The Hill Academy Newsletter- February 28th, 2021

February 28th, 2021 HILL Message (from Academic Director Rick Kunc): This week was a special one at The Hill for a number of reasons. Our grade 8 students and our secondary school graduating students were having their grad photos taken. We were settling back into an athletic schedule where our student-athletes were getting opportunities to participate again. And in our Senior School classes, our students were given opportunities to connect their learning to “real life” issues and master some core competencies. The highlight for me was attending the Junior School Passion Project fair. These student-driven and created projects included topics such as tourism in Africa, birds, wakeboards, skis, hunting, fishing, women’s hockey, shoes, and so many other topics. As teachers, students and administrators asked students to explain their projects you could hear how proud they were of their work. Students said, “I loved coming to school on Wednesday”, “This was cool”, “I got to work on something that I love doing” and “School is usually boring, but this made it great”. Passion projects are so much fun for students because they break the regular routines that we fall into in schools. They allow for an independent adventure in learning. INDEPENDENCE is such an important aspect of the Hill ideals. These projects allowed students to work individually on something that interested them. It allowed them to demonstrate some independence in directing their work and explore how they might investigate a topic of interest. And we believe that this also helped them to understand the success that can be achieved through passion and engagement.

Quote of the Week: “Because of our routines, we forget that life is an ongoing adventure.” -Maya Angelou – American Poet and Civil Rights Activist ____________________________________________________________________________ Other Notes and Important Information: Parent Townhall Meeting On Tuesday, March 9th from 7:00–8:30 pm the Leadership Team from the Hill Academy will be hosting a Town Hall style meeting for our entire parent community. We will provide you with an overview of the Parent Survey and share some updated information in areas including Academics, Athletics, and Campus plan and operations. Rick Kunc, our Director of Academics will be moderating the meeting and we invite parents to engage in a few ways. First, we would like to invite you to send any questions that you may have in advance to the attached link. Please remember this is not the forum for questions about “my child” but rather broader questions and concerns that will impact large segments of our community. All questions are collected