Thanks to all the parents who took time to attend the 3381 individual parent/teacher conferences this week at CA. A school cannot be “great” without involved and engaged parents.

 

Thanks, too, to our faculty and staff for their extraordinary work to prepare for conferences and share their perspectives on student progress.  

 

In the independent school world, we focus a great deal on the “value proposition” of being part of a community like CA. What makes a Colorado Academy education worth the expense and sacrifice? The answer is that there are many things:

 

Perhaps the most important is the school’s mission and its commitment to support the development of the whole child.  We have designed a learning program that allows students nearly endless opportunities to pursue areas of interest and find connections across disciplines and subject matter. At CA, we are also intentional about challenging students to step outside of their comfort zones and engage in a broad range of activities in the liberal arts and sciences, global education, visual and performing arts, athletics and physical wellness, and experiential education. 

 

Key to a student’s progress is honest feedback.  I sometimes quote a faculty member who offered a short-hand version of our mission statement with just three words: “We teach kids!”  I know as a parent, I get tremendous insight into my own children’s learning and progress from CA teachers. I should note — not all of it is positive.  I love my children, but no one is perfect (including their dad).  Frankly, as a parent, I welcome that critical perspective.   I once had a colleague who told an audience of ninth grade parents, “Your child is not at the zenith of his or her intellectual achievement.” The line got a great laugh.  Gosh, I would hope no ninth grader is at the top of his or her game.  But, sadly, too may children in our nation feel this pressure to “peak” earlier and earlier.  We live in a competitive age. Just this week there was an article in the New York Times about rising rates of anxiety in children, sparked, in part, by an overwhelming fear of failure.

 

So, I hope there are some things you can take away from this week’s conferences:

1) Trust the teacher. These are talented, experienced professionals who are invested in a student-oriented process. They are going to observe and see things that you probably don’t always see at home.  They benefit from learning more about the things they don’t see at school, but also be willing to accept and embrace a picture of your child that might look different than the person you see.  

2) Welcome the good and the bad.  Schools are focused on helping young people grow and improve. We approach this from a critical, but non-judgmental perspective. We wouldn’t be in business if students entered our classrooms as fully formed experts. There is a lot of work we do during the 14 years between Pre-Kindergarten and Senior year.  We help students become creative and critical thinkers, but also good and ethical people. This means we are going to draw attention to those “teachable moments” in life that propel growth. In my experience, most “teachable moments” stem from something that was hard to face. To promote resiliency, we actually want some of these hard learning moments to happen when we are young, rather than as adults.  In other words, failure can be a really good thing for young people to confront, particularly when their teachers and parents help them process those moments and provide them that unconditional support that is so critical to forming a healthy self-image.

3) Understand that improvement takes time. We all need to be patient. In a world that changes in just seconds, we must remember that learning and intellectual development is a slower process. There are no “life hacks” for mastering pre-Calculus or understanding punctuation or for being able to analyze Shakespeare. Every child is on some intellectual journey, and his or her rate of travel varies. There are many external and biological factors that affect this rate of growth, but my research suggests that much is affected by genetics and each individual’s unique brain development.  The teachers will have strategies and suggestions that you can follow and will help your child address areas of challenge. Intentionally missing from those strategies is constantly pressuring a child.

4) Review what you learned from the teachers with your child. Sit down and have a conversation. Some grades invite students to the conferences, but not all. Empower your child to take responsibility for her or his learning. Encourage children to set goals for what they might do to continue to grow and take advantage of the tremendous learning opportunities at CA.  The conclusions should not be “work harder” or a setting a goal of “getting higher grades.” Rather, focus on the process of learning: being diligent about getting homework done; establishing a goal to speak out more in class; or endeavoring to meet with a teacher once a week during help time.  I find that when kids do their homework, engage with their teachers, seek extra help, and participate in class, improvement happens naturally.

Our next set of conferences will take place in February. Prior to that, I invite you to attend our January SPEAK event with Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot, a sociologist and MacArthur Foundation “genius” grant recipient, who has served on the faculty of Harvard University since 1972.

She will speak at CA about conferences and the book titled, The Essential Conversation: What Parents and Teachers Can Learn From Each Other. She examines these crucial dialogs from the perspective of both parents and teachers and shows how these conversations are both a mirror of and metaphor for larger cultural forces that shape the development of our children. You can find out more and register for that lecture on the CA website.

 

Thank you again for your support for CA and your positive engagement in your child’s life!