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Official Web Site Of The Douglas School Principal
May, 2008
Dear Douglas Community,
Today we, Alexandra Katis and Eleana Cardarelli, have had the privilege to become the principal’s for the day. In the very beginning ofthe day, while students were exiting off their bus, we greeting them and said good morning. ‘Please walk’ is something that some kids might want to learn.
In the morning, the Douglas school children, teachers and parents had a lovely Memorial Day program. There were guest speakers, such as Dan Silva and Emily Ropiak. As usual, our fifth and sixth grade band played traditional pieces and the second grade classes sang three different songs. Everyone truly did a great job.
Later in the afternoon, Dr. Whitbeck gave us our first project. Some of you might like to shop and I know that we do as well. So for our first assignment, we got to look through magazines and find prizes for the birthday treasure box. Dr. Whitbeck wanted something fun and cool. I hope we gave it to him.
Lunch. Something everyone looks forward to. Especially when it’s from Savory Lane! Dr. Whitbeck nicely offered to bring us lunch from anyplace we wanted in Acton. It took us some time to figure out what place we wanted to eat from. Our final decision was a close restaurant, Savory Lane. We got amazing sandwiches with pickles (which, in Alexandra’s perspective, looked like a leaf). One other special part to our lunch was eating our food in the teacher’s lounge with our boss, Dr. Whitbeck.
After lunch, me (as in Alexandra and Mrs. Bloom’s class) had to go on a field trip to the Workers’ Credit Union. That was a lot of fun seeing all of the machinery. When we got back, Mrs. Bloom’s class went to see Eleana’s class (Mrs. Hubbell) perform some Roman myths.
After all that fun was over, the REAL fun began. That would include going on the roof. While we were up there, we got all of the recess balls that were kicked on top. You wouldn’t believe how windy it was up there. I have one tip for you if you go up on the roof, be careful on the ladders. I recommend not standing under the ladder while someone is going up or down on it. After all of that ended, we got to go down in the “glory hole” (a.k.a. thebasement or storage room). We were surprised to find that it smelled like spearmint! Something must have been rotting down there. Eww.
After emerging from the underworld, we got to visit some classrooms of our prior teachers. The children kept asking us why we were up on the roof.
That closed up our day. We had sooooo much fun!!! The best part was that we got to skip all of the learning of the day. Thank you so much Dr. Whitbeck.
Fromyour favorite principal’s,
AlexandraKatis and Eleana Cardarelli
January, 2008
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Recently, I was carrying some coins in my hand to buy a cup of coffee at Dunkin Donuts. An older woman, focused on counting the coins in her palm, stepped out of the store just before me and in an instant we were about to collide. While I tried to avoid the crash, I dropped my coffee money. I collected myself and my coins and stood up to find the woman smiling and holding out her hand: ìMuchas gracias, senor! She didn't seem to speak English and she thought that the coins that I had dropped were hers. Even if I were able to explain to her in my terrible Spanish that these were my coins, it would have been awkward and seemingly selfish to argue that the coins were not hers. She had already thanked me, so I simply handed her the coins and I walked to the counter to order my coffee and pay with the bills in my wallet.
¡SENOR! SENOR! Just as I had ordered a medium coffee, the same lady tapped me on the back. I have to admit that I was worried that she thought I had shortchanged her! She spoke quickly in Spanish seeming to plead with me. I lifted my eyebrows and shoulders, the universal sign for "I don't understand." She took my hand, placed the change in my palm, and showed me her own coins. She knew that she had not dropped anything, that these coins must be mine, and that I had given them to her. She smiled and walked away. The donut store clerk, who overheard the conversation, smiled, and handed me my coffee. She refused to charge me. ¡De nada, senor! Happy New Year!
July 18, 2007
Mary O'Brien is out of the woods! If you don't live in Acton, you may have missed that Mary, one of the Douglas PE teachers made national news when she got lost for a week in the wilderness of Olympic National park in Washington state. You missed the worry, hope and belief in Mary that we all shared. I sat down with Mary today and she recapped the experience for me. What came throgh was her belief, at most times, that she was going to make it out. She was going to get to the road. No question, no hesitation, each step was a step closer to finding her way.
