Jenny Leffler: Hackley Parents’ Association Chair
The Parents’ Association Chair was endowed in 1999, the Association’s Centennial gift to the school, “demonstrating our high regard for the faculty who help shape our children’s future.” The Chair is awarded for a three-year term to a faculty member who fosters intellectual curiosity and a love of learning, motivates and encourages students, demonstrates creative and effective teaching, and offers students counsel and mentoring both in an outside the classroom. Past chair holders include Kirsten Karlsrud, John Leistler and Joan Fox.
AMAZING GRACE
By Julianne Puente ’91 -- For the past 15 years, Jenny Leffler has epitomized the “Hackley way of life,” giving wholly and unconditionally of herself to colleagues and friends, students and players, parents and alums. With constant kindness and warmth, she has grown professionally and personally over the past decade and a half. All the Hackley “greats” are smart, talented, dedicated, committed, vested, caring, and passionate -- they love the school and their students. This is Jenny. But what distinguishes her in this elite group is her gentle nature and her amazing grace.
Longtime Middle School colleague and friend Steve Fitzpatrick said of Jenny, “Nothing ever seems to rock her. She is extremely even handed in her approach with kids, teachers, parents, and administrators, and…she has a really nice way about her that disarms people and makes them feel comfortable around her.” Walk into her office and you will notice more than 18 plaques that represent the many league championships she has won as the head coach of both the varsity girls’ field hockey and lacrosse teams. But in addition, the walls are covered with notes, pictures, doodles, and posters left by students and players that have entered her classroom or stepped on her playing field. Students are drawn to her for good reason: she is honest, present, and fully committed to their development not just as students, but as people- magnetic qualities, especially for middle school students.
Starting at Hackley as a 7th grade English teacher in the fall of 1994, Jenny quickly emerged as an important figure in the Middle School. When the current 7th and 8th grade classes heard this profile was being written about Jenny, so many of them asked to be included that it was impossible to incorporate their individual quotes in this piece. What emerged over and over was how comfortable they felt with Ms. Leffler, how much they looked up to her, and how much they trusted her. Hackley 8th grader, Chad Malinowski ’13, a student of Jenny’s for the last two years, succinctly summarized his schoolmates’ feelings, “She is really honest and understanding and easy to talk to and those are really great qualities for a teacher to have. She is determined in her work to get it right. Although I love her as my English teacher, I really would also love to have her as a coach.”
Jenny has been determined to “get it right” ever since she was a child. Jenny’s mom Susan Leffler characterized her daughter as “always eager to please… a tireless worker who put forth so much effort to be her best. Jenny wasn’t a star…not the fastest, or strongest -- but she was loyal and worked as hard as she could.” A native of Bedford, NY, and a graduate of Fox Lane High School, Jenny’s journey to Hackley included stops in Ohio, Massachusetts, and New York for college and graduate school and Colorado and Washington, DC for work before ultimately leading to Tarrytown. And like so many veteran teachers on the Hilltop, she thought her stay at Hackley was temporary. “I thought when I came to Hackley I would be here for a year. After I finished my degree at Columbia, it was where I found a job. It was nice that it was close to where I grew up, but I never imagined it would become my life.”
Jenny always loved reading and writing and made the decision to major in English while she was still in high school. “I remember my Junior English teacher reading my paper aloud. It was on The Grapes of Wrath. Then I thought I could become a writer. I went into college wanting to write. I like expressing myself through writing so I took a bunch of creative writing courses in college. I wanted to pursue writing after college so I entered an MFA program in Boston in Creative Writing, but I realized quickly it was a lonely profession and that it wasn’t the thing for me.”
