Associate Head of School Meredith Legg, PhD, welcomed the Emma Willard School community to the new school year, sharing words of wisdom from her passion for roller coasters, which was rekindled over the summer, and her reading of See No Stranger: A Memoir and Manifesto of Revolutionary Love by Valarie Kaur. She reflected on Kaur’s line, “Deep listening is an act of surrender. We risk being changed by what we hear.”

 

Dr. Legg likened the risk-taking of getting on a roller coaster to the chance we take every day as listening, engaged members of this diverse community. “We risk being changed by what we hear—a little scary, a little thrilling,” she shared. “The risk—the possibility—is that on the other side of this experience, this conversation, this reading, you may see the world differently. You may have shifted your perspective, opinion, belief. Maybe just a tiny bit. Maybe in earth-shattering ways.” And that is her wish for the school community this year: that we risk being changed by our experiences and conversations.

Head of School Jenny Rao then spoke to the community about becoming both glass and glassmaker.

This summer in Santa Fe, my family and I enjoyed a glass-blowing lesson with a wonderful glass-blowing artist named David, who welcomed us to his studio. David taught us how to shape the glass while it was hot and soft; it would cool off and become unmoldable, so we would place it back in the hot oven. Heat, mold, cool, heat, mold, cool—a cycle that was repeated until we had our desired shape. For me, that was a bowl; Santi, our older 14-year-old son, made a red pepper; Ivan, our younger 11-year-old son, made a vase; and Arjun, my husband, made a glass. We left thrilled to have learned something new together and proud of our new creations.

 

Glass can only be shaped when it is hot because it becomes soft and moldable. Once it cools, it is strong, firm, and not moldable. Learning has a similar process! Our minds and hearts are moldable when they soften, when they are vulnerable. We open up when we are in a space that provides challenge and inspiration for learning while being surrounded by peers and teachers who know us, believe in us, and want to encourage our growth. A smart, ambitious, and kind community allows our vulnerability to be fertile. We can more willingly step into a challenge—a hard class, a new sport, a new friendship—and stretch ourselves when we are in the presence of others who are kind and are also being stretched themselves. School is like the oven, a place designed to provide challenge and support in the right quantities and at the right times to help students mold their minds and hearts into ever more beautiful expressions of who they are.

 In our own lives, we also have times when we find ourselves in an unwelcome oven, an oven imposed on us by circumstance. Times when we experience challenging emotions—loneliness, grief, loss, pain, heartache, to name a few difficult human emotions. As hard as it is to be “in the oven” during challenging times, these moments are opportunities to grow.

An experience in my own life comes to mind when I experienced profound loneliness. It happened when I went off to college. As many of you know, I grew up in Mexico City and came to the United States for college and arrived in Lewiston, Maine where I attended Bates College. Arriving in a new country and place in late August with my suitcases was hard, but the hardest time actually was after Parents’ Weekend in October. The newness of college had worn off, my mom had come to visit, and when she left I found myself in tears on my bottom bunk bed. I didn’t have any close friends yet; life in college and in the United States was very different from my life in Mexico at home, and I felt desperately lonely. I wondered if that desperate feeling of loneliness was my indication to return home. But it had taken an enormous effort on my behalf and my family’s to get to this point, so I couldn’t just give up.

So slowly, step by step, I began to build a life and community for myself at Bates. I joined the debate team, made an appointment with my advisor to begin to think about a major, and identified two people who seemed kind and nervous about college life and began to spend time together. It took time—a lot of time, actually—but by the middle of my sophomore year, a year and a half after I arrived, I finally found myself not feeling alone.

What is more, I had a new confidence in myself. I had found a new interest—competitive debating—which allowed me to travel to many colleges across the country to compete. I never knew I could enjoy or even be good at debating and public speaking! I also met one of my best friends, Christine, in one of my Economics classes. Our friendship through helping each other with econ material was so rewarding and strong that it made me consider becoming an economics major, not a subject I had ever been interested in before! 

My loneliness was painful, and it was also an effective motivator to be open and receptive to new experiences and people. The vulnerability I felt placed me in a moldable state—I had to try new things and open up. The alternative of simply wallowing in my loneliness was too daunting and painful. Ironically, it was through my loneliness that I found my confidence. I think of this experience often as I watch our new students arrive in August. I know for many of you, Emma Willard is your first time away from home. For some of you, it is also your first time away from your home country, and for all of our new students, this is a new community. Being new anywhere often comes with the experience and fear of loneliness. I commend all of you for your courage in taking this step, and I encourage you to stay open to how this moment of “heat” will shape you.

Adolescence is one long period in the oven, and all of you students are in that oven stage while you are here at Emma! I see those “heat” moments in my Rao Rumbles box all the time. For those of you who are new, Rao Rumbles is a box I have outside of my office where students leave me questions and I take time during Morning Reports, our bi-weekly community gathering, to respond. Students ask me questions about friendship, love, success, independence, dependence, loss, pain, doubt, grief. The questions come fast and furious and I treasure the way you open your hearts to me, to us, as you experience the oven of adolescence. 

Loneliness and adolescence are times when life places us in the oven. And then there are times when we choose to go in and out of the oven. When we are both glass and glassmaker at once. The school year is also a step into the oven by choice. We all come here, day after day for almost 10 months to learn about ourselves, each other, and the topics, issues and disciplines that interest us. We have one enormous oven here at Emma Willard where you can be both a piece of glass and a glassmaker. You have agency and responsibility for designing a glass piece that is true to you, and knowing when you need to be in the oven and out of it. I want you to choose your ovens carefully and courageously. Ask for help when you need it, and offer your support generously to others. Have the confidence that when you are committed to discovering your truth, and have support around you, you will indeed, over time, become the beautiful glass piece you are meant to be.

Following Ms. Rao’s remarks, Dr. Legg introduced the student body to new administrative and faculty members in our community: 

Prince Botchway, Head of Institutional Equity and Inclusion
Aniella Day, Houseparent
Nourane Hentati, Houseparent
Anne LaSalle, Learning Specialist
Mike Lorino, History Instructor
Colleen Graham, Science Instructor
Nicole Miranda, Associate Director of Student Life for Boarding
Dr. Devin O’Brien, Science Instructor
Rachel Sheridan, Language Instructor (Latin)
Dr. Molly Shilo, English Instructor

In addition to the new faces, we honored one of our returning faculty, Alexandra Schmidt, as the new Henry L. Thompson Chair in Mathematics. 

 

In closing, Dean of Students Shelley Maher offered a poem selection, as has become her custom:

“Keep Going” by Edgar A. Guest (with some minor adjustments by Ms. Maher)

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,
When the road you’re trudging seems all up hill,
When the funds are low and the debts are high,
And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,
When care is pressing you down a bit,
Rest if you must—but don’t you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,
As every one of us sometimes learns,
And many a failure turns about
When one might have won had one stuck it out;
Don’t give up, though the pace seems slow—
You may succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than
It seems to a faint and faltering human,
Often the struggler has given up
When one might have captured the victor’s cup,
And one learned too late, when the night slipped down,
How close one was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out—
The silver tint of the clouds of doubt,
And you never can tell how close you are,
It may be near when it seems afar;
So stick to the fight when you’re hardest hit—
It’s when things seem worst that you mustn’t quit.

The newly-formed 2024–2025 Emma community joined together in the alma mater, the first opportunity for many to learn these soon-to-be-familiar words. The Class of 2025 delivered a loud and enthusiastic “SHALL BE!” to launch us into an amazing year!

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View the full recording of Academic Convocation on the live feed archive.

See photos from Opening Week and Convocation on our SmugMug!