Finding our way - isn't that what each of us does daily? We usually have all of the creature comforts with us. Our decisions are rarely life or death, but daily we are simply trying to find our way, to define ourselves, to learn what we have in us. Learning is one of the feelings that I love the most. But true learning requires risk, trying something that's uncomfortable. I don't want to be lost in the woods, but I love the sharp pleasure of the anxious edge that comes from beginning something new that calls on all my resources and challenges my ego. There is excitement in learning, excitement that comes from being able to say to a teacher, “I admire that. I want that. I do not know - teach me. I’ve come to learn. Help me out of the woods."
June, 27, 2007
My father told me last weekend that I needed to update my Blog. At least I know that one person reads what I write. Thanks Dad! I thought that someone might like to read what I had to say at 6th grade graduation this year. So here it is…
Graduates of the class of 2007, I have some advice - close your eyes.
No kidding. That's my advice in a nutshell. Now keep them close and try to make pictures in your mind as I talk for a while. Try not to go to sleep.
The school, this balmy morning, seems hardly changed from seven years ago when you entered. Picture it, the same cafetorium with brown paneling, surrounded the graduating class of '01 -- and probably the class of '66, the year that the Douglas School opened. The classrooms you did your learning in still surround us. Your library with its thirteen thousand books is still in the same place as when you started.
Yes, picture it. All is as it should be. Everything we can see, everything we know is here -- all of it normal, all of it fit for a graduation speech. This is the world that you have known for seven years. A world that you have no trouble picturing. Now picture yourself entering a different world. One less familiar. One that will demand you to do different jobs. Your job may be to be as a student, an athlete, a musician. But I’ll let you in on a secret job, one that I have taken on, and this is the first time that I have shared it with anyone – my job is… simply… to change the world. Now if that's not a big enough surprise, here’s the really big one, I’ve secretly been doing this through you! And now it your turn to do my job. Picture yourself changing the world. Now open your eyes.
I have a vibrant vision of what this world could be, a world at peace, a world where people of different cultures, ideas, and values, listen to one another and work together to understand one another. So I want to give you some tools as you take on this new job of changing the world. To my mind, here's the first step in your new job: Some time soon, with your eyes closed, try to see our world honestly for what it is and then perform a magical act: Conjure up a new set of previews -- visualize a future in which everyone is doing good. Imagine yourself, thirty years from now, standing at a podium like this, speaking to a group of graduating 6th graders, or perhaps simply sitting with all those parents proudly watching your own child graduating from 6th grade. I hope that you are picturing a very different world. Your first tool for changing the world will be that picture, that vision of what the world can be.
Now, I can't tell you how to act or what to do in this new world. I wouldn't even pretend to know, but I want you to listen to a story that might provide the second tool that you'll need. It’s a story about a graduation ceremony at a small high school in Vermont. This school only had 17 graduating seniors and each of the 17 was offered the opportunity to stand at the podium and present their own graduation speech.
One of the graduates, began her speech like all the rest, reviewing what she had learned and some of the great moments of her high school career. When it came time to emphasize a point about taking the road less traveled, to try new things and to have confidence in yourself, she took off her graduation robe and delivered the rest of her speech stark naked.
Well as you can imagine the audience went wild and word soon got out of the naked graduate. The newspapers and TV news got a hold of the story and they all wanted pictures of Barbara to run in the paper or on TV. And, could you believe, in all of the commotion and excitement, no one thought to take a picture, no one except the video guy who had been hired by the school to videotape the ceremony. He was new to the business and very dedicated, and so Jay Cavallero continued taping.
It turns out that Jay had the only, the exclusive footage of the naked graduation speech. Now that tape was worth a lot of money and Jay needed money badly. In fact, Jay was offered over $100,000 for the tape. But Jay never sold the tape. To make a long story short, when asked why, he said, “It just wouldn’t be right.” He had every right to sell that tape, he needed to sell that tape, but if you haven't figured it out, this isn't a story about a naked graduation speaker, it's a story about knowing what's right.
