circle back - september 8

san francisco friends school * 250 valencia street, san francisco, ca 94103 * 415.565.0400 * sffriendsschool.org

CIRCLE BACKSeptember 8, 2011

September6-16 Lower School Potlucks

9 Arts@SFFS Gallery Opening (3:30-4:30p)

13 SFFS Board Meeting (6:30p)

14 Annual Fund Volunteer Training (6:00p)

18-23 Yosemite Trip (8th Grade)

21 Back-to-School Night - Lower School (6:15 - 8:45p)

27 Back-to-School Night - Middle School (6:15 - 8:45p)

October4 Building Friends Campaign Kick-Off (6:00-9:30p)

5 Community Worship (8:40-9:15a)

5 Parents Association Meeting (6:00-7:00p)

The Peace Testimony

My 359-Month-Old

Easing The Transition

The First Six Weeks

Curious about sibling admissions?

See page 6

San Francisco Friends SchoolSeptember 8, 2011

Stuffed Animals for Visual Arts ProjectDonate your old stuffed animals to our school art project. Drop items in art room.

Caren Andrews and Jen [email protected] [email protected]

Back-to-School NightsCome back to school on Septem-ber 21 (LS) & 27 (MS), 6:15-8:45p. The evening starts with a reception in the unfinished 3rd floor space (hearty refreshments and music). Presentations and classroom visits to follow.

Details:September 21 (LS), 6:15p - 8:45pSeptember 27 (MS), 6:15p - 8:45pJennifer Arnest (LS) [email protected] Salverda (MS) [email protected]

Gallery Opening This FridayWe are proud to announce the sec-ond year of the Arts@SFFS gallery space. The purpose of the gallery is to engage our school with a wide variety of artwork by adults in our community as well as by artists in the Bay Area. Each month we show a new artist or group of artists. There is an “opening” where the artist/s invite students, staff, and families to interact, ask questions, and make art with them. 15% of all sales go to the SFFS Scholarship Fund. The SFFS arts gallery is locat-ed on the second floor of the school where you exit from the elevator.

Our gallery space kicks off the new school year with the works of a local photographer, Allison Tungseth. Al-lison’s work is about looking closer and seeing things in a new way. For this show she will be sharing works that focus on “place” and “home”. Tungseth uses her craft to open up private worlds and visions that allow the viewer to make connections to the experiences and lives of oth-ers. The opening for this show is on Friday, September 9th, 3:30-4:30. Come meet Allison, see her work, and make some art!

Opening: September 9, 3:30-4:30p

Contact:Jen Stuart, [email protected]

Join the Diversity Steering CommitteeParents: please join this school com-mittee to discuss how to deepen the diversity of our school community and our understanding of the value of diversity. Meetings are on the 2nd Wednesday of each month, 5:00-6:00p.

Next meeting:September 14, 5:00 - 6:00pRoom 225 (Diali’s room)Guybe Slangen & Diali [email protected] [email protected]

Francis of Assisi Rummage SaleThe Francis of Assissi Senior Commu-nity is holding their annual rummage sale.

Details:September 24145 Guerrero StreetGinny [email protected]

PARKing DayThe 6th grade will be creating our own “parklette” in front of our school as part of global PARKing Day, an event that “invites people to rethink the way streets are used.” We will be one of over 800 parks in over 30countries that day!

Details:September 16Jen [email protected]

Photograph by Alison Tungseth


A “testimony” is a central value in the Quaker faith.

There are six Quaker testimonies:

Simplicity, Peace, Integrity, Community, Equality, Stewardship

As a Friends school, we are committed to letting these Quaker testimonies guide our educational program and community.

•What is peace?•Where do I see examples of

peace in our community?•How do I find peace within

myself?

We hope that you, too, will en-gage this year in listening to the wisdom of both the “small voice within” and the gathered commu-nity in your life’s work of living the peace testimony.

-- Gwen Rino, Academic Dean

The Peace TestimonyEach year, our school community undertakes a year-long exploration of one of the Quaker testimonies, those simple and profound calls to live in accordance with the understanding that there is that of God in every person. This year we are probing the peace testimony, which challenges us not only to oppose war and violence, but also to work to eliminate the conditions that lead to them. As teachers in a Friends school, one way that we do that work is to teach and practice the skills that help children and adults solve problems peacefully.

As a faculty, we began this year’s exploration of peacemaking and healthy conflict with a visit from “the Quaker Ladies,” Lynn Brick and Priscilla Taylor-Williams of the Moorestown Friends School religion de-partment. In a beautiful worship share under an enormous fig tree during our faculty retreat, we reflected on our experiences of peace and conflict in our school careers. The teachers’ thoughtful comments underscored the way that the testimony challenges us on all levels: internally, inter-personally, in our communities, and as world citizens.

We focused especially on practices within our school for helping children manage conflict in peaceful ways, such as the peace tables in the Kin-dergarten and first grade classrooms, and the class meetings and Meet-ings for Business that help children of all ages work together to resolve difficult problems. Teachers were especially reflective about the role of listening when “waging peace,” because the experience of feeling heard is so crucial to the process of finding a mutually respectful way forward.

