Julie Storer: The Closers

So, we're done! This incredible week ended with a grand finale of one hour spent with Ted and Nancy Sizer - the founders of The Coalition of Essential Schools. He is professor emeritus at Brown University and they have spent 30 years changing schools in America...and they're still going. We submitted questions thru the week and today had them answered with a very informal Q & A that followed. The amount of respect and appreciation they are due was made apparent by the standing ovations both at their introductions and when the session was over.

Our final activity was to take a period of time reflecting, then we composed a letter to ourselves that the HGSE will mail sometime in the fall. I wrote my as though I were a colleague who had also attended the Institute and mentioned all the plans I have for applying what I've learned this week. I'm interested in how it will feel to get the letter in several months and see that there are already positive changes on my campus in student learning.

After saying goodbye we went our separate ways - I spent the afternoon wandering thru Harvard Yard one final time. Then I took the T to Boston Commons and took advantage of one final afternoon in Massachussets by running the Freedom Trail all the way to the end at Bunker Hill.

I can't thank Raise Your Hand Texas enough for the opportunity of a lifetime to attend the Harvard Leadership Institute for Redesigning High Schools. We were all very proud to tell our colleagues from all over the US, Ireland and Australia about the organization that is so dedicated to improving schools that they would send 100 of us to Harvard. I can say without reservation that the group of dedicated professionals from Texas that I had the honor to work with this week represented our state with pride. With our schools in the hands of this quality group of educators the future is bright!

Julie Storer