“The State of the Union… oops, I mean, the State of the School is strong!”
Were he President Fech, that might’ve been how Head of School Dr. Scott D. Fech would have begun his January 30th “State of the School” address to the Winchester Thurston Community. Speaking in the newly renovated Joan Clark Davis Center, Dr. Fech laid out the present state of Winchester Thurston, what school faculty, administration, and staff have been working on in the past year, and presented a wide-ranging and ambitious plan for WT’s future.
Although Fech acknowledged some challenges faced by the school — including the continued reverberations of the pandemic, new research that has challenged decades-old progressive pedagogy orthodoxy, and the ever-present task of raising more money — Fech was staunchly optimistic about the state of WT.
I watched Fech’s address because I know you didn’t, and because there is much that Fech said that should interest even the most disinterested of students — including a planned makeover of Molloy Posner Hall that would see a transformed cafeteria and expanded Middle School. Nothing yet on the plot of land next to the Upper School, though.
Fech began his address by giving an update on WT’s Strategic Design Plan (don’t worry, I’ve never heard of it before either!), the four pillars of which are “Reimagining Learning, Rethinking Time and Space, Strengthening Community, and Supporting Employees.” Beyond these lofty titles are some actually quite real changes, many of which have already been implemented.
With regard to “Reimagining Learning,” Fech outlined WT’s phasing out of AP courses and their ongoing replacement with new advanced courses. As anyone who has so much as made my acquaintance will know, I certainly shed far more tears at their loss than Fech does, yet even I will admit that WT does not make these changes without reason.
Fech echoed what many other teachers and administrators have said about their replacement: that it will give teachers the freedom to create better and more unique learning experiences; that it will help WT move away from test-based learning towards a more project-based curriculum; that it will help WT better prepare students for the real world.
Without a doubt, Dr. Fech’s two favorite phrases must be “interdisciplinary learning” and “City as Our Campus”, for he spared them no mention in his address. This, perhaps, is the chief conceit of WT’s entire Strategic Design plan, and indeed, Fech characterized the move away from APs as part of WT’s effort to incorporate more interdisciplinary learning and to expand the City as our Campus (CAOC) program.
Fech spotlighted Dr. Narragon’s “The Past in the Present: An Introduction to Public History,” noting the prominent CAOC element to the course — students take a Civil Rights tour across the South — as well as the community engagement aspect that tends to characterize most Narragon courses. This seems to be the model envisioned for future advanced courses.
“Strengthening Community” is another pillar of the plan; in that respect, WT seeks to cultivate more and more projects and experiences that engage with the broader community outside of WT. Fech highlighted collaborations with Pittsburgh Public Schools, as well as WT’s attainment of a second E. E. Ford Grant to “create and pilot summer intensive opportunity for WT students and students who would otherwise not have opportunity to experience WT.”
In terms of “Rethinking Time and Space,” Fech hailed the opening of the Joan Clark Davis Center. WT’s student population, as he would go on to describe later in his speech, has been growing at a breakneck speed. Enrollment in the City Campus has gone from 566 in the 2014-15 school year to 678 in the 2023-24 school year and is continuing to rise every year. This has led to issues of overcrowding, both in Molloy Posner Hall (MPH) and in the Upper School.
Moving the Upper School History Department, along with most administrative offices, to the Davis Center has thus provided much-needed relief from these pressures. Student response to the Davis Center has been by and large positive, although one can only wonder how it aids interdisciplinary learning to cut off the history department from the rest of the academics.
Fech also heralded the success of the switch from trimesters to a semester/quarter system. This was evidently a change driven primarily by faculty, especially in the Lower School, who say that the new system is more conducive to providing timely feedback about students. Quarterly as opposed to mid-trimester comments give teachers enough time to actually get to know their students before they provide feedback; semester comments leave enough time for further changes to be actually implemented. In the Middle School, students can also now enroll in more electives as a result of the quarter system.
Fech extolled the progress WT has made towards being more sustainable. The Davis Center was designed and constructed using Passive House methodologies, one of the highest standards of sustainable building practices. The Davis Center is well insulated to reduce the amount of energy needed to heat or cool in the building, and the building is entirely electric (no gas heating). Solar panels can (and presumably will) be installed on the roof and sensors monitor CO2 levels to ensure that students learn in an environment with fresh air. Fech said that it was a long-term goal of WT to similarly electrify MPH (more on those renovations later).
