The Path Ahead:
A. Establish and/or strengthen multiple pathways to advanced work for students in all academic disciplines culminating in real-world problem solving and contributions to academic discourse and scholarship.
1. Draw on successful models already in place, especially in sciences.
2. Continue to develop partnership with Turtle Conservancy and others.
3. Diversify offerings and opportunities for advanced study in humanities.
B. Reimagine the Senior Exhibitions Program to better integrate with Thacher’s vision for teaching and learning, making it more connected to the four-year academic program, rooted in authentic inquiry, solutionoriented, and flexible as to format and outcomes.
C. Equip students to leverage new technologies to deepen and accelerate learning in healthy, ethical, and innovative ways, developing skills and expertise to excel in college and in the workplace.
D. Create intensive, weeklong, mixed-grade experiential learning opportunities focused on real-world problem solving.
E. Inspire and reward faculty members with an expanded program of summer innovation grants to design and pilot new student learning experiences.
F. Ensure exceptional academic spaces and facilities to support a larger student body.
THE CALL TO ACTION:
The past five years have been rife with dynamic and creative curricular and pedagogical innovation at Thacher, offering a roadmap for continued growth and opportunity. At the same time, the imperative to further distinguish our academic program by making the learning process more personalized, human, interesting, and relevant against the backdrop of generative artificial intelligence is one which will require increasing our scale and empowering the talented educators and students in our community.
TOGETHER, WE COMMIT TO:
UNLEASH EDUCATOR CREATIVITY AND STUDENT AGENCY
THE OPPORTUNITY:
Catalyzed by the opening of the GATES building, our academic program has grown more dynamic, creative, and relevant in the post-AP era. The primary factor constraining further innovation in our academic programming is not the imagination and capacity of our teachers, nor is it the appetite and ability of our students. Rather, it is largely a matter of scope and scale. Expanding our student population and making further investments in innovation within and across departments will allow us to capitalize on that momentum and further define the distinctiveness of our academic program.
As we look to the next phase in the evolution of our academic program, we draw on proven models that have helped to transform teaching and learning at Thacher. We know that providing students with real choice and agency stimulates their curiosity and leads to richer and deeper engagement. We know the value of learning that transcends a single discipline or the confines of a classroom’s four walls. As our academic program continues to evolve, we will prioritize efforts whose impacts extend beyond the classroom, by contributing to academic discourse, by solving real-world problems, and by collaborating with partners outside of our gates.
