Our winter sports program is moving ahead full throttle, with our varsity basketball players having recently won their holiday tournament. We have the EPA Family Dance Party, the Upper School Musical Urinetown, field trips, and service projects all to look forward to. And all of this on top of the truly engaging learning and growth that is happening every day in our classrooms. As always, it’s a great time to be at Ellis.

One of the real hallmarks of Ellis is our commitment to being a truly inclusive and welcoming school. We know this benefits our students’ growth, as they learn in the company of classmates who bring different life experiences and perspectives, and as they build all the skills that will prepare them to work effectively and collaboratively in the ever-broadening workplace they will enter as young adults. We also know it is not enough for us to be a diverse community—we need to be a truly inclusive one in which each student and family feels known, welcome, and appreciated.

We’re proud of the steps we’ve taken as a community to reach these goals: we’ve strengthened our professional development programming for faculty and staff around diversity, equity, and inclusion; we’ve supported the creation of student and family affinity groups to provide members of our school community opportunities to come together around shared identities; we’ve enhanced our programming for students to increase their understanding and skills in working across—and appreciating—differences. And we’ve recently launched a Board Committee on Diversity and Inclusion that will focus on the ways our Trustees can support and further our work in this area.  

We know there is more work for us to do. We know we need to keep learning and listening to our students and families as they share their experiences of the school with us. This is important work, and great work for us to be doing together, in community.