Audacious Goals

IN THE OPENING DAYS OF THE ACADEMIC YEAR, IT HAS BEEN a joy to see you settle into the patterns of school life. You are unphased by living in a world of Days 1-7. I am especially proud of our new students and the 9th graders who have found their classrooms and learned the intricacies of our campus labyrinth. All of you are now getting to know your teachers or reconnecting with a teacher you’ve had in the past. You’re seeing their passion, learning their expectations and seeing how committed they are to your success.

You have already leapt into your school work. I am very impressed about how much work is getting done in the halls and the library during your free periods. You are eating early and often in the Dining Room, Grille Room and the Tuck. You are returning to life with a dress code after the summer of sartorial independence. You are learning or being reminded of the importance of Marlene and Marco, wondering when we will be blessed with chicken patty day.

For the athletes among us, you are already into your seasons. Our actors and actresses are gearing up to audition for the fall production of Antigone. Our musicians are forging new ensembles and gearing up to make sweet music in the PAC and Chorus Room. Our artists are already creating the next wave of masterpieces that will adorn the studios and bulletin boards. You have begun to hear about community service opportunities. You will be learning more about clubs, those that already exist and those waiting to be proposed. You are reuniting with your “old” friends and making connections and the beginning of friendships with new students. In other words, you are fully engaged in your life at Hackley and, as a result, we are off to a very good start.

When we begin something new, whether it’s a new school year or a new job, we should take the time to set some goals. In fact, I suspect some of the more organized and forward thinking among us even write them down so they have a very clear picture of what they aim to accomplish. Your parents may have “asked” you to do such a goal-setting exercise and your academic advisor may do so as well.

When I talk of goals for the year, I am sure that many are swimming in your heads at this point. They may include:

• This year, I want to earn all effort grades of “1” and “2.”

• This year, I will make it a point to visit all of my teachers in person to ask them questions about what we are studying.

• This year, I will be on time to homeroom.

• This year, I want to make the varsity team.

• This year, I want to get a role in the school play or perform in a coffeehouse.

• This year, I want to get involved in community service.

• This year, I want to use my frees more productively.

• This year, I won’t chew gum in front of my Dean, get a DD, and then complain about the rule (oh wait, that’s one of my goals for you).

You get the point. As many people are in this room, there are goals. Why then do we set goals? In short, goals provide purpose, direction, motivation, and inspiration.

Having now asked you a bit about your personal goals, I think it only appropriate to tell you what Hackley’s goals are for you. For a school like Hackley, the goals are captured in the school’s mission statement. When you think about it, mission is a pretty dramatic and cool name for a goal. Sounds like something from an action movie, doesn’t it? Those of you who are Admissions Ambassadors, you may have heard about Hackley’s mission. For many of you, you may be hearing it for the first time. The school’s mission statement is “Hackley challenges students to grow in character, scholarship and accomplishment, to offer unreserved effort, and to learn from our community’s varying perspectives and backgrounds.” You will notice that neither of our much talked about mottoes is part of the mission. So while we aim to live by the mottoes of “Enter here to be and find a friend” and “United we help one another,” we have laid out our school goal as a challenge.

Just as your personal goals might be ambitious and audacious, so are Hackley’s goals. Think about the words of Hackley’s mission. First off, the key verb in the statement is “challenges.” It sets up our mission as something aspirational, a challenge that all of us undertake together, and something that we must all work to attain. It’s not a simple description of what Hackley is.

You may also notice that Hackley challenges you to “grow in character, scholarship and accomplishment.” Did you notice that character comes before scholarship and accomplishment? It may not always feel that way since you don’t take a class called “Character” and you do take classes in subjects like history and math. But yes, we are ultimately more interested in who you become as a person, the decisions you make, your personal integrity, and the values that we aim to nurture than we are with your grades, test scores, or where you go to college. And truth to be told, it’s actually more challenging to mold character than it is to teach you any of the subjects on which you are formally tested in your classes.