Switching gears, Jenny enrolled at Columbia and completed her graduate work at Teacher’s College in anticipation of becoming an English teacher. When asked about her first visit to the Hackley campus, Jenny recalled, “I came up here and I met Phil Variano, Peter Gibbon and I guess I met Arthur Naething. I had a good feeling about it [Hackley], but I really wanted to continue living in New York City. I remember sitting in the Mt. Kisco Diner with my dad the day after I interviewed telling him ‘this is how much money I have to be offered to accept the job’…of course the offer was nowhere near that amount, but I took it anyway.” Looking back, she sees it as the best decision she could have made.
While teaching three sections of 7th and one section of 9th grade English during her first year at Hackley, Jenny was able to reconnect with the two sports she had played in high school and college by becoming the JV Field Hockey and Assistant Varsity Girls’ Lacrosse coach. From the start of her Hackley career, she effortlessly crossed between the Middle and Upper divisions as a teacher and a varsity coach, helping students emerge from the murky waters of Middle School into the different but equally complicated world of Upper School. “I do love their energy in Middle School and the fact that they are willing to do anything. I guess there is a part of me that loves that they are clueless. There is something so endearing about them. I like the fact that I might have some influence on who they will be later, and I get to witness them grow up. But I have to be honest, what keeps me sane is coaching my varsity teams.”
According to her mom, “Jenny always was into sports. When she was 10 she dressed up as Bucky Dent for Halloween! Sports made high school for her. They gave her a niche and structure and taught her discipline.” As Jenny recalls, “I didn’t start playing organized sports until basketball my freshman year, and I didn’t play field hockey until my sophomore year. I think the thing that won me over was the team part of it.”
Jenny cites her high school athletic experience with inspiring the values she instills in her players as their coach. She points directly to her field hockey and lacrosse coach Beth Starpoli as the most dominant and influential person in her life during high school. “Starpoli was always just there. When I think about a coach, I always think about her. She demanded a lot of us. She was tough, but it was her devotion to us -- what she said always meant the most to me. She was the dominant influence in my life at the time…. We may not talk often, but when we do, she is always anxious to hear about my life. In high school we never won anything -- but we always left the season thinking we were the best team ever. I learned what you make of your team experience is worth more than any championship or trophy.” This philosophy of unconditional support and encouragement has paid off impressively: 13 Ivy League lacrosse championships, 5 lacrosse state titles, 5 Ivy League field hockey championships, and 1 field hockey state title.
Just watch Jenny, now a veteran coach in her own right, interact with her players for just a few minutes and you will see the special, meaningful relationships she has built with her girls -- Starpoli can be more than proud of her protégé. Indeed, Vanessa Greenberg ’00, who played both field hockey and lacrosse for Jenny, described her coach much the same way Jenny had described her mentor: “She was interested in us as individuals, not just as players or students. And when I speak to her, whether it is after a few months or a year, she still has that energy and excitement, wondering where the latest chapter in my life has taken me.”
Jenny is so committed and vested in her teams that players want to be part of her programs just to have the “Leffler experience.” When asked to describe Jenny, Lamia Harik ’08 wrote: “She always gave every player and student her genuine care, concern, and advice, which made us always feel loved. She made me always want to perform my very best for her; she made me and all my teammates want to give everything we had to make her proud on and off the field -- to do for her what she does for us.” Hilary Smith ’08 echoed her teammate’s feelings about their coach: “She is a very important person in my life, and I am privileged to be both her player and her friend.”
But what people see in Jenny in the classroom, in the halls, and on the field is only part of the story. Within the calm she radiates is often a storm of emotion. For example, after the recent nail-biting double overtime state championship win over Portledge, Jenny did not run onto the field or jump for joy at the conclusion of the game. Rather, she took in the moment by placing her hands on her knees and staring at the ground. Moments later, she briefly covered her face with her hands before embracing fellow coach, Melissa Abraham ’90. Many might interpret her motions as signs of relief from a tense championship game, but those who know her would correctly identify her movements as a release from the tension of a season to which she has unreservedly put her entire self. Her reaction at the conclusion of this game would have been the same regardless of its outcome.
