Head’s Message

State of the School Night 2011 – September 20 and 21, 2011
Speech by Joel Pelcyger, Head of School

On the first day when Ellie and I started PS#1, back in 1971, John Lennon’s Imagine album was released. I could not have imagined forty years ago that I would be here standing on this stage looking out at you as Head of this amazing institution, raising children with you every day, and on the threshold of building our Dream campus. Thank you.

How do I feel about starting and running PS#1 for the past forty years? How can I feel anything but great when on the very first day of school two weeks ago – after a long summer of work spent trying to get everything ready so that when everyone of you came back, it would all seem effortless – I received an email from a parent that read:

“Her Last First Day
Today was my daughter’s last First Day of School at PS#1. I cried. I’ve cried every year on the first day. I’ve cried because I couldn’t believe that my daughter was old enough to start Kindergarten. Then I cried (two years later) because her baby brother was old enough to go to school with her.

I also cry because this year, like the six years prior, the kids press at the gate, clamoring for the bell to ring in a new year. You can feel the excitement as they await the countdown. Bubbles everywhere, teachers and staff greeting and cheering. Fun and festivity await… at school! The kids can’t wait to get in. They RUN to their classrooms to start school. They WANT to be here. It’s beautiful and it makes me cry.

This year was really no different. Despite some physical changes, the excitement was still the same. The bubbles, the running, the joy. And once again I cried. But this year I also cried because my daughter is a “grad.” Today was the last time she will run with excitement to her class at PS#1 on the first day. It has been an incredible journey of fun, festivity and learning.”

I get to welcome back every year… every month actually… countless graduates and their parents who return and reminisce about what they say were the best days and years of their lives. I see confident, competent, and connected young people on our campus every day. How can I not feel great?

Last year, in my State of the School speech, we showed you pictures of, and described, our Dream campus. Tonight I speak to the realization of the Dream. How did that happen? Because we have families so grateful for what PS#1 has done for their family they want to give back to help all of the children and families who will be passing through our doors for generations to come. They tell us through their contributions that they know that the present and the past build the future. It is a $ 6 million project – we have raised $ 3.4 million to date. Raising the full amount for what we are building is within reach. We will be contacting all of you during the coming year to help us get over the top.

We own our seven prime Santa Monica lots with virtually no debt. In addition, all of the buildings on our campus are debt free. I hope to be able to say that AGAIN a year from now when I stand in front of you giving my 2012 State of the School Address – that all of our buildings are debt free. If we all pitch in to the best of our ability, I know we will get there.

We added our full complement of students a year ago when the now hollowed out structure – the Buffalo Building – housed the temporary ninth classroom. On March 17th of this year, we started constructing our permanent Ninth classroom. We told you it would be done when school started in September, and it was.

And now, only yesterday, the new foundation was poured for all of our new buildings which will be completed before this school year is out. Many of you have remarked how seamlessly we have staged this transition even though we don’t have use of any of the frontage on Broadway that will, by next year at this time, add 8500 square feet of building to our campus. Our faculty and staff have worked extraordinarily hard to make sure that this year of change brings more opportunity than loss.

Next year, we’ll have a new multi-purpose activity center, new offices, a new community room, and a new music room. Our school has been built the way an elementary school should be built, matching our architectural program with our school philosophy… one step at a time. To best support our philosophy, the building environment is consciously planned (some say within an inch of its life, but that’s just who I am). We’ll be moving the current art and music rooms so we won’t be crossing the street anymore and those programs and pursuits will always be easily accessible. And our new Library will be at the center of our campus where it belongs.

I have always been conscious of the need for young children to be in an environment that was knowable, comprehensible, and comfortable to them. So we build our school facilities with these guiding principles in mind. When we complete our campus, it will certainly be the newest but it will intentionally not be the most flashy or extravagant school. The word ‘unpretentious’ was actually in our school’s Mission Statement for many years. We sing ‘Tis A Gift To Be Simple’ together as a whole school community at every Thanksgiving Circle to emphasize this point. Keep it simple, clean, purposeful, deliberate… and also magical and inviting. We develop a campus on a scale that is comprehensible to young children.

