Harkness at Lawrenceville: Understand How Lawrentians Learn

It all works out, it always does.

I wonder if we're better served to mute ourselves when we aren't speaking, uh, I'll bet you that will help with the ECHO II. I didn't think about that, but it probably would help us. I think so we can try it. We can try that.

It.

Can yes I can. I can hear can you hear me now I just muted myself, wanted to make sure you guys Yep. So when it turns green.

Green and it turns white. You can hear me.

Great yeah, just to not confuse anything. I've done it so many times with these types of events. I go on a spiel for two minutes and people are like oh.

Uhm?

All you want to probably focus on is is the mute button. That would be the only thing you can. You can mute a video you don't want to mess with that.

And.

Yeah, do you guys see? Do you guys see the chat room? Do you have the ability to see the chat room?

You do.

OK.

No work, no worries please.

OK.

Excuse me

like like what?

You're you're.

I think you can just turn. You can mute First off. I would just mute and then I would just turn and say I'm on a. I'm on a zoom.

Wow.

I have two. I have two of you, Allison.

Yep.

I'm trying it looks like we're starting in seven seconds, so you might have to just close out and try closing both out.

Yeah.

I don't know.

OK.

Wow.

It's still there again.

Alright.

Oh no.

Oh well.

OK.

Well, welcome everybody as you're starting to enter the room, just want to say hello. I'm Matt Mulhern. Nice to see you all. Please be patient. We're going to allow. We have. We have over 100 people who were scheduled to be in this room so I want to make sure everyone has the ability to get on. If people could do me a huge favor and let me know that you can hear and see me in the chat room, that would be very helpful.

Also, if you could let me know that you can see all five panelists.

That would be very helpful in the chat room as well.

Great.

Great.

We're going to be patient here for a couple minutes just to get started and allow people time to get into the room.

It's amazing we have people from all over the world who are joining us this evening here, but obviously it could be early in the morning from overseas. I'm seeing some from from China which is nice as well. This is great welcome.

If you've just joined, please let me know that you can hear and you can see me as well as we have four panelists who are joining me this evening.

We're going to be patient here for another minute or so before we get started with our event.

It looks like we're starting to get up to our number. I'm just going to be patient here for another 30 to 40 seconds here. And then we'll we'll kick off.

Kick off the event.

It's great to see so many people from so many places.

It's amazing, isn't it?

I know.

This is why we tend to try and do him in the evenings because we get folks from all over the globe, which is really nice that they can join us rather than sometimes catching them. You know mid day when they're when they're off at class and trying to do their schooling.

So wait, another another 15 to 20 seconds here. And then I'm going to kick off the night and hopefully people can join us a little bit late.

Alright, I think we've hit a point where I think we should get started. Here we have. We have less than an hour here to get through a lot of material and I want to make sure we have plenty of time for our questions. So let me kick it off. Well hi, everyone and welcome. And thank you all for being here with us and taking time out of your busy schedules to learn more about our academics and Harkness at Lawrenceville. We're thrilled that you can join us. My name is Matt Mulhern and I'm the senior associate.

Director of admission and I've been in boarding schools. I think now for for over 2022 years I went to boarding school and currently have a second former or a ninth grader here at Lawrenceville. My wife also works at Lawrenceville and the capacity as an English teacher as well as she coaches lacrosse.

So let me kind of run you through the sequence of events for this evening.

Directly following my remarks will have our faculty and student panelists do a brief introduction.

Distance.

What their role is, what they do here at the school as well as talk through what form they're in. That means grade as well as some of the activities that they're involved with. Here at Lawrenceville, once they introduce themselves.

We will then have Allison Easterling introduce our academic program, followed by Matt Campbell, introducing Harkness at Lawrenceville.

Once Allison and Matt have the opportunity to run us through their respective areas and oversight, I will then present pre submitted questions to the panel for them to answer. Remember, we may not get to all the questions, so if for some some reason we can't get to all of them and there's not enough time in the evening, please feel free to reach out to the admission office directly. We'd be more than happy to answer your questions.

If you would like to ask questions during the event.

Please feel free to do so in the chat room.

If we if we are able to get through all the pre submitted questions, I will then move to some of the chatroom questions.

So without further ado, I'll let Allison begin our introductions of our panelists, Allison.

Can you hear me?

Good, OK, great so welcome everyone. Thank you for being here. I'm going to be here and tell you a little bit about myself and then more about the academics at Lawrenceville. So I am this year is my 17th year at Lawrenceville. I've been here since 2005. I've raised two children here, one of whom is a proud member of the class of 2020. So I'm also a Lawrenceville parent. I came to Lawrenceville primary. You teach history.

I spent many years coaching track and cross country. I lived in the in the dorm. What we call houses for nine years and and I've also served as the department chair. The chair of the History Department. I spent a number of years in the Dean of Faculty's office as the assistant and Associate Dean of faculty and now I am serving in the role of Dean of academics and I will turn things over to Mr. Campbell to Matt Campbell.

Thank you so much Mrs Easterling. Hi everybody so glad you're here this evening. It's wonderful to spend just a few minutes with you and share all the awesome things that happen at Lawrenceville, particularly as they relate to Harkness. Learning my name is Matthew Campbell. I sit on the currently sit on the Harkness chair of teaching and learning. I'm also the director of the theater program here at Lawrenceville. I have taught at Lawrenceville for 14 years.

