Collaboration Day One: The Graduate at Graduation

If the worst thing you can say about a day is that the scones didn’t show up for tea break, you’re doing pretty well. That’s how we feel after our successful first day of workshopping with the Leopards Hill Faculty and guests from other Jesuit schools.

Our first goal in the morning was to reflect on the retreat the day before. To our great relief the LHS teachers affirmed that the students had a fruitful experience. They had particular praise for the students who spoke to the large groups about their experiences. We hope there will be excitement among both students and faculty about having more retreats in the future.

We spent most of the day discussing the “Graduate at Graduation”, BC High’s document describing what we hope our graduates will be like by the time they leave us. The students shared their ideas yesterday about what a model LHS student would look like, and today it was the teachers’ turn to consider that same question.

Faculty spent a while in small groups, after coming up with initial ideas on their own. Words that kept surfacing included “hard-working”, “compassionate” and “self-less”. When we gathered near the end of the day to share a few ideas, many groups had discovered that most of what they were trying to say could be summed up with one word: loving.

We’re pretty sure that they didn’t say that just because it’s one of the descriptors of the BC High version of the Graduate at Graduation. What a thrill to discover that what we want for our students is the same as what they want, half a world away. It takes time to describe what we mean when we say loving, and it takes a lifetime to figure out how to draw that virtue out of young people, but knowing it’s a goal is a great start.

In the evening we met with the Parent Teacher Association for about an hour. They shared with us their respect for the Jesuits and their hopes for the school. We answered their questions about BC High and told them about the work that the LHS faculty had done that afternoon. Our time together concluded with conversations about how LHS and BC High can continue their collaboration after this workshop has ended.

For now, we’re just worried about finishing up a successful workshop – there’s plenty of time to figure out what we’ll do after we’re done here, but it’s still really nice to be asked to stay in touch!