Schools are so much more than buildings. In everything we do, systems are established and revised so they can evolve over time. Teachers are hired – and they stay at our school for a long time adding a stabilizing force to everything we do through their daily practice. Parents join our community – and now grandparents also through the creation four years ago of our Memoir Club – and become our partners, and we their partner, and they make this school their own. The community feeling is palpable – children happily charging to their classrooms on the first day of school doesn’t happen by accident. It is a true expression of how so many of us feel on our campus every day. It happens because there is a marriage between our physical environment and school philosophy.

Our philosophy of education consists of four key elements: the inherent value of each child; the realization of the partnership between schools and families in raising children together; the three core values of confidence, competence, and connection; and, fourth, developing and fostering a child’s responsible voice.

You will hear more about our curriculum and our program and the knowledge your children gain from our inspired and dedicated teachers after my talk tonight in your child’s classroom.

When we talk about pluralism – the ‘P’ in PS#1 – we are referring to respecting, recognizing, and building upon a child’s passions, interests, talents, personal expressions, and uniqueness. Value a child for who they are and for what they bring to their everyday life experience inside and outside the classroom and you then get to work with a motivated, engaged, confident being strong in themselves, open to knowing others, and ready to take on new challenges. That’s what made me start saying years ago: “It’s not how smart you are; it’s how you are smart.”

We want every child to know every other child. That’s why when you received your child’s class placement from us a month ago, you would have seen that, after Youngers, every classroom is composed of students who were in four different classes the year before. A year from now, that will happen again – you keep your old friends and you make new ones. When a child’s placement within their new peer group changes from year to year, they subconsciously reinvent themselves and branch out in new and different directions. This is exactly what we want.

Childhood is a period of discovery and rediscovery. When they skip a year being with their best friend in class (even though they are still in the same small school setting so they can remain close friends), children build character as well as new friendships. This is how we build community at PS#1 – it doesn’t happen by accident.

We have two teachers in every classroom who model collaboration. Our teachers challenge themselves and each other and participate in professional development and thereby model lifelong learning. We have consciously chosen to be an urban school in the heart of a residential neighborhood within a megalopolis to help our students feel comfortable wherever they are. We travel to nearby factories, businesses, theatres, museums, and parks and show through direct experience the richness and interconnectedness of the world around us.

PS#1 celebrates its Fortieth Anniversary this year. Please save Sunday, May 20th on your calendar to join us and people from every single year in the school’s history for a very special celebration. When you enrolled at PS#1, you joined a small school with a rich past thereby enhancing your own experience. We are all connected – think about it – there’s something special knowing that anyone you meet who has ever had anything to do with PS#1 was attracted to the school because they shared similar values and beliefs and attitudes about children and learning as you do. (You can even share the same jokes about me – some things never change!) Read the first PS#1 brochure from 1971 – and read what is written now. We may put the em-PHA-sis on a different syl-LAB-le now and then but, we knew then what was important for children and families to thrive, and we still do.

Back to the beginning of my talk – and thinking about the words to the song Imagine.

You may say that I’m a dreamer
But I’m not the only one
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be as one

My dream is about pluralism. Living together – working together – growing together – learning together. We don’t lose who we are or what makes us different from each other. Vive la difference! (We celebrate our individuality at Moving Up Day and each child’s personalized PS#1 Graduation.) Think about it for a moment. The richness and uniqueness of our lives can best be realized when there is an element within each and every one of us where we take the road less traveled – it’s our own piece of genius.

Respect that element – don’t try to make us all the same – and, at the same time, make sure you create an environment that allows us to hear each other and work together for the ideas, vision, and goals we have in common. I am talking here about PS#1’s philosophy of pluralism – and also about the founding principles of our nation. The words inscribed on every American coin are E Pluribus Unum – it means “Out of Many One.” Don’t make the “many” all the same – retain our uniqueness – and build one nation, one school, one community. We live the principles upon which our nation was founded, and we raise our children together at PS#1 in that spirit.

Out of Many Unique People Valued and Cherished for their Differences We Make One School Community. That is the PS#1 Way.