Just recently stepped out of being the head of House for Stevens House on the Crescent. Some of my fondest memories are from that time and largely the work that I do outside of the theater program is working with our teachers and empowering students to be lifelong learners as they engage in hardness in the classrooms here. It's been a really interesting two years and seeing how strong Lawrenceville is and kind of keeping those traditions of learning through Harkness and teaching through documents alive as we adapted.

Virtually, but also in person, and I love the work that I do and I'm glad that I get to kind of work with such an amazing group of colleagues and students. And keeping that going forward. So that's just briefly a little bit about myself.

I think we're gonna pass it onto a Yendi next maybe.

Yep, hi everyone, I'm Wendy. I'm a senior. I used to be in the McAllen House. Now I'm in McPherson which is senior housing. Uhm I came to Lawrenceville as a new sophomore from Kingston, Jamaica and it has honestly been one of the best decisions of my life. I have no regrets and I also had the pleasure of being in Mr Campbell's class. So really excited to be here in another hardness discussion with him tonight.

Oh, and I'll pass it over to Grant now.

Hi everyone, like Candy, I'm super pumped to be here. A junior from Montgomery, NJ and this is my third year here.

I grew up playing basketball, but I wrote crew here and on campus. I'm involved in a lot of publications and I'm also involved in the jazz band.

OK, so shall I like.

No.

Yeah, Allison, do you mind just talking people through giving him a general overview of the academic program here at Lawrenceville, please?

Happy too, so I think one of the well our our curriculum has as a as a very kind of special structure to it and we do have a structured curriculum that I want to explain a little bit so we when students come in as second formers what we what we call freshman second formers, they take a series of classes, all the freshmen take the same history class, the same English class, the same science class. And then there are some.

Choices obviously, depending on level of proficiency in math and in science and math and language. Excuse me. And then freshman also taken art. We have a three term arts requirement at Lawrenceville and returned to that a little bit so they'll start working on that requirement as well. Our curriculum is structured in in really what we have a philosophy that says that our curriculum is based on some foundational courses that all students will experience together.

In some core disciplines, and that is because we're really committed to this idea that all students across the board will experience the same classes, gained some some skills and disciplines, and understandings that they can then bring to higher level courses and starting in their junior year, they start to have increasing amounts of choice across the curriculum and until senior year, what we call our fifth form is really for most students.

Made up completely, of course, is of their own choosing on, so we really are committed to an idea of giving students a shared, foundational experience on which they can build in their own individual ways, and then be able to pursue their own interests really fully, as as upperclassmen in this as fifth formers. So our curriculum does include a series of core course requirements in English in history in sciences again.

Math and language are areas where proficiency will determine their level. In arts, students take performing arts visual arts. We also were unusual in that we offer, well, we have a Department of Religion and philosophy and we actually asked our four year students take two courses in the areas of religion and philosophy. So compared with some high schools, we have a very robust core curriculum. I'll just tell a quick sort of personal story about that, I think.

It's if any of you have older children you might have already experienced this kind of decision, making you know there are colleges that have a core and then their colleges that really don't have any kinds of requirements and and we are kind of trying to to thread the needle in the middle. We want students to have this shared experience and then have all this choice. My own son took a course in religion and philosophy because he had two and that actually really set him on a course of intellectual discovery that I don't think he would have experienced otherwise. He probably.

Might not have made the choice to take a philosophy course. For example, if he hadn't had that as part of his requirements, and that actually led to a number of additional higher level courses in that area, and that's become a real passion for him. So I think that we are what we have set up really works and is really designed with some intentions to allow students to discover and pursue passions. So that's that's part of our our curriculum. I guess I would.

To add that, we allow we, we create opportunities for students to pursue high level coursework in really all disciplines. So depending on a student's interest, they can pursue very high level coursework in the STEM fields in the humanities, in the arts, and in fact for students who get to the point where they Max out our curriculum. In some areas we even have in our agreement with Princeton University down the road where a student can take.

Of course at Princeton, and say science or math or language, if they have actually gone beyond our offerings, but we have college level courses across all of our disciplines, I think that's a really exciting opportunity. I think the other thing that I want to just touch on briefly before I pass things off to my colleague Matt is just to talk a little bit about experiential learning and research opportunities here, which I think is something that does distinguish us from some of our peer schools.

We so we at the same time we're having students do these core requirements were also part of that is to prepare them to then go off and do some more experiential and research based learning to highlight just a couple of opportunities. We have a series of what we call our scholars programs. These are two week residential programs in the summer that are then followed by further coursework and research between.

Is between well in junior year and then into senior year as well. We have a scholars program in the sciences called Hutchin Scholars Program which offers students opportunities to work in labs actually around the country and some really interesting work even based here in our own science department in a partnership with Stanford University. Doing some really interesting genetics research based on fruit flies. Actually we also have a history research scholars program which uses our archives.