I know I am only one of many who feel they could not imagine their lives without Jenny. There are so many -- students, teachers, coaches, and parents -- whose lives Jenny has enriched. How fitting it is that someone well on her way to being a Hackley legend should be living in a house previously occupied by one of Hackley’s greatest legends, Randy McNaughton, who also raised his family here and made Hackley the center of his professional life.
Jenny’s two children, Hackley first-grader Annabel, and four-year-old Colin, who will enter the Hackley kindergarten next year as a member of the class of 2022, have been fixtures on the Hackley campus since they were born. Is there a greater compliment parents can pay a school than entrusting their children to that institution? It seems no other group trusts Hackley more in this regard than its own faculty. “I know it can be easy to take things for granted here, but I try not to. I believe in and trust Hackley so much that I am sending my children to Hackley. My children are so comfortable here that I know they can’t imagine going to school any place else.”
A few weeks ago, Jenny asked her son who attends a local Jewish preschool, what religion he is. Colin reasoned that since he attends a Jewish school, he is mostly Jewish, but since his dad is Christian, he must also be a little Christian -- a perfectly rational argument for a smart four-year-old to make. Jenny then asked him what religion he would be next year when he starts Hackley. Without a moment’s hesitation Colin responded, “Next year I will be a little bit Jewish, a little bit Christian, and a little bit Hornet!”
Of course it is impossible to capture all the facets of a person who is mother, wife, daughter, sister, writer, athlete (including triathlete), traveler, and friend, and who so well embodies the spirit of Hackley. For those of us dedicated to sustaining and vitalizing the Hilltop, Hackley is a special place -- more than a school, more than a job, and more than a home -- it is a way of life. Jenny Leffler is one of the reasons.
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Julianne Puente ’91 is one of Hackley's most distinguished alumnae in the Class of 1991, having won the Parker Cup, the Mother's Association Bowl and the McIlhenny Bowl. She went on to Cornell, and after graduating in 1995 came back to her alma mater. She has served Hackley in a multitude of roles including Boarding Associate, Assistant College Counselor, Associate Director of Admissions, musician, 8th grade Dean, History teacher, and State Championship winning Varsity Coach. She has decided to take on an exciting new challenge in 2009 – 2010 as Deputy Headmaster for Student Life and Dean of Students at King’s Academy in Jordan.
Back
By Julianne Puente ’91 -- For the past 15 years, Jenny Leffler has epitomized the “Hackley way of life,” giving wholly and unconditionally of herself to colleagues and friends, students and players, parents and alums. With constant kindness and warmth, she has grown professionally and personally over the past decade and a half. All the Hackley “greats” are smart, talented, dedicated, committed, vested, caring, and passionate -- they love the school and their students. This is Jenny. But what distinguishes her in this elite group is her gentle nature and her amazing grace.
Longtime Middle School colleague and friend Steve Fitzpatrick said of Jenny, “Nothing ever seems to rock her. She is extremely even handed in her approach with kids, teachers, parents, and administrators, and…she has a really nice way about her that disarms people and makes them feel comfortable around her.” Walk into her office and you will notice more than 18 plaques that represent the many league championships she has won as the head coach of both the varsity girls’ field hockey and lacrosse teams. But in addition, the walls are covered with notes, pictures, doodles, and posters left by students and players that have entered her classroom or stepped on her playing field. Students are drawn to her for good reason: she is honest, present, and fully committed to their development not just as students, but as people- magnetic qualities, especially for middle school students.
Starting at Hackley as a 7th grade English teacher in the fall of 1994, Jenny quickly emerged as an important figure in the Middle School. When the current 7th and 8th grade classes heard this profile was being written about Jenny, so many of them asked to be included that it was impossible to incorporate their individual quotes in this piece. What emerged over and over was how comfortable they felt with Ms. Leffler, how much they looked up to her, and how much they trusted her. Hackley 8th grader, Chad Malinowski ’13, a student of Jenny’s for the last two years, succinctly summarized his schoolmates’ feelings, “She is really honest and understanding and easy to talk to and those are really great qualities for a teacher to have. She is determined in her work to get it right. Although I love her as my English teacher, I really would also love to have her as a coach.”
