the middle school and this new building is the token of that. 

But tonight I wanted to speak for a few minutes about privilege and anxiety.  I was struck this spring upon recognizing that the two books in my reading experience that best capture the sights and sounds, the environment—the culture—the world of excellent independent schools and universities—that both books contain in their title the same word:  Privilege. 

Graduation Dinner Address, June 2004

 This past weekend two events occurred linking us to events and persons of enormous significance in the history of the United States.  On Saturday, former President Ronald Reagan passed away, and then yesterday we marked the 60th anniversary of D-Day.  

Graduation Address, 2005

Graduation Address, 2006

Good morning Saklan Valley School: Students, Teachers, Parents, Guests, and Graduates:

Last week I had the good fortune to attend a screening of the new movie Cars, as the guest of one of our wonderful new Pixar families here at Saklan. No, I am not going to tell you the ending-- it is a secret-- but I am going to recommend you see it this summer, and I am going share with you one of the movie's important themes: that being a good friend, and helping others, are far more important than anything else.

From a 2005 Saklan Monthly

 100%! Nine out of nine! Yes, we are crowing and please forgive us if we continue to do so for a few more months. Every single one of our fine Eighth Grade students has been admitted to his or her first-choice private/independent secondary school. It is a great honor for them and for the school; the list of schools admitting members of the class of 2005 speaks for itself: Athenian, Bentley, Branson, College Preparatory School, East Bay Waldorf, Holy Names, and Orinda Academy.

It is not that they were all selected to some commonly perceived “top” school or schools. We don’t rank schools, and we discourage those who attempt to do so. Rather then pushing or pressuring our students to apply only to “marquee” schools, we carefully counsel our seventh and eighth graders to consider a wide variety of schools, and in that thorough process we work to match up each individual student with the school which we believe will be the best fit for his or her unique abilities and particular educational experience goals.

From a 2003 Saklan Monthly

From a 2004 Saklan Monthly

Saklan Monthly Head's Column, Winter 2007

 A highlight of our association’s national conference this year was a dialogue, in a sense, between two great thinkers about organizational development—one, the widely known author of Good to Great and Built to Last, Jim Collins, and the other the most prominent organizational consultant within NAIS, Rob Evans, author of The Human Side of School Change.

As a speaker Jim Collins was passionate, engaging, and inspiring; “Good is the Enemy of Great,” he preaches, and he implores organizations to reach for greatness by adopting his five organizational development strategies. Rob Evans is a low key alternative—sometimes sardonic, sometimes mordant, but always compassionate, as unusual as that combination might seem. “The Perfect is the Enemy of the Good,” he responds, and urges us to stay our course, to perpetuate the things we do so well.