And then goes beyond our archives to allow students to kind of see what it's like to do history the way historians do. That we have a Meryl Scholars program which is English literature and really literary criticism. While students to do research in depth research into archives of an author, for example, or to understand the different kinds of literary criticism that's developed around a particular author's work, we also have a sustainability scholars program named after Aldo Leopold, one of our famous.

Graduates who is really one of the fathers of sustainability in the United States and they spend two weeks in June really studying a particular sustainability question and then developing some projects around that. So those are a couple of our sort of more academic experiential programs, even outside of those, students undertake a lot of scientific research under the tub ledge of different members of our science department. There are opportunities for research through independent studies in a lot of different fields.

And actually, including performing arts. Actually. Mr. Campbell oversaw a really fascinating, independent study with a student in the fall who was interested in looking at at Shakespeare in performance and and so our curriculum does offer that kind of flexibility as well. I'll be happy to take more questions about that, but I don't want to, you know, overstep my time limit. So I'm going to pass things off to Matt. And I'm here for questions.

Thank you so much Allison. I'm just going to borrow a phrase that are Laurentians know very well which is. I'm going to piggyback off of what you just said and just add a little bit of more colorings to that. Harkness Learning is a really new experience for all of our students that come to Lawrenceville. What might surprise a lot of our newer students is that they enter most of their classrooms to find this large table placed before them. Let us surrounded by chairs.

And the experience of sitting down and facing your peers is a really different way of engaging in a in a discipline or in a class. When you have to look in the eye of your peers in the IR, or hear from a from a teacher or discuss something in depth. I mean, Harkness, Harkness learning began here at Lawrenceville in 1936, where Edward S Harkness bequeathed to the school a gift, but also and a change from a lecture format to the heart. This format and this Harkness learning.

Takes place around these tables. Not one great question that did come up early for tonight and this might answer it. Not all classrooms have a table in it, but the principles of Harkness learning do exist there. You may have circles, or you may have small desk groups, but the idea behind Harkness learning is wild. Studying a certain discipline, a certain subject students are engaging deeply into that work, asking critical questions, posing questions, answering questions, building off of other ideas, negating ideas as opposed to just.

Hearing from the lecture from the teacher up front who has all the information and just absorbing that and then being expected to parrot that or just give it back on an exam. Here students are talking with one another, seeing each other in the eye, thinking deeply about the subjects that are being discussed and then coming to a better or deeper understanding of how to apply what they're learning through the structures that are that are going on in that class. It is interesting to see how Harkness takes shape across all disciplines.

Uhm, yes it does happen in a music class. Yes, it does happen in a science class and in a math class and in an English class it may take a little bit of a different shape slightly, but it does happen across the board here at Lawrenceville. And that experience of of digging into what we call dialogical learning discussion really going against going into the material allows for a deeper understanding about it. It tests the the depth and the strength.

Of what students are learning. It also forms some patterns. Some grit standing. You know, confidence building up confidence in certain ideas and also you know, and it's coming to a collective understanding, listening and understanding who else is in that class with you. So you kind of get to know your peers more than you may. As somebody who grew up in the public school system coming into the Harkness teaching program as an adult, as an educator, it was a shift for me. But immediately I could see the benefits.

With that and and how students engage the material, how they engage with one another, how in some some moments in classes, the teacher isn't necessarily the expert. They are leading nurturing those discussions.

Putting framework in assessments in place so that students are challenged, but in the way in which they must dig deep and it doesn't just exist in our classrooms alone, you could see Harkness or aspects of Harkness learning happen outside of the classrooms. Some might say, well, how does that work out? But even in our sports teams, you have circling up even in our community service programs, you have students who are coming together to build new programs. One one of the wonderful things that Lawrenceville has. And this is building off await Denise Dillon just shared.

'cause we have this wonderful opportunity for students to travel abroad as well, and our Harkness travel program partners travel programs offer a member opportunities for students to go overseas, but even their students are working collectively with their trip leaders to build the program that they want to engage in listening to each other building on what they want and digging into the possibilities and the opportunities they have to travel overseas together. And whatever. Wherever they might be going, all of this is fairly general speaking, but come in short, Harkness.

Allows students to really dig in to the materials to the content that they're working on and.

When did you step in? When you step into a Lawrenceville classroom, you know it's just kind of you some aspect of I'm going to be speaking today. I'm going to be engaging the material I I'm kind of treading new water, but I'm also learning a lot as I do that, so it's a it's a. It's an amazing opportunity to have each day when we work with our students and see what they're thinking and where they're going. And hearing their voices lead many of the conversations and discussions we're having as they dig deep and go a bit further.

I'm going to hold there. I know there are specific questions coming up, I hope that gives you a flavor of what Harkness is, but I'm sure we'll hear more from granting Andy and ask questions come up as well.

That's great, thank you Matt and thank you Allison. That gives us a good starting point and I think what we'll do now is we'll move to the pre sent in submitted questions that we had and I have a large number of them, so I'd like to start with a few and and kind of piggyback off of what Mr Campbell was saying with regards to to Harkness. And there were a number of questions that we had.

Regarding whether it was used in all of the classrooms, but I would really love to hear from this. Students on how is is is Harkness applied to math and science. There is a bunch of questions regarding specifically math and science, and I hear it in the admission office a lot. So I would love for you guys to kind of tap into that a little bit and see if you guys can help our audience understand that a little bit more.