Jenny has been determined to “get it right” ever since she was a child. Jenny’s mom Susan Leffler characterized her daughter as “always eager to please… a tireless worker who put forth so much effort to be her best. Jenny wasn’t a star…not the fastest, or strongest -- but she was loyal and worked as hard as she could.” A native of Bedford, NY, and a graduate of Fox Lane High School, Jenny’s journey to Hackley included stops in Ohio, Massachusetts, and New York for college and graduate school and Colorado and Washington, DC for work before ultimately leading to Tarrytown. And like so many veteran teachers on the Hilltop, she thought her stay at Hackley was temporary. “I thought when I came to Hackley I would be here for a year. After I finished my degree at Columbia, it was where I found a job. It was nice that it was close to where I grew up, but I never imagined it would become my life.”
Jenny always loved reading and writing and made the decision to major in English while she was still in high school. “I remember my Junior English teacher reading my paper aloud. It was on The Grapes of Wrath. Then I thought I could become a writer. I went into college wanting to write. I like expressing myself through writing so I took a bunch of creative writing courses in college. I wanted to pursue writing after college so I entered an MFA program in Boston in Creative Writing, but I realized quickly it was a lonely profession and that it wasn’t the thing for me.”
Switching gears, Jenny enrolled at Columbia and completed her graduate work at Teacher’s College in anticipation of becoming an English teacher. When asked about her first visit to the Hackley campus, Jenny recalled, “I came up here and I met Phil Variano, Peter Gibbon and I guess I met Arthur Naething. I had a good feeling about it [Hackley], but I really wanted to continue living in New York City. I remember sitting in the Mt. Kisco Diner with my dad the day after I interviewed telling him ‘this is how much money I have to be offered to accept the job’…of course the offer was nowhere near that amount, but I took it anyway.” Looking back, she sees it as the best decision she could have made.
While teaching three sections of 7th and one section of 9th grade English during her first year at Hackley, Jenny was able to reconnect with the two sports she had played in high school and college by becoming the JV Field Hockey and Assistant Varsity Girls’ Lacrosse coach. From the start of her Hackley career, she effortlessly crossed between the Middle and Upper divisions as a teacher and a varsity coach, helping students emerge from the murky waters of Middle School into the different but equally complicated world of Upper School. “I do love their energy in Middle School and the fact that they are willing to do anything. I guess there is a part of me that loves that they are clueless. There is something so endearing about them. I like the fact that I might have some influence on who they will be later, and I get to witness them grow up. But I have to be honest, what keeps me sane is coaching my varsity teams.”
According to her mom, “Jenny always was into sports. When she was 10 she dressed up as Bucky Dent for Halloween! Sports made high school for her. They gave her a niche and structure and taught her discipline.” As Jenny recalls, “I didn’t start playing organized sports until basketball my freshman year, and I didn’t play field hockey until my sophomore year. I think the thing that won me over was the team part of it.”
Jenny cites her high school athletic experience with inspiring the values she instills in her players as their coach. She points directly to her field hockey and lacrosse coach Beth Starpoli as the most dominant and influential person in her life during high school. “Starpoli was always just there. When I think about a coach, I always think about her. She demanded a lot of us. She was tough, but it was her devotion to us -- what she said always meant the most to me. She was the dominant influence in my life at the time…. We may not talk often, but when we do, she is always anxious to hear about my life. In high school we never won anything -- but we always left the season thinking we were the best team ever. I learned what you make of your team experience is worth more than any championship or trophy.” This philosophy of unconditional support and encouragement has paid off impressively: 13 Ivy League lacrosse championships, 5 lacrosse state titles, 5 Ivy League field hockey championships, and 1 field hockey state title.
