All Boarders

Last Friday, our 90 boarding students and the 20 adults who live on campus participated in All Boarders Weekend, three days of fun, challenge, laughter and renewal. After a rousing kick-off on the quad, students enjoyed the beautiful weather with a barbecue, a 40-foot inflatable obstacle course, giant checkers, and a bean bag toss. They ended the night with s'mores in the amphitheater — complete with scary stories and campfire songs. On Saturday, everyone went kayaking, canoeing, and paddle boating on Lake Cochituate, and then participated in "Dorm Wars,” a competitive and spirited selection of relay races and field games. Congrats go out to the residents of Trapelo, this year's big winners. On Sunday, each dorm had breakfast together and engaged in a community building activity before getting ready for the culminating event: Fractured Fairy Tales.
 Last Friday, our 90 boarding students and the 20 adults who live on campus participated in All Boarders Weekend, three days of fun, challenge, laughter and renewal. After a rousing kick-off on the quad, students enjoyed the beautiful weather with a barbecue, a 40-foot inflatable obstacle course, giant checkers, and a bean bag toss. They ended the night with s'mores in the amphitheater — complete with scary stories and campfire songs. On Saturday, everyone went kayaking, canoeing, and paddle boating on Lake Cochituate, and then participated in "Dorm Wars,” a competitive and spirited selection of relay races and field games. Congrats go out to the residents of Trapelo, this year's big winners. On Sunday, each dorm had breakfast together and engaged in a community building activity before getting ready for the culminating event: Fractured Fairy Tales.

Fractured Fairytales, a CSW tradition for over 20 years, presents each of our four dorms with a challenge: take a well-known fairytale, incorporate certain new story elements and aspects, and then perform your new version in front of the entire boarding community. Performances are judged by a panel (this year including yours truly), which selects an overall winner. Each year, the winning dorm is presented with the VIRC Stick, a talisman (conceived of and fashioned by Andrew Murdock ’08) that stands for Voice, Integrity, Respect, and Community, all key components of CSW’s boarding program.

This year’s Fractured Fairytales introduced us to updated versions of Hansel and Gretel, 101 Dalmatians (not really), Jack and the Beanstalk and Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. A few interesting required incorporations were: “R-E-S-P-E-C-T, find out what it means to me;” one character who is not human; a dance and song in which all members of the dorm participate; and last but not least “what you think Jane Moulding will be doing after she retires from CSW.” As you might imagine, it was all quite a riot!

Watching these performances is one of my favorite, quintessential CSW experiences each year—and I have never been a judge before, so being part of that difficult process added an element! Our four productions this year were all strong. The Barn added 101 corgis to their tale; Trapelo added an organic farmer (this head of school) into the Jack and the Beanstalk tale; Aleph had fun representing dorm parent Patrick hunting a turkey and used Tide pods instead of crumbs in the classic Hansel and Gretel scene; and the “Hi Ho, Hi Ho” dance scene in Warren’s skit was brilliant.

After a grueling discussion, with such very high standards to judge, my fellow judges and I (Assistant Head of School Julie Johnstone and Dean of Student Life Aaron Hirsch), chose the Barn to receive the VIRC stick, which will hang proudly on their common room wall. As an added bonus, my corgi Merry and I visited the girls after the performance when everyone was back in the dorm so she could thank them for their stellar depiction of corgis!

It was an evening, and a weekend, that won’t soon be forgotten. Congratulations to all of our campus residents on an outstanding few days!

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CSW—a gender-inclusive day and boarding school for grades 9-12—is a national leader in progressive education. We live out our values of inquiry-based learning, student agency, and embracing diverse perspectives in every aspect of our student experience. Young people come to CSW to learn how to learn and then put what they learn into action—essential skills they carry into their futures as doers, makers, innovators, leaders, and exceptional humans who do meaningful work in the world.