In STEM, there's double.

But

Yeah for sure come with the oh Grant. You could go first. You could go first.

OK.

I don't know yet, yeah?

OK, so with with science specifically. I know that come for my classes right now I'm taking a science course called research and applied chemistry and we cannot get through one of those classes without Harkness. We don't necessarily have a hardness table, but it's just more space for us, so we'll for example, have a homework on a new aspirin synthesis project that we're going to take on, and will read the material and be absolutely confused about it the first time we skim it, there's a lot of new words, you know.

It's a lot to take in at once, and being able to use hardness within the class to just discuss, unpack what exactly did I just look at? What did I just read? How is this going to help me for my lab preparation is like so helpful and so beneficial, and it really does help to solidify those concepts in a way that simply regurgitating and writing it down cat. So I think it's extremely important, and it's a definitely there in all the science classes as well.

Grant, do you want to add to that?

Yeah, sure, since he talked a little bit about her science experiences, I guess I don't talk about my math experiences.

Come in math.

You definitely can't have as.

As traditional Harkness approach with everybody around a table, but there's still the Harkness aspects of collaborative learning and building off of the work of your peers.

So a huge component of our math classes will just be boardwork.

Where a small group works in the board and then shares the rest of the class.

And then.

The classes are usually less lecture focus, so there will be times where teachers will present a concept. They usually just present the concept.

And give us time to work through the intuitions ourselves, which I think builds a far deeper understanding of the material.

Great, thanks, Grant, uh, another question we have in here is is how do you help second formers, that's 9th graders who have never learned using the Harkness method make the shift.

I'll jump in briefly there. Well, although Allison, I think you're you touched on it a little bit beforehand.

When new second farmers come in, not only is there like an orientation process in which they get to meet one another in their houses and get to meet each other in those opening weeks at the school and acclimate to the routines that you go through at the beginning of the school year. But the foundational level of their classes and cultural studies in English are all framed around them having that shared experience. Learning together what Harkness is about around content. So there's a cultural studies class English so forth.

Even math at certain levels, even though students can place a little bit, maybe failed place out of a certain level. All of it's framed around a shared experience, and that and they they acclimate to that process because they're all in it together. All of them are new to that process usually.

I think I would also add when we well when we talk about Harkness at Lawrenceville we are we are talking about.

Primarily.

Nope.

Yeah.

Students as Grant said, collaborative learning students learn working together to deepen their understanding and that does sometimes take the form of a what we might call kind of a classic Harkness discussion. So around the Oval table and you know the teacher kind of facilitating. But really, the students driving that? But that's not. That's not always what we mean by Harkness. I think darkness is a broad definition here of students student centered learning.

What is it?

I'm asking that centers student experience and student collaboration and deepening of that about learning. That said, in the second form, I think one of the things that's really interesting about both classes that Mr. Campbell just mentioned and I talked about earlier. This core experience is part of what they do is really.

Practicing how to have those kinds of conversations and and and really breaking that down into thinking about in a conversation that really does need deeper understanding. There are different roles that people play. There are different types of questions that you can ask and so learning about that. But what are the kinds of questions that will be what we might say generative questions? What are some questions that might be more leading towards summary or?

Which is better?

Questions that are just kind of clarifying questions. What does it mean to be in a Harkness discussion, which actually is a really important role, you know? To listen, view that as a role. And in fact, sometimes a listener might be looked to two at certain moments.

Yes.

You know soft conversation and say OK. Here's where we've gotten to so far. Where might we go next? So there really is some attention paid to trying to.

I really learn how to do those steps to make those moves within a discussion.

Yeah.

Great thank you. I have a couple questions here and I'll try and show you did you want to piggyback grant?

OK please.

Yeah, do you mind if I just add onto that, yeah?

As a as a freshman from like coming in from a public school, I had never had any Hartness experience. Wait, am I cutting out?

You guys are frozen for me.

Alright.

We can figure we can hear you.

Alright, cool.

As.

As a freshman coming in from a public school, I had never had any hardness experience before, so I think both the orientation process as Easterling was mentioning and.

Also, like the first pass fail term.

Really helped me to adapt to.

This new system of learning, I think that.

Especially for new students, teachers are really understanding and.

Start introducing these frameworks that Miss Easterling was mentioning.

And.

They won't have the same expectations.

They'll eat.

They'll slowly raise their expectations as the terms go on instead of just expecting you to understand Harkness right from the beginning.

And actually Grant mentioned something important that I think is also something that differentiates our approach to, you know, easing students into the expectations that we have around, you know, are are the work that we do here. Is that in those core courses, the first term for our 9th graders for second formers, history, English and Science. Those are pass fail. Students do not get letter grades for those classes during the fall term, and we've done that.

Intentionally so that students are really focusing on feedback and really feedback for growth and so the pressure of the grade is removed during that first term. And I think that can be an effective way for students be able to really focus in on settling into the school, settling into the academic expectations and and and the Community here.

Well, quit.

Great, thank you.

I have a kind of a combo question here that I'd like to put together. How is Harkness different from other schools? And what is your major benefit from the Harkness learning? So trying to pair those two together?