So, I invite you to take some time to create your second tool. Once again, sometime soon, close your eyes and this time make two lists for yourselves.~ The first list is the list of the things you will do for money.~ The second list is the list of things you will not do for money because it wouldn't be right.~ Then, throw away the first list, it's not really all that important. But, keep the second list with you at all times and then go live your life.~ Knowing what you want the world to be and knowing what is right is really all you need. When it gets really tough, and it will, close your eyes and think of these two things. Everything else will be a cinch. Come back, let me know how those tools are working. Thank You.
May, 21, 2007
Greetings from almost spring in Acton, MA! It should be almost summer, but the past weekend of rain keeps me questioning whether I will ever get to sit on my back deck and play my guitar for the Tuesday night Whitbeck Family Dance parties. Speaking of Dance parties, I was a
proud participant in a benefit concert for the Bright Horizons Foundation this past weekend. BUT, I was not alone!! Four Douglas Students, Shahim Goulatte, Katherine Bennett, Cecelia Villesenor, and Jo-An Erickson got to play and sing with Dan Zanes, Peter Broggi (our music teacher), Craig VanDerAa (Douglas Dad) and me at the Berkley Performance Center in Boston! Look for our pictures on the pTO board at school. I have to
say that I was such a proud principal. The kids sang two songs with the band and brought the house down! The grown-ups even got to join everyone on stage for a rockin waltz with Peter Wolf from the J.Geils Band! If you haven't checked out Dan's music, you've got to click over to his website and try it out. His message is the same as that of Douglas School - we have so much power in this creative community, the more that we work together and sing some songs together, the better chance we have for a peaceful america, and an america where everyone feels accepted!
February 07
I’m terrible at putting things away. My desk is a mess, the top of my dresser is a mess, and my side of the bathroom sink is a mess. I’m not sure if it’s laziness, or sloppiness, or just bad habit, but it sure is easier just to put those things down in hopes of getting to them later. Sometimes it’s just the randomness of life that interrupts my attempts to be neater. At school, I have every intention of putting things away but then someone stops at my office door asking if I have a second…sure, but I won’t be able to put these papers away. At home I have every intention of cleaning off my dresser but then my youngest son comes toddling into my bed room…read book…sure, but I won’t be able to get to this clean laundry. In the bathroom I have every intention of keeping my side clean but then – well I don’t have anything distracting me
from this, it’s just that the bathroom vanity is great horizontal space for piling things. But the fact of the matter is that I’d rather be enjoying life than keeping things neat. Talking with the Douglas staff and students always wins out over a clean desk. Reading to my son always wins out over putting laundry away. Anything wins over cleaning the bathroom – even writing my blog.
January 07
Happy New Year – Here we are with another transition into the new, a chance to start over, to redefine ourselves. The New Year is fecund with opportunities, some that you might not have thought of. You might improve your ability to play air guitar with rock and roll on the radio. Or use a broom as a dancing partner – nobody gets hurt when you do deep dips or swing it over your shoulder – unless you have a lamp near-by. Of course, you might want to be a better cobweb remover. Or do more balancing tricks to impress small children.
Perhaps our dedication to the New Year is not really about learning new tricks. Perhaps it is really a symbol of a need to clean house mentally. To let go of small sorrows, to throw out small grievances, to clear off the clutter of irrelevant things-to-do lists from the refrigerator of life.
We can be assured that the New Year will become the old year. The fuss and mess and bother of life will accumulate again. It’s a cycle. Maybe that’s the deeper reason we look to the possibilities of a New Year. To break the cycle, to force some change into our lives – and to learn some new balancing tricks to impress small children.
