From Building Blocks to Steel Beams

Director Phil Kassen and Lower School Students tour 42 Charlton Street

Dear Families,

I have spent a fair amount of time over the past few days sharing the new construction our Charlton Street campus with a variety of members of the LREI community. As you have heard, over the summer we completely renovated the high school’s lobby and one of our science labs, as well as beginning work on the creation of new and renovated spaces in the adjacent townhouse. These spaces include generous basement rooms excavated from what was the townhouse’s rear yard in addition to a restored parlor, circa 1840, that will house our College Guidance Office. It is exciting to watch the construction crews at work and to imagine what this new space will add to the high school program once completed and occupied.

I visited the construction site today with a group of four and five year olds, decked out in shiny LREI hard hats. They asked many thoughtful questions as we watched the sparks fly from where a new stairway was being welded and while looking at the new elevator being assembled out of a room full of parts. It was exciting to hear  these young students make curricular connections, noticing that the steel beams holding up the back of the townhouse were similar to the long blocks they use in their classroom constructions, for example. It was fascinating to stand there having this basic discussion of engineering, knowing that just on the other side of the wall between the old and new spaces was a class of high school students studying topics in mathematics, the knowledge of which makes possible the type of construction their younger schoolmates were watching.

As I walked back to the Sixth Avenue building with these young learners I imagined them entering high school nine years from now. It was not hard to do. These students are learning to work together, to plan, to investigate and to integrate what they learn in school into their daily lives. We saw today how talented they are. They talked as a class about how they would travel to the construction site, about what they might see there, about who they would meet and how to operate appropriately during their visit. Their high school colleagues were involved in a similar exercise in their calculus class, thirty feet away. They were working together to hone problem-solving skills and subject area knowledge in order to better understand the world around them.

I look forward to watching our youngest students grow into their high school selves in ever improving facilities. More importantly, I look forward to watching them develop into ever more able learners and citizens.

Phil

P.S. I will be taking many other students on tours, including increasing numbers of high school students. If you are a parent who drops off on Sixth Avenue, keep an eye out. If you see me in the lobby sporting my red hard hat, it means that I am on my way to lead another tour. Grab a hat and come along!