How is Harkness different from other schools?

And what is the major benefit from Harkness learning?

I guess I could, I'll start and then we can ask that question around I think. So how is Harkness? How is what we do with Harkless different from other schools? I think it's it's different in that students.

They cannot be kind of passive consumers of their own learning here. You really can't you? There's no I mean, obviously, if you're in a classroom that actually has the table, there's there's nowhere to hide or there's no back row. But I think it's more than that. I think that we we expect that part of a students learning in any discipline is is about being able to engage in discussion and sometimes debate, you know, sometimes kind of argument about it, but.

I think it was what was the benefit of it?

Really, that it's really that learning is about listening and refining one's own ideas, kind of over and over again. So I think that really is something that differentiates, differentiates or practice learning for maybe other types of pedagogy and other schools. And now I can't remember the second part of the question.

Uhm?

So maybe I answered that if I didn't, we could put it back in the chat, but I'll, I'll let. I'll let people build on on my response. And what would other people say?

I would just simply add that that it is experiential, in a way you become just as we as like an athlete. Overtime becomes more strong or more adept at what they're doing, or musician becomes more skilled in what they're performing. Being daily in different groups around Harkness cable, your skills of listening and and getting out your ideas and that expectation.

You actually build up this. This pattern of approach that empowers you to dig deep into your learning and to grow as a learner, taking advantage of the opportunity of arguments but really kind of honing in on that, and a great example, is some. Some alums. I've had some fascinating conversations with alumni who have gone on to major universities, and they've had the experience of having intimate 1214 person classes at Lawrenceville to maybe having some of the similar.

Classes in college or a university, but then also having lectures of where 300 students are there. And I I'm thinking of a beloved recent graduate who shared with me recently. This is this is Panos Vandross, who shared with me recently and he said I really wish I could engage more in my lecture classes at university because I have so much I want to say. So he takes what he's listening to and his urge to practice engaging in the material.

And puts it into the work that he's doing. And then of course.

Talks with his professors. Talked with his teachers one of the cool things we have here at Lawrenceville, and we might talk about this little later on though, is that although there is great learning that happens around the table and in the classrooms, there's all these opportunities baked into our daily schedule that allows students to meet with the teacher. Have a consultation. Have group consultations. And that's a really excellent way of kind of building on the learning. Taking up the mantle of like this is my learning. What am I learning? What do I need to do to improve? What am I working on right now or questions I have?

Uhm, and putting that placing those opportunities out there for students to take take care of so. So whether I think the alumni will speak to the springs of how their voices are really fine tuned when it comes to the experiences they have in their formative years as high school students.

Yeah, I definitely remember what we see. Something you were saying how you can be passive in a traditional classroom. And I felt that on a visceral level because I definitely was a type of student to only be engaged with like I only like STEM classes. I didn't like history or English, so in some classes you know I'd be like super engaged. I was always hands on, you know, when we got to the lab I was always excited and then it would be English or history class and I would just like take a seat in back, you know, stay quiet kind of just not do anything.

And on coming to Lawrenceville and having to do the Harkness forced me to be engaged with these subjects that I was a little more shy around, like less, I wouldn't say less.

It's not that I didn't love them as much, but it was harder to love them in the same way, and I feel like I'm so grateful for this experience because I really have fallen in love with the humanities over the time since I've been here. I still loves them, but I feel like it's made me a more rounded student in general, and also the thing with Harkness, like Mr Campbell is saying is that it's not just in the classroom, it does teach you to take initiative and hardness doesn't just die once you step out of the classroom. Oftentimes, if you go into the library.

Especially right now you're going to see the pods filled with students standing around in a circle, probably arguing about the math problem on the board. Or you know this reading that they just had to do. It's very common, and I think that the skills that we learn in hardness prepares us to have strong conversations that are very fruitful and we get a lot more out of our study sessions because we have those skills.

Like well done.

Have a question? Probably for our students. What are some things new students find challenging upon arrival?

So thanks new students find challenging.

Nothing, huh?

Gradually I could I could go.

I don't want to take up all the space, so I'll just be quick about this, but uhm, I came as a new sophomore so we don't have the traditional pass fail that you get as a freshman. Most of the Hartness I'm not gonna say games but hardness workshops and sessions were already done by the time I came and at first I was like very scared that it was going to be a difficult transition for me. But most of my peers were super supportive. They understood they were willing to work with me until I was able to get to that.

Point, and so I really, I really felt that I was able to like transition quickly into the community because of that and we have consultation which is incredibly helpful because I like if I felt out that I was falling behind in one subject. I could always go in. I could talk to my teacher about it personally, figure out a game plan and the best way to approach it going forward.

Not going to say it's like picture perfect where you're just going to go in and it's just going to be easy and you're just going to get in, but there's always a support system of students and a faculty and your advisors that will help you to get to that point where you feel as if you never missed a beat. So that was my transition coming in as a new student and then yourself more.

You have a lot of math teachers and Kennedy. You're lucky.

Uhm, I I think I'll just add. I know that's more a question for students, but I think I am. I think one of the ways that I think about Lawrenceville is that we are a high demand and high nurture. So we we are an academically rigorous institution. We demand a lot of our students and I think you know students who are at Lawrenceville would certainly say that they have, you know, uh, the homework load is is significant here, although we do set limits on it and we do have, you know, lower.