10/30/06
I'm thinking about Halloween. At some point in my life I moved from loving Halloween to not liking it so much. I have to admit that it was well after college. Prior to this, Halloween was a reason to have a party, get some candy, or at least dress up in a cool costume. I still vividly remember so many of my great childhood costumes - the pumpkin when I was in Kindergarten (it involved orange crate paper, green tights and lots of fussing from mom), the robot from junior high (I had to jump in and out of the back of a pick-up truck with a huge box around me), the cowardly lion in high school (and then again in college - I really liked that one).
But now choosing a costume makes me anxious and this is my primary reason for not liking halloween. I'm an elementary principal and I inherited the job of grand marshal of the Douglas School Halloween Parade, so I get to choose a costume each year and I'm not happy about it. I don't want to choose something scary - Personally, I don't like to be scared and I wouldn't want to scare our youngest children. I don't want to look silly, I do have some pride. I also want my costume to speak for itself - I don't want to have to explain what it is. This is a challenge to my artistic side. Then I have this general standard that it should represent something educational, maybe a leader, an Ionic figure worthy of my position. That leaves out pumpkin, robot and the cowardly lion costume doesn't fit any more - too many birthday cup cakes!
I'm sure that you never understood how much anxiety one costume can cause. So when you're child tells you that they want to be a dinosaur, don't argue. Find or make them the dinosaur costume - they've thought about it and that's the costume that meets their standards. And who knows, maybe they will share all of their halloween traumas publicly one day and you don't want to be at the center of this. By the way…our halloween parade will be tomorrow, come see who leads the parade.
10/9/26/06
Every once in a while a teacher shares something with me and I think, "I wish that everyone could see this." Below is a poem constructed by Mr. Grob's 6th grade class. It began as an exercise in generating poem "starters." The assignment was initially to go home and generate 20 starters, but Mr. Grob thought that it would be a better experience if each student modeled one. Well Mr. Grob began and the next student connected their starter to his, the next student followed suit and the following poem was created…Be sure to read all the way to the Epilogue! (Warning…contains 6th grade humor)
My Long (regular) Day
by Mr Grob's Class
Saturday AM
Time to write'm
List, List, List, and
then off into the mist
After I've made my list I go for a run
I think passing all those building is fun
I like the cars driving by 'till I come back
Now I find my cleats on the floor in a stack
I've just returned from a Saturday A.M. run.
Now I've got a soccer game to attend,
I'm sure it will be fun,
and cleaning the chicken coop is just around the bend.
The soccer game was fun
Now I have to clean the chicken coop
Cleaning the chicken coop is done
Now I'll play with Bob and give him some soup
I am all out of energy,
And I'm ready for a snack.
I'll have garlic this is raw.
I'm going out to play hockey, ma!
Now that I'm full,
It's time to hit like a bull.
A kid skates down the rink it could be a goal,
But I hit him so hard he can no longer think.
I get the puck and pass it to my team,
We score a goal and we all scream.
If I don't bathe I'll be in trouble,
So I take a bath with Bob and it has a lot of bubble.
After I play hockey
I smell like a donkey
I take a bath with my hamster Bob,
Down the drain he goes, I start to sob.
I had hoped, for a nice bath, with Bob the hamster
But when Bob went down the drain,
I went insane!
Hopefully the ghost will come in time, before Bob turns into shredded lime!!!
I reached out to Bob as he began to drown
When I saw a ghost hamster hovering around
He floated towards Bob and shook him awake
And then a bike ride we decided to take
Ghost of the hamster of the past saves Bob
Then I went for a bike ride,
a very fun bike ride,
and then I took a nap.
I came from my bike ride and started my nap.
For some reason I was dreaming about rap,
there was this pattern tap,bap, tap, bap,
then I realized this was no dream.
I woke up and 3 bandits took me away, so extreme.
I woke up from my nap with a very big tap.
Some bandits threw me in a crate, I just didn't know my fate.
We finally got to China.
I forgot to eat breakfast and I was getting the rots.
So I asked them to take me to Dunkin Donuts.
I couldn't believe I got kidnapped to China,
I was just minding my own business eating breakfast at a diner.
