Solebury School

Solebury is a college preparatory school that develops students' capabilities by encouraging them to push themselves academically and to recognize that the easiest path is not always the best. Our philosophy and curriculum are geared toward helping the student become a successful academic achiever and a critically aware citizen of the world. Toward that end, our classes are small; we average 11, so students are able to participate meaningfully in discussions and work closely with their teachers, who have regularly scheduled conference periods three days per week and routinely offer additional support at other times. In addition, Solebury adopts an academic theme each year as the cornerstone of our whole academic program: we create courses, assemblies, evening lectures, student groups, etc. all around this one general concept. This year, we have again chosen "War" as our theme for several reasons. First, as we found two years ago with Environment, a second year on the same concept allows school-wide conversations to gain momentum and time for students and teachers to investigate issues from a multitude of perspectives. Second, as the country continues its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, all citizens have a responsibility to think about the costs, benefits, and rationale behind these or any war. Third, war is a particularly powerful vehicle to discuss the individual and society. In a time of war, what are the rights, obligations, and duties of both citizens and state? By design, we have not limited the definition of the theme for the school and certainly implicit in War are the concepts of peace, rapprochement, negotiation, etc. Our goal is for the academic departments and even individual teachers to shape the theme to suit their coursework (and vice versa) and challenge their students' patterns of thinking. In addition to the topical issues that will be relatively specific to each course, we hope that general themes will emerge. To facilitate that process, we selected Khaled Hosseini's The Kite Runner (for Upper School) and Anne Frank: the Diary of a Young Girl (for Middle School) as our summer reading. Beyond our classes, we also integrate the theme into our assemblies, and develop inter-class and school-wide projects. A discussion of any school would be incomplete without a few words on its faculty. Solebury has teachers who have been here virtually their entire careers and others who arrived recently. Whereas some schools recruit teachers from only one mold, ours have been drawn here for many of the same reasons as our students: they prize the opportunity for individual expression and value the creativity that results. What they have in common, however, is a commitment to continuing education, both their own and their students.