Last but not least (or so one should hope), Fech described the ways that WT is fulfilling its pledge of “Supporting Employees.” In the words of Fech, “Our greatest asset outside of our children, are our faculty, staff, and administrators — that’s where the magic happens!” One of the main attractions of WT is indeed the teaching staff. Unlike a public school, where teachers must have a teaching diploma (and consequently often don’t have diplomas in other academic subjects), WT can hire teachers who have field-specific degrees (like in history or engineering; 70% of teachers have a master’s degree or doctorate). Attracting and retaining staff, then, is critical to the quality of WT’s education — and indeed, WT’s attrition rate for teachers (14%) is lower than that of comparable schools.
Fech announced that, working with ThreePoint consulting, WT had done a “deep-dive” into compensation, looking at workload, benefits, different compensation models, and more to create a comprehensive Compensation Philosophy. Fech also outlined a two-phase plan for developing an evaluation system for faculty, which includes a “faculty professionalism checklist” and more communication between Division Directors and faculty.
Teachers are essential to our society on a fundamental level, yet teaching well is far from easy and teachers are often not properly compensated for the work and effort they put into their jobs. One would hope that as a school that so loudly proclaims itself to be so “progressive,” WT would lead the way in giving teachers their due, and that Fech’s words will translate into material benefits for WT’s teachers. It should be again noted that WT’s attrition rate is quite low.
I’m almost to the fun stuff (renovation plans!), but first, a bit more housekeeping. In his address, Fech also reported on the academic outlook at WT. As Fech admitted, not even WT could escape the tremendous learning challenges posed by the pandemic. Just as they did at nearly every other school, testing scores across divisions dipped in the 2021-2022 school year, in some cases even falling below the norm for other independent schools. Nonetheless, testing scores in the spring of 2023 did seem to show that WT has mostly recovered to pre-pandemic testing levels.
However, several things are still notable. In eighth-grade mathematics, WT remains below the norm by several percentage points. Indeed, the norm for eighth-grade mathematics at independent schools is worryingly low: just 34% of eighth graders in the spring of 2023 were “on track” (at WT, it was 26%). This is a national problem and Fech acknowledged it as such, while also pointing out that the data also showed that the eighth-grade cohort in question (class of 2027) had made very significant year over year during their time in middle school.
Fech also acknowledged that employees continue to report behavioral, maturity, and academic delays compared to pre-pandemic years which will likely take years to correct. “At really critical moments in our kids’ lives, they were not able to do the social-emotional kinds of activities that we just think of as standard. We told kids don’t get close to one another, we put masks on them so that they didn’t understand facials. Is my teacher smiling at me, [or] is my teacher not smiling at me?” Such issues are similarly present on a national scale, and Fech said that the school was making changes to adapt to these new challenges.
Several new support positions, including additional counselors for all divisions, Lower School department chairs, and a Director of Academics and Curriculum (works on articulation and integration between grade level curriculums) have also been created to manage both the aftereffects of the pandemic and the challenges of a school growing rapidly in size and scope. Monthly wellness surveys are also sent out to all Middle Schoolers to monitor potential mental health issues that might arise.
For some very good news, WT’s SAT scores remain very much above average, even showing improvement over last year. The graduating class of 2024 had an average SAT score of about 1330, compared to the national average of about 1030 and the class of 2023’s average of 1300. According to the data Fech showed about the class of 2023, when compared to similar schools, WT’s reading and writing scores were above the mean and WT’s math scores were at the mean. Graduating students also continue to get into top-level universities across the nation — in that respect, WT is certainly continuing to fulfill its promise of being a college preparatory school.
Another issue Fech addressed with respect to academics was a recent development in early childhood education. For several decades, schools across the country (including WT) followed the “balanced literacy” pedagogy of education professor Lucy Calkins. Her approach emphasized the story aspect of reading, focusing on cultivating students’ own desire to read by allowing them to choose “just right” books that fit their interests and abilities. The idea was that rather than learning to read through phonics and sounding out words, children would develop a love for reading and would pick up words through context.
In 2022, however, the tide finally turned against her approach as a growing body of research increasingly showed that Calkins’ pedagogy is much less effective than the “science of reading” phonics approach. Fech announced that WT was moving away from the Calkins approach and that teachers are presently working towards finding and developing a new reading program. In the interim, several programs, including Wit and Wisdom (K-5th) and Bridge to Reading (K-1st), are currently being piloted.
