Philosophy Philosophically, the faculty has worked on defining and codifying Park’s specific approach to progressive education, curriculum, and pedagogy. Several teachers attended national workshops and conferences in the summer and fall to test and hone Park’s way of teaching and learning. Program Programmatically, Lisa Conrad and her division heads have created a system to observe and evaluate classroom practice to ensure that it is aligned with the school’s philosophical principles that emphasize problem solving, critical thinking, and performing knowledge as the most authentic way to demonstrate knowledge acquisition. In addition, Park has increased its social-emotional and college counseling capacities; expanded its performing and visual arts programming; and increased its athletic offerings from first to twelfth grades. People The school has invested in its people, by creating professional development opportunities, designing a mentoring system for new faculty members, giving a series of historically high salary increases, and investing in a culture of support and well-being. Physical Plant The school has also invested heavily in its physical plant as evidenced by the new security doors and camera systems; the Stone Hall facelift; the design of a new Harlem Road sign; repairing the roofs in LLC; planting several lovely gardens; executing a systematic pruning of its acres of trees; and partnering with an industrial snow plowing and salting service among many other improvements. Pipeline Park’s funding pipeline has significantly increased beyond development and tuition dollars due to the tremendous growth of the school’s summer camp program. In addition, the Board has created a committee to study other ways the campus can be leveraged for ancillary revenue streams. Promotion And the school is strategically promoting its value proposition with the addition of a Director of Marketing who has revamped and redesigned the school’s website; created a targeted print and digital marketing campaign tied to a rigorous set of talking points and themes; and trained faculty and staff to utilize social media platforms to promote Park. We have also begun new partnerships, as we did with the Roycroft Winter Arts Festival, to get more and diverse sets of people on the campus. Nationally, Dr. Frome has given two papers at academic conferences on Park’s philosophical approach to teaching and learning. In just one year, Park is already seeing results from its strategy. Our enrollment has increased 10% since we implemented the plan. Overall giving to Park increased by 50% from the 2021/22 fiscal year to the 2022/23 fiscal year. Faculty attrition has decreased by 50% and student attrition has decreased 18%. Our seniors were admitted to more than 80 colleges and garnered more than $2.2 million dollars in merit based scholarships. The strategy is far from complete and we are not in the position to declare victory – yet. But we are well on the way to achieving this new state of equilibrium - sustaining the Park way for generations of students. 8
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