The blow to my head was a loud as thunder,
When I can to I found I was taken down under.
After I ate breakfast I thought since I'm close I might as well go to Australia
In Australia I saw some Kookaburras and it was feeding time so I fed them Bob
Then later someone tried to feed that same Kookaburra a corn on the cob
After feeding the Kookaburra I decided to try and catch the Kookaburra
Kookaburra eats my hamster Bob,
To get him back is my full time job,
I catch him and eat him with some fries,
Now I'm sick and out he flies!
Once I fed Bob to
The Kookaburra I ate him.
He didn't taste good,
So I threw him up.
Bob was thrown up into a tennis court one day
So then finally he decided to play
He couldn't hold the racket and was smaller than the ball
But after he won, he looked ever so tall
Bob goes to play tennis
But his small little toes can't hold the racket,
So Bob holds it with his mouth so he runs and smacks it
Then Bob won the game!
The Kookaburra and hamster Bob
Fly back to the home they've missed,
And so they don't forget their job,
They write a Sunday morning list.
EPILOGUE
We hopped on an Australian jet.
"We'll be home by Sunday I bet."
We crossed the Date Line and found out in time,
That it was Saturday once again!!!!
9/1/06
September and only one long weekend left before school starts. Everyone who stops by school asks how the summer was and whether I'm ready for school to begin. The summer was great and YES, I'm ready. In fact I can't wait for the first day of school. I have my new school clothes and I'm ready to put away the orange Crocks that I bought this summer, (of course you might see me in them on wild shirt Fridays).
For decades, teachers have been asking students to write the "What I did on my summer vacation" essay. The worst thing about becoming a principal was that I no longer had a long summer vacation. I used to spend the whole summer with my son - we called it "Camp Daddy." But now, like most parents who work outside of the home, I'm held to a couple of weeks of summer vacation. I put a lot of pressure on myself to make these two weeks memorable, to recreate the type of experiences that I had when was little that I can picture fondly now. While my family had some wonderful times on our summer vacation, I realized that what my children considered memorable moments happened every other day of the summer. Eating breakfast outside on our deck on a cool summer morning, playing baseball at dusk with cousins until it was so dark that they couldn't see the ball, having dinner at the Olive
Garden. And so I can't wait until school starts and each day brings with it opportunity for special moments.
Welcome back!
8/4/06
August and the heat finally broke! I start my family vacation next week, I'm hoping that the heat stays reasonable. There were record temperatures all week - 104º was the hottest at the Douglas thermometer. Friday morning rose with a slight drizzle, I wasn't sure if the sprinklers had just turned on or if it had actually rained. At 10 am, my office became very dark, a stiff wind blew, and the skies opened! I couldn't see the end of the parking lot. And then, everything was cooler.
How refreshing a rain storm can be - especially a rain storm that literally washes away the heat. It was as if a heavy blanket of heat and humidity dissolved. It now lies in puddles in our parking lot. I hope that it takes a long time to sew that oppressive blanket. It reminds me of how refreshing summer can be for schools. Those of us in the Douglas Community were working at a frenzied pace on the last week of school. Teachers had to get all of the report cards written, students had to finish all of their projects, there were school celebrations to be celebrated and parents were frantically trying to figure out what they were going to do with their kids all summer. June 20th my calendar was blank! It was go, go go…stop. For me, the frantic pace came crashing to a halt. I put on the summer shorts and sandals and rarely altered this outfit all summer. Just the
change in date and outfit was like our summer rainstorm, it washed away the frantic energy that accompanies the end of school.
Still, it was a bit sad. Schools are at their best when they are filled with energy. I am at my best feeding off of that energy. Just as soon as I breathed that sigh of relief, just as soon as I felt the frantic pace settle down, I yearned for its return. And so I look forward to September 6th when it all starts again. The laughter, the noise of the cafeteria, the squeak of sneakers in the gym, the "silent" passage of students in the halls - I look forward of to the noises of school. Let's just hope that it's not too hot!
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