I am honored to be here, under this tent, surrounded by these historic buildings, inspired by an enduring mission, and indebted to the seventeen former heads of school who have come before me. I am humbled by the legacy that began with our founder’s vision and belief in the power that would be realized by educating women, a power that surpassed even what she might have imagined or intended. I am humbled by the many women inspired by this institution who have served and shaped their worlds and who collectively continue to influence our world. 

In the last few months, I have been asked what I will do as head—how I will lead, how I will serve this community. I am reminded by advice from students offered in the search process: “Learn from Emma how to lead Emma.”

Their wise counsel validated my early lessons in leadership, namely that leadership involves much listening and asking of questions, more listening, and cultivating a strong team to collectively set and maintain a course toward new horizons.

Emma is already on an inspiring course, set by thoughtful leaders, teachers, and colleagues who recognized that our horizon can be infinite, and enabled through an incredible campaign by dedicated alumnae, parents, and other supporters who have been transformed by and believe in this community and our enduring mission.

While I will continue to learn from Emma how to lead Emma, I will share today some of what is important to me and what is important for Emma Willard now and in the future.

Our mission and legacy are important. We will continue to embrace the traditions we hold dear…and in the spirit of continuous learning, we will ask questions…what is next? How might we evolve?

We will evolve. We will face challenges. 

The rights and positions of women (and of humans) across the world continue to be challenged and eroded. Our mission continues to be relevant, urgent, and imperative.

Incredible advances in technology are and will continue to push us to answer existential questions:  What is education even for? Where and why and how do we actually gather in community? What does it mean to be human?

Our values will guide us, and at the core of those values is care—care for ourselves, care for others, and care for the world we live in. These form circles of care, as a long-time colleague of mine, Tom Ramsey, used to say.

At the center of these circles is care for self…which has a wide scope. I mean it to include literal physical care - sleep, nourishment, resilience. I mean it to include emotional and spiritual care. And, I believe it also manifests in a love of learning, in exploring, in pursuing passions, and in finding and using one’s authentic and unique voice.

Just as Emma Hart Willard sat by the fireplace as a child, captivated by her study of geometry, caring for self includes nurturing the life of the mind. 

Emma Willard, and so many of the women our school has inspired over centuries, went on to care for and serve others. Nurtured in our classrooms, dormitories, on the pathways, and in the broader communities that surround us, we have a legacy of caring for each other. And we teach and inspire leaders who serve others.

And in that care for others, we care for the world in which we live…I wrote an early draft of this address while sitting near a lake one morning in early August. I needed some inspiration, and my surroundings provided it. And yet, as I sat in the sun, feeling the slight breeze, I recognized how precarious it all was —the gradual warming of a cold-water ecosystem below the surface, invasive brown tail moths in the trees, fertilizers in run-off near the shore. All of these threats couldn’t even compare to the extreme weather and rising sea levels that pose a much greater threat to so many around the globe.

Even as the fate of that world can seem precarious, I believe in human resilience, resourcefulness, and ultimately in the power of our collective will for sustaining a healthy and just world. My confidence is buoyed by a belief in young people, and especially in young women, the young people I see on this campus every day—being their best selves, supporting each other, and becoming leaders and stewards who will protect ecosystems and recreate human systems that promote a healthy and just world. 

What binds you and all of us together, over the last two centuries and across our broad school community are enduring values, and an “enduring vitality,” to borrow the words of one of our honorary trustees and alumna, Susie Hunter, an enduring vitality in which all of the best aspects of the past inspire and impel us toward a better future…a future in which we continue to build and develop new tools and ideas to meet the needs that future will demand. 

Foundational to any set of tools are the enduring values of curiosity, empathy, and leadership—values and habits of mind that are and will remain inherently human…and that transcend any particular era, technological age, or political shift. 

At Emma Willard, we will continue to nurture empathy, perspective, and respect for human dignity through literature and history, and the arts and sciences. We will continue to encourage curiosity about the world and about each other and our differing ways of experiencing the world. Our curiosity will compel us to ask deep questions about a complex universe, and instill in us the humility to rethink and reimagine, sometimes entirely, what we previously held to be true. We will continue to foster and practice leadership skills as we develop the confidence and agency that enable us to use what we learn to make a difference. 

A couple of weeks ago, Mx. Robison and Mr. Marchese uncovered some old vinyl records from the 1940s in a storeroom. On one of them, former headmistress, Miss Eliza Kellas, spoke these words to students and alumnae:

Today, the challenge to women is greater than ever before…so we need…leaders with trained minds, unselfish vision, daring initiative, forceful self-reliance, reverence for beauty, and loyalty to principles…In every field, women fitted in body, mind, and spirit to stand the stress and strain are called. Women unafraid to assume responsibility.

These are our ideas, our values. They are common threads that connect us to this place, to each other, and across generations. 

Today, as I accept the trust to lead this incredible institution, I ask that together we build on the work of past leaders, weaving new threads with the old, to co-create an even stronger school that will carry us proudly into the future.