This is why, in the context of classes, grade meetings, conversations with your teachers and Deans, and in opening assemblies, we speak often about what you probably think of as “the rules” of Hackley. Why do I ask each teacher to spend some time in the opening days of school talking about academic integrity and how academic honesty is defined in their classroom? Because we want you to understand our expectations about what constitutes honesty. Why do we talk early and often about the importance of entering here to be and find a friend? Because we aim to honor and cultivate the values of kindness and civility. Why do we have Chapel talks? Because we want people to share their stories and what they’ve learned in the hopes that their story will positively affect the choices you make. Why do we ask you to do lunch duty? Because we want you to take responsibility of our shared space.

All of these examples hopefully help you to see that Hackley is keenly interested in who you are as a person, your character, not simply what grades you earn, what SAT or ACT scores you achieve, and what college or university you call home at the end of your time at Hackley. So, while we care deeply about scholarship and accomplishment, remember that our greatest aim is to nurture the content of your character, not just the content of your resume.

Our school mission statement then challenges you to offer “unreserved effort.” This is my favorite phrase in Hackley’s enunciation of our school goals. If someone were to ask me to picture unreserved effort, what would immediately come to mind are images of you: Hackley students working hard in the classrooms, the hallways, the art studios, the PAC, in the gym, on the athletic fields. Perhaps without even knowing that the school had a mission or what it said, I think it’s important for you to realize that you embody one of the institution’s core goals. Your teachers exert the same “unreserved effort.” The hours they put into lesson planning and grading, coupled with the time they spend giving extra help are critical manifestations of just how much effort they put forth on your behalf. Also, think about your report cards. Love them or hate them, it’s why we as a school award effort grades in addition to achievement grades. When we ask you to offer unreserved effort, we are challenging you to do your best. We’re not saying “earn an A.” Rather, we are saying “work hard. Ask questions. Engage and commit. Don’t be passive or apathetic.” In our challenge to get you to offer unreserved effort, I think this is one area where Hackley is very successful in meetings its ambitious mission statement.

The last charge in the school’s statement of goals is to challenge you “to learn from our community’s varying perspectives and backgrounds.” In some ways, this is the easiest and also the most difficult of the goals outlined in our mission. It’s easy in that you are part of a community that contains many different perspectives and backgrounds and we are constantly learning from each other.

Think about what you have learned from your classmates and teachers about their lives and experiences. What’s more challenging is to assess how and what we are learning about each other’s differences. It’s why we try to expose you to many different ideas, experiences and points of view. It’s why we actively encourage you to engage in community service.

It’s why we have clubs like UNITY, GSA and HEAL which are dedicated to issues of diversity, inclusion and sustainability. It’s why we actively promote global education through our curriculum, community service and travel opportunities. It’s one of the reasons why we’ve established the new Community Studies Department. It’s why we have outside speakers and assemblies. It’s why we have The Dial as an outlet for the students’ voices. It’s why we promote creative expression through The Vision. And it’s also why we have difficult conversations on challenging topics in classrooms, assemblies, meetings and the hallways.

Given that our goal is to challenge people to learn from our community’s varying backgrounds and perspectives, it is only appropriate that you be challenged with issues and ideas that might cause you some occasional discomfort. There’s a well known quotation that comes to mind at this moment. Some attribute it to Frank Zappa which for the adults in the room makes it much cooler. It goes like this: “A mind is like a parachute — it doesn’t work if it isn’t open.” So I read the phrase in our mission about our community’s backgrounds and perspectives as a challenge to be open-minded and curious and not to assume that your way is the only way.

The best kind of learning is a dialogue, a conversation, not a monologue or a lecture. So, I challenge each of you to join the conversation and share some of yourself with the rest of us.

So let’s read the mission one last time. “Hackley challenges students to grow in character, scholarship and accomplishment, to offer unreserved effort, and to learn from our community’s varying perspectives and backgrounds.” I hope you have a better sense of what Hackley’s aims are and I also hope that you see how ambitious and audacious they are. The author Philip Roth wrote “audacity without purpose is cheap and vulgar.” I hope that you see Hackley’s purposeful, intentional audacity as something valuable, meaningful, and shaping.

So as you set your personal goals, I challenge you to see if you can align some of them with the school’s aims. Set goals about character, community, effort and open-mindedness. It’s harder to do but well worth it.

I look forward to a superb school year.