Now, on to the fun stuff!
Fech announced that WT is planning some quite significant renovations to MPH — but they won’t come cheap. Something that many people don’t realize about WT is how reliant it is on donations. Tuition only covers about 85% of operating expenses, and even with revenue from other sources (chiefly the endowment), the school still relies on a little over $1 million in yearly donations just to stay in operation. For additional capital expenses, like earlier renovations to the auditorium and the gym, as well as the Davis Center, WT is entirely reliant on donations.
By looking at public tax returns for the 2021-2022 fiscal year, the year that WT received capital contributions for the Davis Center project, it can be estimated that the entire project cost a little less than $4 million (take my calculation with a grain of salt: I am not nor do I claim to be a tax lawyer). For the planned renovations in MPH, WT is seeking $13 million, of which they have as of yet only obtained $2.28 million. Suffice it to say that they will need a massive capital campaign to fund these projects. Yet, I found myself very convinced by Fech’s address that these renovations are not only beneficial but probably quite necessary for WT.
On the ground floor, WT is planning a complete renovation of the cafeteria. The seating capacity will be doubled to over 300, with the seating area expanding into the current locations of the dance studio and the kitchen. The kitchen will be moved to the opposite end of the cafeteria, towards the auditorium, and the lunch line will be doubled. Fech said that the new arrangement will fix many of the current lunchtime problems that overcrowding has wrought — including more rushed lunches and many students not actually eating lunch in the cafeteria.
Fech also said that composting and “real” recycling opportunities would be available and that the new arrangement would allow for more small-batch cooking and therefore less food waste. The music rehearsal room will be a casualty of the renovation, though the blueprint seemed to suggest that the current Middle School music room would be converted to an Upper School music room. Fech didn’t say where the dance studio would be moved to, though one would hope that the arts do not become a casualty to the stomach.
WT is also planning to relocate the fifth-grade classrooms from the second floor to the first floor (which now has more space due to the relocation of administrative offices to the Davis Center) and to replace them with a Middle School learning commons and conference space. Fech said that the new space would allow middle schoolers to gather and “feel their own identity,” and presumably, it would allow for more interdisciplinary learning. As a former middle schooler myself, I can say that the space will be a welcome addition to the Middle School, giving more communal workspace and helping to alleviate compression.
Fech said that WT hoped to finish fundraising by January of 2024 and complete the renovations by August of 2026. These are, needless to say, slightly aspirational timelines given the immense nature of the renovation.
Fech ended his address by emphasizing the continued expansion of the CAOC program, continued demand for admissions, efforts to attract and retain the best teachers, and, of course, by asking members of the WT community to donate money to the school. According to Fech, the success of the capital campaign (and other donation campaigns) is critical to WT’s future.
The one thing that I wish Dr. Fech had better addressed in his State of the School speech is the impact of advances in generative A.I. on education. Make no mistake; we are undergoing a new technological revolution that will transform every aspect of society. Although WT has announced some more obvious, shorter term policies that regard unsanctioned A.I. use to complete assignments as cheating, no long term plan (that I know of, anyways) has been laid out. How will WT alter its curriculum to adapt to these changes? Will WT try to incorporate A.I. into its curriculum, or will it adopt a policy of isolationism, trying to maintain a traditional form of education? How will WT prevent the unfair, de-facto penalization of students who don’t use A.I., even as many other students do?
These are important questions, especially as A.I. begins to uproot many of the careers that WT students might have once aspired to enter. WT must develop a comprehensive, long-term response to the rise of A.I., or else risk falling behind a rapidly changing world. If we are so exceptional, we must act now if we wish to remain so.
TL;DR: The State of the School is strong. Semester system and Davis Center are complete successes, some new positions have been created, testing scores are mostly back to normal after COVID, and WT might have new compensation philosophy for teachers sometime soon. WT is also planning to renovate Molloy Posner Hall to expand the cafeteria and give the Middle School a new common area… and they need 13 million more dollars to do it. Prepare for some fundraising emails… and most of you (high schoolers, that is) will probably graduate by the time these renovations occur.
Here is a link to the slideshow presentation that accompanied Dr. Fech’s presentation. It includes many of the figures, main points, and images I referred to in my article, as well as the blueprints for the new renovations.
Here is a link to a video recording of Dr. Fech’s State of the School address.
