Catherine Zhang ‘26 and Anouk Shin ‘26
I sat down with Dr. Hills in his office on the Saturday morning after the assessment week. He was not wearing his typical St. Mark's vest, but in jeans and a shirt. He brought munchkins to the table and sat right next to me at the round table in his office. I proceeded with the following questions to reflect on his first year and potential changes happening for next year.
Use three words to describe your first year here!
Learning. Planning. Optimistic.
I think in sequence, they actually work chronologically. It's been a year of learning for me, trying to understand what the strengths are of this school, what traditions are very important or valuable to the school, and what should be preserved. That's on one side of the ledger. On the other side of the ledger is where we can be better, and how we are going to be better. So that's learning.
With that in hand, the planning is okay, these are some things that we're probably going to need to try. And it could be, these are the things we need to do to make sure we don't lose our strengths. And these are the things that we need to do to shore up our growth areas. Because some of that planning happens in light of what's going on in the outside world, too. The world is not static. Even if the world were static, the planning would be quite challenging. Given that the world is changing, planning is even more difficult.
And then the third word, optimistic, is future-looking. And I think there are a lot of opportunities for our school. And it's a wonderful thing, I think, when you have a foundation of strength, but there's a lot of work to be done. Because it means that your time and energy will lead to improvement…we're neither the disaster school nor the perfect school. Which actually should be very exciting for all of us.
What has surprised you the most about our school community this year?
A good positive surprise is that I'm aware of lots of student bodies at lots of different schools. Everybody's working hard…And I know, I mean, this may be a controversial statement among some parts of our student body. But again, I'm familiar with lots of different student bodies. Our students are generally quite kind. I think they mostly care about each other and try to take care of each other. I know it's not perfect because…I mean, it is high school, right? But overall, we're a pretty kind school. Maybe Chapel helps with that. You know, when I think about the planning that I was talking about previously, that's a lot of the planning is how do we keep that going? Because that's very special. And no organization wants to lose what makes it special.
Negative surprise? They're not surprises, but these are areas where we can improve. I think we can push a little bit more. So, for example, our school motto, Age quod agis, right? That's what you do, do your best, right? Keep pushing, always moving forward. I don't think that the school lives by that motto as much as we can…
What do you consider your biggest accomplishment during your first year as Head of School?
Biggest accomplishment. Well, part of my goal, my mission, was learning. So I think I have a good understanding of the school. It's dangerous and risky to make big decisions before you understand the system. So I think a big accomplishment is learning…We have a small business here. And the head is like the CEO and off campus a lot, doing other things, managing people. So some grounding elements for me are I have an advisory, and I'm teaching. Next year I'm teaching chemistry and I'm going to have an advisory. There are lots of heads that don't teach and don't have advisories. So I think a big accomplishment is, I don't know if it's a big accomplishment because you have to give me the scorecard, but I attempted to form relationships with students. I don't know if I succeeded…
What has been your greatest challenge so far, and how have you addressed it?
Greatest challenge. It's a little bit from the previous answer. I think the greatest challenge has been trying to make sure that we have the right people on campus. This is both adults and students who are committed to building a greater school.
What existing school traditions have you found most meaningful?
I mean, I like chapel. I like the fact that we get together. Anything that brings us together. So chapel is good, school meetings are good, and seated meals are good. However, with the seated meal, the actual operations of it are not great. That's no human's fault. That's the physical space fault.
Are there any specific programs or policy changes that you're considering implementing next year, such as a schedule change?
The schedule change is not that big compared to the calendar change. The calendar change is bigger…And I would say the biggest changes are the length of the class. They'll all be the same. And we're going to do Chapel after the first class of the day. The calendar is changing because we're going to start a little bit earlier. We're going to try to do prize day by Monday. Memorial. So we're not going to be here in June. And we're going to move Lion Term.
I'm not sure there will be many new programs. But students might be surprised at the implementation of the program. Next year, we're going to take attendance very seriously. But that's not new…I think we need to take the dress code seriously. But that's not new either…The new thing is, we will do what we say we do. You know, part of the practical challenge here was that we lost our Dean of Students. And so I think we're doing a good job as a school, considering the challenges we have faced this school year. But we are not the best version of ourselves. Next year, my second year, more stability. We need to step up our game as a school. All of us. Together. And I want to be very clear. I'm not blaming anybody. We're doing a good job considering the situation that we had.
What has been the most rewarding part of leading our school so far?
Seeing students develop confidence, seeing students develop skills, seeing students very enthusiastic and energetic about whatever they're doing. Sometimes that's in athletics. Sometimes that's in, just talking about ideas. I kind of like nerds. Everybody can be a little nerdy about different things…And not just students. I love seeing faculty who support all of that. We've got some good faculty here who themselves are kind of nerdy, and it's great.
It's great when you see an adult, and you see a student, and there's a little bit of magic because the student wants to work hard. But they just want to know what direction their efforts will be valuable. And the adult has the wisdom to say, “I believe in you. Why don't you try this thing?” The kids like, “Thank you.” And then they go do it. That's magic.