Finding Courage

A Letter from Our Head of School

Dear WSP Community, This week, we were faced with challenges and deep sadness and distress due to the mass shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee on Monday and then the series of hoax phone calls on Wednesday that caused numerous schools in local and state districts to go unnecessarily into lockdown. All of this just takes one’s breath away. In times like these, we are grounded in our emergency operations and safety plans that have been developed over years and are practiced and reviewed annually. We stay steady in the community relationships we have developed including that with the police department who has always been very responsive. Yet we continue to hold questions without all of the answers and do the best we can everyday. How can one have courage in times like these? I am reminded of a quote by Nelson Mandela, “Courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it.”

This week, I noticed this daffodil (pictured above) blooming. It was planted by one of our early childhood children in the fall as part of our Michaelmas celebration. This was also the day when children wore golden capes lovingly made by parent volunteers. These golden capes were to give the children courage, so that they could work on the earth to help all growing and living things. Our community has demonstrated that we have courageous hearts by meeting challenges over and over again throughout our history. I trust we will continue on this journey together as we continue strengthening ourselves and our community. I encourage you to reach out to one another—to both people you know well and to those you have not yet had the chance to get to know. What if you engaged in a conversation about courage? What does courage mean to you? What inspires courage in you? Who has cultivated courage in your life?

With growing courage, Kirsten Christopherson-Clark Head of School