History

At a recent event for the Independent School Alliance, I heard one of our seniors give an uplifting speech, telling a crowd of more than 100 the story of her family’s educational journey. Reaching back several generations, she shared the arc of this history with eloquence and conviction by beautifully weaving her grandmother’s story with her own experience. The audience’s stillness reflected the solemnity of her words as we were invited into a world that few of us have experienced. Talks like hers have a way of getting into my soul — nestling among the other stories that remind me to be grateful, humble, and hopeful.

While I did not get to listen to everyone's history last week during Grandparents and Special Friends Day, I did hear a few. What struck me over and over again was how much they wanted to share their stories and bind them firmly to their grandchildren’s experience. For some, the generational legacy at Poly was integral to their family narrative and ours — gratitude is a two-way street. Others were awed by how the physical campus and the opportunities our students have here dwarfed anything that they experienced growing up. Their sense of wonder was almost as thrilling as seeing what our students have done with the resources available to them. After our all-school assembly wrapped up and we spilled onto Babcock Field, several grandparents and a few special friends shared with me how moved they were by our community — its diversity, its talent, its kindness, and its joy.

As our senior, the granddaughter of a migrant worker, closed her remarks, she described herself as her grandmother’s “wildest dream” now poised to graduate from Poly and to head to college. It is a gift and an awesome responsibility to know that your life is a dream fulfilled, a story that binds you to the generations that preceded you and inspires the ones that will follow. As a community, we have a similar responsibility to hold sacred what our forebearers imagined while staying true to who we are and what we have become.

JWB