Designing Serene Start-Up Days

September 4th 2009

Last winter I convened a small group to discuss ways to make our opening August week of faculty and staff meetings more inspiring and less stressful. While I thought we were doing a fine job in general, I was aware that my tendency is to pack a lot of information into a concentrated period of time, and move the balance more toward efficiency, perhaps at the expense of community-building. Thus the purpose of the group became “Designing Serene Start-Up Days.” Thinking about the last two weeks – the faculty returned the week of August 24th, and the students came this week – I think we got the balance just about perfect. A few examples in particular come to mind:

We had a Student Leadership Summit attended by almost 20 of our high school students where we balanced discussions of theories of leadership with each person creating an action plan for their role (captain of the soccer team, student council president, etc.) that we will check-in on at a winter meeting.

Cary and I hosted a lunch at our house for our five new employees, including their mentors and many of their colleagues, and any other employee who was new to DS in the last few years. The event was small enough to allow attention to and conversation with each new person, but big enough to have a nice party atmosphere.

In response to being over-programmed and not allowing enough time for classroom preparation or individualized problem-solving, we allowed a day in the middle of the week that was an “Admin-free zone” – faculty could use the day any way they wanted, including working from home.

We ended last week with a well-attended and lively gathering at Shortys. You could tell from the attendance and the level of excited chatter that debriefing over nachos and a margarita served a need.

Finally, beginning the week with class retreats, new parent gatherings, and two days of academics eased the transition from long summer days to classroom time. No matter how exciting the teaching, that transition is effortful work for our students, and we are wise to build in the recognition that shifting gears – however welcome – comes with a certain level of energy demand.

No doubt looking at a beautiful three day weekend ahead seems just about the right balance for many of us.