by Head of Upper School, Dave Genger
One of my favorite scenes from the first Harry Potter movie involves the sorting hat that is used to decide to which house each student at Hogwarts will be assigned. Every year the hat sings a different song that weaves the history of the four Hogwart’s Houses and also portends the year’s events. In the first Harry Potter novel,
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, the Sorting Hat's song went like this
Oh you may not think me pretty,
But don't judge on what you see,
I'll eat myself if you can find
A smarter hat than me.
You can keep your bowlers black,
Your top hats sleek and tall,
For I'm the Hogwarts Sorting Hat
And I can cap them all.
There's nothing hidden in your head
The Sorting Hat can't see,
So try me on and I will tell you
Where you ought to be.
While we do not have a mystical sorting hat, we hope to capture some of the magic inherent in the House System at LFCDS. England, Australia and New Zealand have long employed the House System in their secondary schools. I visited several schools, most notably
Christ College in Christchurch, New Zealand, during my sabbatical several years ago and the experience left a lasting impression. Upon my return, I was very surprised to find out that many private schools in the U.S., such as Overlake School in Redmond, WA and Cranbrook School in Detroit, MI, had well-established House Systems, and I became keenly interested in starting one at LFCDS.
Sally Bullard, Michael Robinson, Bob Bullard and I worked in concert to create a vision for what the House System should look like at LFCDS. We decided that the primary objective of the House System would be to bring together the Upper and Lower School students as well as faculty and staff for organized fun that enhances each member's sense of belonging to our School community and builds tradition. Achieving this goal involves building connections and developing lasting relations among all students, faculty and staff from Preschool through eigth grade. Secondary objectives include:
- Creating a supportive, respectful, caring environment for all community members
- Giving students, faculty, staff and families a sense of identity and belonging
- Facilitating the integration of new students, faculty and staff into the School culture
- Creating a stronger sense of responsibility for the well-being of each member of the community
- Providing students with enjoyable leadership and mentoring opportunities in a setting outside the classroom
- Enhancing school spirit through friendly, fun House competition
Sally Bullard, Susan Murphy and I thoughtfully sorted all of the school families, faculty and staff into four houses based on the school’s name: Lake, Forest, Country and Day. Each house was assigned a color and a male and female house leader. The Lake House (blue) will be lead by Dave Genger and Susan Murphy; the Forest House (green) by Michael and Frances Robinson; the Country House (red) by Bob and Sally Bullard and the Day House (yellow) by Chris Nicoletta and Rich Massa. All students from the same family were placed in the same house and we made every attempt to balance the numbers and boy/girl ratio in each house.
We are excited to launch the LFCDS House System with two special events this year. The first will be a kick-off event right before spring break where we will announce the house rosters and the second will be a field day towards the end of the school year. We hope that the House System will evolve with input from students, faculty and parents so that it becomes part of the many traditions that make LFCDS so special.