Workloads for our freshmen. Sophomores, for example. Compare with our juniors and seniors, but but there's no getting around that it's an academically rigorous environment and and we want it to be, but we also do. I think, compared with some schools, special schools of our size, and I think we are very high nurture as well, both because of the House systems are advising system, I think because of the hardest classrooms because of the opportunities that students have to develop relationships with adults in the classroom. You know, on the field on the stage, in houses, so I think that.

Most students feel that they they have a lot of adult support around them when they need it.

That's great, I would just add as a second form parent or a ninth grade parent and I'm just going through this for the first time with my 9th grader that the onboarding process has just been tremendous here at Lawrenceville and I'm just seeing it through the parent lens, the house system, the way in which that they've oriented the kids to make sure that they're spending quality time and doing lots of fun activities and making sure that they're able to juggle.

Everything that they need to juggle because you know, there is a lot going on and they they have many balls to juggle and sure how have I seen my son drop a few? Yes, that's already begun, but he is a ninth grader, so we're trying to piece that all together and try and strike that balance and find where where that happy medium is where you can be social and you can be involved and you can be tapped into lots of different things here, but you can still be taking care of all the things that you need to take care of from an academic standpoint.

But I've found it to be tremendous, and if any any parents want to tap into me as a resource, you're welcome to do so. But I just want to add my two cents from a parent perspective.

A quick and a quick I I just add on to that is that for the our new sophomores, new juniors and the occasion and RPG's that do come on in, there is also part of the orientation program to be in the year an opportunity for them to gauge in with just each other.

In and around what Harkness is as part of that orientation schedule, so they're not totally flying into the classroom without something going into that. But it happened. And that is all led by Lorenz, who helped model that for them as well. So we're aware that that they do need a little bit of experience before they head into their first few days of classes.

Great, thank you, Matt.

Another question here says is asking can you explain more about the opportunities to study abroad? They'd love to learn a little bit more detail about our opportunities and the offerings that are available to them.

Sure, I can start with that. So we do offer, so I'll talk about the Harkness travel programs first, and then I'll talk specifically about you know kind of study away opportunities so we have a very robust what we call Harkness travel program. Mr Campbell referred earlier to that that even on our our travel abroad programs, we are asking students to collaborate together to to develop some of the programming on those trips in the spring and in the summer. COVID notwithstanding, right? We offer opportunities.

For students to travel with faculty members most of the time these are trips have been designed by our faculty in areas of their own research interests or connected with a particular class. And usually there are two or three faculty members, and you know 8 to 10 or 12 students who traveled to different destinations such as Ecuador to study tropical botany to Greece. There's a trip to Greece. It doesn't. Philosophy and math. There are sort of more outdoor or leadership.

Theme trips that some of them are domestic, like the Grand Canyon on. There's been a trip to the Alps to the Auto Austria and Germany and its hiking in the Alps. We've had trips to China and again more domestic trips that have a A community service theme. So usually about five or six places to choose from for spring and usually three to four for the summer. Iceland as well as the recent one.

Forests and and we actually make sure that every Laurentian who wants to has an opportunity to take advantage of one of those Harkness travel trips. So if a student is on some kind of scholarship aid, that scholarship aid is also available for our study. Our travel programs. We do have some study away opportunities, so we have a partnership with school year abroad. So we do have students. Not very many, but we occasionally do have a student who decides that they'd like to spend a year in Spain.

For example, or in France in the past, in China we aren't having. I don't think that program is running right now.

Or even in Italy, even though we don't speak, we don't teach Italian, but students maybe have taken Latin. Could go do that and then learn Italian if they're there for a year. So we've had students do that in the time that I've been in Lawrence at Lawrenceville up. Probably, you know, between eight and ten students that I'm aware of, we've done that. It can be a really life changing experience.

There is a possibility to do that just for one. For one part of the year, rather than a whole year. We also have a partnership with the island school in the Bahamas in Eleuthera, Bahamas that has a very strong marine biology and certainly will sustainability focus and we have students who do that in the spring or in the fall or in the summer. We also occasionally have students who will go do a study away program at the High Mountain Institute, which has a kind of sustainability and outdoor leadership.

Theme and so those are the ones that we mainly have a partnership with and then there are some additional summer programs that we have sent students to routinely that we have a kind of more informal partnership with Ann and I'm happy to take more specific questions you offline about any of that.

I will add that it's some of the greatest work that I've had the privilege of being apart of. I've I've, I don't even know how many ships I've done, but there have been many trips that I've LED with with students and teachers fellow colleagues to Tanzania and to Brazil and to the UK on our history. We studied. We studied World War Two, and the Blitzkrieg went to Normandy. We had planned a trip for Bali and a number of community service trips. But then, as Mrs. Easterling shared the nurturing.

That goes into those to the students lives and our learning together on those trips is is an extension of what happiness really is at Lawrenceville. I'm very excited that we are getting to travel again this upcoming year safely soundly, as I'm actually working with students to take them to the UK. I'm very excited to go to Scotland and England again, so another great opportunity that Lawrenceville offers too many, many of our students nurturing them along the way.

