Looking Back On the School Year

Our wonderful elementary and chorus teacher Laura White has just published a sequel to her inspiring children’s book Our Class Needs You. Her new book, Our World Needs You, invites readers to engage in the important process of reflecting on their experiences in the past school year. The book opens with the lines, “The school year is ending, it’s been quite a ride! We look back and reflect on our learning with pride.”  

Has this year been “quite a ride?” The colloquialism “quite a ride” refers to experiences that have been intense, memorable, or potentially challenging. It seems accurate to say we have witnessed memorable and challenging events in the world this year. It has also been a signal year for our school. In September we began the exciting challenge of planning our golden anniversary, which occurred in February. 

Reconnecting, reminiscing Trying to gather email addresses for five decades of students stretched everyone’s resources. Imagine planning a dinner party without knowing if you would have 50 guests or several hundred. Our 50th turned into a three-day event with about 1,000 people attending the Sunday festivities on campus. A central learning, as with previous reunions, was that alumni are eager to reconnect and reminisce about their Meher Schools experiences. As Laura’s book suggests, it’s also helpful for current students to reminisce at the end of their concluding school year.

Reflecting on challenges As the historians of a child’s life, we can remind them that at the beginning of the school year, they didn’t have many of the skills they have now. It’s wonderful to focus on the accomplishments, but we also want to point to perseverance even when a subject or a social situation doesn’t feel easy.

Laura’s book highlights the reality that children have different strengths and challenges, and their individual qualities are valuable gifts to the world. Talking about the fact that people feel challenged by different circumstances is a way of helping children understand and have compassion for one another. “Sitting quietly is a challenge for him.” “She loves art but finds math challenging.” When a child starts acting in what seems like antisocial ways, we can offer the idea “Maybe he’s having a challenge in his life right now.”

Reflecting on the year in terms of its high points and challenges can open us to a bigger picture. We can ask ourselves what happenings during the year inspired us to find new ways to make our shared life more rewarding and inclusive.

Remembering with gratitude One of the most important qualities we role-model for children is our dedication to helping community members in need. When one of our preschool teachers had her car and purse stolen, parents rushed to offer to loan her their cars and to pick her up on their way to school.

The end of the year is always a time of reflecting with gratitude for all the care that has flowed so generously in our school community, with special inexpressible thanks to our loving, dedicated staff.

Now we have the chance to be together during the summer months in lots of fun and fulfilling ways. Here’s hoping summer is a time of restoration and relaxation for you and your family.