Just watch Jenny, now a veteran coach in her own right, interact with her players for just a few minutes and you will see the special, meaningful relationships she has built with her girls -- Starpoli can be more than proud of her protégé. Indeed, Vanessa Greenberg ’00, who played both field hockey and lacrosse for Jenny, described her coach much the same way Jenny had described her mentor: “She was interested in us as individuals, not just as players or students. And when I speak to her, whether it is after a few months or a year, she still has that energy and excitement, wondering where the latest chapter in my life has taken me.”
Jenny is so committed and vested in her teams that players want to be part of her programs just to have the “Leffler experience.” When asked to describe Jenny, Lamia Harik ’08 wrote: “She always gave every player and student her genuine care, concern, and advice, which made us always feel loved. She made me always want to perform my very best for her; she made me and all my teammates want to give everything we had to make her proud on and off the field -- to do for her what she does for us.” Hilary Smith ’08 echoed her teammate’s feelings about their coach: “She is a very important person in my life, and I am privileged to be both her player and her friend.”
But what people see in Jenny in the classroom, in the halls, and on the field is only part of the story. Within the calm she radiates is often a storm of emotion. For example, after the recent nail-biting double overtime state championship win over Portledge, Jenny did not run onto the field or jump for joy at the conclusion of the game. Rather, she took in the moment by placing her hands on her knees and staring at the ground. Moments later, she briefly covered her face with her hands before embracing fellow coach, Melissa Abraham ’90. Many might interpret her motions as signs of relief from a tense championship game, but those who know her would correctly identify her movements as a release from the tension of a season to which she has unreservedly put her entire self. Her reaction at the conclusion of this game would have been the same regardless of its outcome.
I know I am only one of many who feel they could not imagine their lives without Jenny. There are so many -- students, teachers, coaches, and parents -- whose lives Jenny has enriched. How fitting it is that someone well on her way to being a Hackley legend should be living in a house previously occupied by one of Hackley’s greatest legends, Randy McNaughton, who also raised his family here and made Hackley the center of his professional life.
Jenny’s two children, Hackley first-grader Annabel, and four-year-old Colin, who will enter the Hackley kindergarten next year as a member of the class of 2022, have been fixtures on the Hackley campus since they were born. Is there a greater compliment parents can pay a school than entrusting their children to that institution? It seems no other group trusts Hackley more in this regard than its own faculty. “I know it can be easy to take things for granted here, but I try not to. I believe in and trust Hackley so much that I am sending my children to Hackley. My children are so comfortable here that I know they can’t imagine going to school any place else.”
A few weeks ago, Jenny asked her son who attends a local Jewish preschool, what religion he is. Colin reasoned that since he attends a Jewish school, he is mostly Jewish, but since his dad is Christian, he must also be a little Christian -- a perfectly rational argument for a smart four-year-old to make. Jenny then asked him what religion he would be next year when he starts Hackley. Without a moment’s hesitation Colin responded, “Next year I will be a little bit Jewish, a little bit Christian, and a little bit Hornet!”
Of course it is impossible to capture all the facets of a person who is mother, wife, daughter, sister, writer, athlete (including triathlete), traveler, and friend, and who so well embodies the spirit of Hackley. For those of us dedicated to sustaining and vitalizing the Hilltop, Hackley is a special place -- more than a school, more than a job, and more than a home -- it is a way of life. Jenny Leffler is one of the reasons.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Julianne Puente ’91 is one of Hackley's most distinguished alumnae in the Class of 1991, having won the Parker Cup, the Mother's Association Bowl and the McIlhenny Bowl. She went on to Cornell, and after graduating in 1995 came back to her alma mater. She has served Hackley in a multitude of roles including Boarding Associate, Assistant College Counselor, Associate Director of Admissions, musician, 8th grade Dean, History teacher, and State Championship winning Varsity Coach. She has decided to take on an exciting new challenge in 2009 – 2010 as Deputy Headmaster for Student Life and Dean of Students at King’s Academy in Jordan.
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