Great thank you. There was a quick question that popped in here. Most popular study abroad program. Is there one?

And I don't think so. I mean, I suppose probably the study away program where we send them the the most number of students you know, sort of year in year out, is the island school, so our program with our program. But we have a relationship with the island school for students who want to study marine biology or sustainability. That's probably the most popular in terms of our Harkness travel programs. That's hard to say. I think some of our longest standing programs we it's not running this year, but for many years one of our.

Colleagues and science department. He's actually a very well known tropical botanist himself. Doctor John Clark has taken students to Ecuador and actually I've had. I've been able to go on that trip as a chaperone too, so that was pretty amazing and I guess, actually, the program that you you're participating has been going for a number of years right to the UK? To this to Scotland.

It it's it's it's we get to perform at the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh, Scotland. It's a great feeder focused, but uhm, yeah, there's been a number of programs that kind of cut the kind of inflow a little bit, but that one's been running for some time. Yeah, But Dr Clarks is very popular too, and there's a contingent of that that ties to Hutchins, which goes over to Edinburgh, Scotland, as well to the botanical gardens there. So there's a lot of connections there.

Yeah.

Great thank you for that.

I have a question here how does a newly enrolled student and how do returning students select their classes? How does one go about that for our newly enrolled students and then for our returning students, how do you go about selecting your classes each year?

That's a good question, so I'll talk about newly enrolled students and it it actually that the newly enrolled student experience will depend quite a bit on their level, like what year are they coming into school. So for example, a student who's coming in as second former there they won't be in a sense, choosing their history, English or science class because all freshmen take the same, they'll be in different sections, but they're all taking the same course for language and math students who are coming into this.

For the first time, take a placement test in both of those areas and based on the placement test they will go into the appropriate level and then there is a. There is an opportunity to make a selection and to what art they would like to pursue for second former so they can choose again. Like I said earlier between visual arts and performing arts and they have an opportunity to indicate their preference and that information goes to our registrar and then they get enrolled in the classes that hopefully that they that they wanted to be enrolled in in arts.

That's, uh, you know, the the process is somewhat similar really for 3rd formers and then for juniors and seniors and incoming juniors and seniors where there is really more choice to be made. There's an opportunity to include some course choices, like after acceptance. There will be some information coming from admissions and often.

But in my office, the Dean of Academics office will speak individually with students and parents about any questions I have around for selection. For students who are here on campus already in already out, Lawrenceville, we have a big kind of scheduling day event. Normally in the winter term, this year is going to be on February 2nd and it's a day where we don't have classes. We actually have four meetings, so we meet by levels, 9th graders, 10th graders, 11th graders to talk about some of the things that are relevant to their scheduling process.

Leading up to scheduling day, students will have already had an opportunity to speak with their advisors. Look at a course catalog and make some decisions about what they might want to take in the coming year. And I think for the most part, students are working with advisors to think about a multi year plan so you know, OK here if I'm a rising sophomore, here's what I want to take that year. But then I also want to think ahead to you know what are something that I really want to make sure that I can can work into my schedule. In my last two years at Lawrenceville. So it's a it's kind of ongoing.

Process leading up scheduling day and then students are actually enrolled in their courses and you know get their course assignments in the summer time.

ND or grant you want to add anything to that. Anything that you think people should know about.

Perspective right?

Uhm, I was gonna say everything. Pretty much checks out again. I came as a new soft so I I did the the online you get the form to fill out where you're interested in and you get your choices and I was really happy with most of my choices. I know there's also that transitional period during the first like is it weakish of school where if you like feel like you're not accurately placed in your courses or if you'd like to try different cores. Maybe your interest shifted throughout the the period between when you submit.

To the form and when you actually started the class, you can always change. You can reach out to visit Mr. Fernandez and have the the courses adjusted as as needed, but other than that there's a lot of prep work that goes into it, so it usually isn't like a very popular thing.

Great thank you. I have another question here that came in how does Harkness learning promote critical thinking and creative learning? So how does Harkness learning promote critical thinking and creative learning?

I think the I'll just jump in here briefly and say that you know it all the different.

Classes that you get all different subjects that you can take. There's going to be the framework. Partners provides a framework, a structure in which students can engage around that content, and within that comes critical thinking and creativity. You're going to find creativity exists both in the science lab as much as it might be in like a visual art class and deep thinking that critical thinking, whether it's around a math problem, asking the questions I don't know about the Revolutionary War.

Uhm, dissecting a poem. I'm going into how the poem actually functions and how it's meant to be performed or heard. All of that is is supported by how Harkness is as the framework of Harkness would hardnesses, so Harkness serves 2 as a platform at framework and for students to have that that that that creative, or that that critical thinking edge. But it's it's set up in each classroom. It depends on where you're at, what is being studied at that time, but it.

Happens across all different classes, I think though to come as Mrs. Easterling was talking about before that critical thinking comes in. The framework of that experience that you had in getting to understand how Harkness works. There are something that we have in our classrooms that you kind of become second nature. Which are these Harkness moves that we have? Which is you might initiate an idea, and then you might, or you might add on to the idea. You might negate an idea.

