Dear Brooks School Community Members,
As we close in on the end of a school year unlike any other in Brooks School's 93 years of existence, I want to take this opportunity to update all of you since my last letter of roughly one month ago. Since that time, we have done extremely well with both our distance learning model and the challenge of overcoming the disappointment of not being able to return to school on campus this year. At this point, we find ourselves in the final stretch of the academic year with our virtual graduation ceremony for the class of 2020 coming on Monday, and classes wrapping up for the rest of the school on Friday of next week. I continue to be incredibly proud of our students and faculty, and grateful to so many who have pitched in to help the school begin finding its way through a challenge that is proving to be very difficult to pin down.
At the outset of this pandemic, our first priority was finishing this year as well as we possibly could. In addition to engaging with their classes, our students have stayed connected with teams, clubs, advisor groups, and a range of additional passions and interests they share with peers. Our faculty have continued to amend and evolve their own distance learning approaches with steady and thoughtful feedback to consider from students, parents, and one another. We set out to simply do our best in a mode and circumstance for which we had precious little time to prepare, and I believe we have made good on realizing that goal. From here, we are poised to turn our attention to doing all we can to prepare for the 2020-2021 school year. This work is well underway.
With all of that in mind, I would like to share the following updates regarding the finish to the current school year and some of our summer plans:
- While we are looking forward to having an opportunity to celebrate the class of 2020 and confer well-earned diplomas virtually on Monday at 7:30 p.m., we continue to have our sights set on bringing the class together on campus for a more fitting graduation, when it is safe to do so. We are still allowing for the possibility that this could happen over the summer, but know we will not be scheduling this event any sooner than August 1. We will have an update to share by the end of June.
- We have started the process of allowing students and families to gather belongings from dormitory rooms and lockers on campus. This will take a few weeks to complete, and we appreciate everyone's patience as we do this safely and efficiently. If there are questions, please be in touch with Andrea Heinze or Willie Waters.
- We have canceled all on-campus summer programs. With a sense that a number of our students are having their own summer plans canceled or disrupted, we are working on some virtual summer offerings. Please feel encouraged to fill out a brief student survey or parent survey to share your ideas for summer courses taught by Brooks faculty. We will have more to report about those possibilities by the middle of June.
Looking further ahead, I would like to share how we are approaching the work of preparing for the range of potential scenarios we might be facing in 2020-2021. As I have noted in some online conversations and in weekly videos, we have not yet made any change to our plan to operate the school as currently scheduled in the coming year. The experience of living through this spring apart from one another has us determined to do everything we can to find a way to be on campus together in the fall. We are also anticipating the strong likelihood that realizing this goal will require us to consider some modifications to our program. To that end, we have established a COVID-19 Task Force to oversee a broad-based effort to ensure we are as prepared as we can be to have the school year we want to have as safely as possible. Dean of Faculty John McVeigh is chairing this task force and is working with five colleagues leading different aspects of the overall effort:
- Health & Safety - Beth McNeff, Director of Human Resources
- Academic Program - Susanna Waters, Academic Dean
- Non-Academic Programs - Andrea Heinze, Associate Head of Student Affairs
- Enrollment & Financial Operations - Paul Griffin, Chief Financial Officer
- Parent, Alumni and External Relations - Gage Dobbins, Director of Institutional Advancement
This group has been working for a couple of weeks at this point and will have more to report as we get into June. Our goal is to update the entire community on our plans for 2020-2021 by July 1. Between now and then, we will be working on that plan and bringing to bear all expertise, counsel, and health agency guidelines we can access.
This work may also move us in the direction of revising our enrollment contract for next year to reflect any modifications we make to our approach. We would share this updated version with all new and returning families on, or shortly after, July 1. Our expectation would be that signed contracts are returned by July 15. As with all things in this COVID-19 world, this plan is subject to change if circumstances beyond our control move us in a different direction. If you have any questions, please let us know.
Finally, I would like to touch on two more updates from my last letter before wrapping up:
- First, we are heading into the final stretch of our Brooks Fund effort in what has been an atypical year by any measure. We appreciate the fact that this pandemic has thrown the economy into a virtually unprecedented tailspin and that charitable giving, in general, has suffered. We also know that annual giving is a critical component of the school's financial health every year, and is perhaps more important than ever as we seek ways to hold our community together during an especially challenging moment in time. Thus, if a gift to the Brooks Fund before the end of this fiscal year on June 30, 2020, is within reach, thank you. We are deeply grateful for the support.
- Second, we now have a clearer picture of where our variable expenses will finish up in this fiscal year, and we will be moving forward with a reimbursement program that will be composed of a range of options. There is still work to do in order to better define the plan, and we will share details with current families by June 15. Here, too, we appreciate the economic challenges many are facing, and hope that this step proves helpful in some way.
I continue to be grateful for the wealth of support and care our school community has received from all constituencies during this heretofore unimaginable stretch in our lives. We will do all we can to find our way back to one another here at 1160 Great Pond Road as soon as we possibly can. I will plan to be in touch again at some point in the second half of June. For now, take good care and please do continue to be in touch with any questions and thoughts on your mind.