Come and these moves help you to dig a bit deeper into what it is that you're studying. Whatever the the content is that I'm going through that process, though, gets more critical. It gets you to think more critically and and you'll find that that collaborative nature. That's all going on there. You'll end up doing some creative work despite whatever subject you happen to be in. That's a very general understanding of it all, but it's in its nature to go critical and to go creative in the work that we do in the hardness classroom. I don't know, grant.

Brandy if you happen to have like an experience that you want to share or Mrs. Easterling of that we're like, you've got more critical or creative just because Harkness was there. Whatever subject or class that might be.

Uhm, oh, there you go.

Sorry, there's just the overlap, but you could go ahead.

Then Grant took the words right out my mouth, and he that was so good, uh, the only thing I'd probably add on to that is that, you know, on top of you know, UM, learning for other peoples opinions and formulating your own. Everyone learns differently and creatively in their own respect and sometimes mulling out ideas out loud is a great way for you to like flush it out in your head in a way that you probably couldn't if you were just some writing, or if you just like doing a reading.

And sometimes when you say something out loud, you realize that's not. That might not have been what you wanted to say, or somebody else could go off that and say, oh, that's brilliant and add onto it and it just creates this beautiful melting pot of opinions and information all in one place. And then you can take it however you want. And I find that that's the beauty of discussing. So if you find that you're better, you're better learner when you only discuss, that's perfect. If you find that you're better when you write notes, you can take away the synthesis of.

Everything that you learn in these discussions as well, it's just what works best for you, and I think that hardness gives you that autonomy to decide how you want to learn creatively.

Fantastic thank you so much. We have time for probably one more question here so I think this is probably a great question for us to to finish up with. What is your most memorable Harkness class experience? Obviously this is geared probably more towards students, but I'd love to hear from the teachers as well if they they have our most memorable Harkness experience.

Yeah.

Yep, go through the Rolodex.

There are so many actually girls.

There's been a lot. There's so many.

Uhm, I think sophomore. Ironically, it's also a music class. We did this exercise where there was like a long.

String a really long string and you would say something, and then we'd roll the string over to the other side and they would grab that end, and then we'd roll it all around for the discussion and you just watch the conversation literally. Just like form shapes and patterns.

The.

And I think we were talking about like some historical. I don't fully remember the conversation at this point 'cause it's been so long is when the first classes I took, but it had to do with musical history and how like genres of music developed. And I was like absolutely fascinated watching it unfold visually as well as like her in the conversation. Go down. So that was probably one of the coolest things I ever saw.

That's awesome great.

I was just going to share briefly the the the the classes I remember most I I haven't had the privilege of teaching a number of interdisciplinary classes, and those are classes which are part of our curriculum program here that a lot of juniors and seniors and PGS will take. And these classes are designed to bridge two specific disciplines. And the cool thing I always am inspired by all those moments when students bring in their learning from outside of the classroom and.

It somehow falls flat in the middle of the class, and now we're presented with this even deeper or just really cool moment to go further. UM, nothing too specific here. But those moments where interdisciplinary work happens naturally through a discussion that you might be having on a certain topic, but it goes there that those are magical moments because the students are leading those moments, and that's wonderful.

Connect died tip 20 seconds so I know we're out of time almost so I'll just say very briefly that sometimes you know you have to know something you have to know about something to be able to really have a Harkness discussion, so that's why you know we need students do their homework. And but I think in history class you know sometimes a really good Harkness discussion is the culmination of a number of days of small group work or pair work. Or, you know, really focused reading work that you're doing in class, and then I can think of.

Several of many examples where then suddenly that that you know, OK, we're going to actually have a Harkness discussion. You know on Friday or whatever about this thing that we're talking about. And that's where kind of everything comes together. And so students have an opportunity to really see like, what do I understand and actually try it out? What do I understand? Oh my gosh, wow, what what, what ND just said has helped me think about, you know this other thing in a different way. So I I think that often it's the IT can be a really wonderful opportunity.

The process learning as you're doing it and it could also be this kind of capstone experience altogether.

Well, thank you all and I'd like to thank our panelists for their their time and their energy tonight. I hope you guys enjoyed all of their insights into Lawrenceville. Please folks who are on this call, I would. I would welcome you to come for a visit to Lawrenceville. Spend a day with us and check things out. We're doing tours, we're doing interviews in person. We're also doing online interviews and you're welcome to do that. So if you haven't done that already, please.

Set up a time to interview. We'd loved to meet you and teach you more and inform you more about Lawrenceville. Just a reminder that our application is due by January 15th, so please be working on your applications and get those into us by January 15th. And if you have any questions in the meantime, feel free to reach out to our office. We are here to help. We want to help streamline the process and we would welcome any communication with you, so thank you again and have a wonderful evening.

And thanks to our panelists, have a great evening.

Thanks everyone.

Night.

Thank you.

Night.

Bad.

This is just me or did Miss Easterling freeze.

Your music and see.

Thank you.

I think it's just I sorry I, I think grant Andy. Thank you so much this season. I think she's she signed out now have a lovely evening. I'll see you around you can just click close no problem.

OK oh, thank you.

Bye bye.