Now that school has begun, teachers are introducing the students to three queries about the peace testimony that were developed by the Quaker Life Committee. These queries, which will serve as touchstones for our work together all year, are:

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I have a bench at my local Peet’s, and a favorite end of the bench, along with a well-rehearsed grouchy look, which allows me to eavesdrop, read the Sunday Times, and reliably prevent any idle chatter with hyper-caf-feinated Oaklanders.

Recently, my bench mates were two young moms, using the broadcast-volume voices preferred by mothers who are eager to share their uncom-plicated feelings about television, Barbies, and Cheetos with the general public. They were chirpy and anxious, yoga’d and manicured, and laden with enough supplies for a three-month trek to Bhutan. Between them were the two little ones on the receiving end of this parenting expertise - a 12-week-old and a 14-month old. I eavesdropped grouchily. These two moms made me feel old. Really old.

I am the parent of a 359-month-old and a 323-month-old. They were born back in the 1900’s, when coffee came in cans labeled Chock Full ‘O Nuts, and the five channels of television were warmly regarded as trusty family members who tended your children. There were no yoga mats or cell phones; in fact, we’d just “upgraded” from a rotary dial to a trendy touch-tone. Back in the 1900’s, vast stretches of time went by when kids were not only unsupervised, but completely without stimulating educa-tional toys. Once we got a VCR, our kids watched the same cartoons over and over and over and over again. It was simpler back then. We had noth-ing against oxidants, and most of our radicals were still imprisoned.

I didn’t interrupt the flow of wisdom from the young moms, but really, as the mother of 359- and 323-month-olds I wanted to tell them that we’d learned a lot more from our kids than they’d learned from us. And we’re still learning, even as our “big boy” nears his 30th birthday.

In the beginning we learned about our own capacity for love, about our stamina, and about how to take an infant on a long road trip. Neither strict nor permissive, we just waffled around in the middle, depending upon how much sleep we’d gotten the night before. We thought that everything wonderful that our first kid did or said was the result of our stellar parenting skills. We started on the nurture side of the debate, and, with our second kid, did a philosophical 180. We saw, with humility, that kids seem to arrive on terra firma hell-bent to be themselves. So we did our best to get out of the way.

Mark Twain wrote, “When I was a boy of 14 my father was so ignorant I could barely stand to have the old man around. But when I got to be 21, I was astonished by how much he’d learned in seven years.” I think our 359- and 323-month-olds would say that their parents learned an “aston-ishing” amount too. They’d have a couple good yarns to spin about the times we got wrapped around the parenting axle, and about our wanton use of “grounding” in those memorable teen years. But overall, I think they’d characterize our parenting foibles as a reliable source of a good laugh.

Something like, “love deeply, trust

who they are”

My bench-mate moms made me wonder if there isn’t a seven-word guide for childrearing, the equiva-lent of Michael Pollan’s rules for eating: “eat food, not too much, mostly plants.” Something like, “love deeply, trust who they are.”

Forget all the busy-ness and worrying, and just take in the beauty of your children; their sweet hands in yours, their fur-rowed concentration as you read to them, their joyous play in the park. And cross your fingers; next thing you know they’ll be 359 months old.

-- Cathy Hunter, Head of School

Ben, 10 months old

Ben, on left, 359 months old

On Having A 359-Month-Old


Easing the Transition with Abby Rovner As 7th and 8th graders prepare to make the leap to high school, there is a new face at Friends to help them along the way. Abby Rovner will be serving as our high school transition coordinator, oversee-ing the complex process of applying to high school. Abby comes to SFFS directly from the Mission-based “I Have A Dream” Foundation of San Francisco. Since its inception more than a decade ago, Abby served as its Executive Director. Abby taught Language Arts, Litera-ture, and English as a Second Language to middle school students at a Newcomer’s program in Redwood City, worked in the administration of a Redwood City charter school, and served as mentor and guide for Waking the Village, a nonprofit that brought eighteen at-risk and homeless youth on a cross-country bicycle trip across the country. Besides leading programs and supporting youth to reach their full potential, Abby loves yoga, baking, the outdoors, her dog, Izzy, and her family.

8th Grade Field TripSFFS 8th graders pose in front of a newly unveiled mural designed to raise awareness about undocumented

immigrant youth. The mural is painted on the wall of the San Francisco Meeting and American Friends Service

Committee building on 9th Street. While visiting the building, 8th graders attended a presentation by Pablo Pare-

des from the AFSC about the challenges these youth face everyday as they struggle to make a life in America.

Learn more about these youth at website67suenos.org.


Sibling Admissions ProcessIf your child has a sibling who will apply for kindergarten next year, the application process begins in mid-October. Packets will be mailed in mid-September. Here are the deadlines:

Application due: October 17, 2011

Teacher Recommendation due:

November 2, 2011

Child Visit: November 7, 2011

Admission Decisions: November 16, 2011

Families applying for tuition assistance follow the same procedure as other applicants, submitting financial statements to the SSS by February 1, 2012.

Please contact Yvette or Suzanne in the Admissions Office if you plan on applying for sibling admission.

[email protected], [email protected]

The First Six WeeksNo matter his or her preschool experience, the first six weeks of kindergarten are a whole new thing for our newest stu-dents. New routines, community expectations, caring for the classroom and for each other: we are all learning a lot about each other.

As the teachers in the room, we work hard to create a warm and safe climate for every timid or brave student. We learn each other’s names and how loud voices can be during writing workshops. We learn that mis-takes are OK and you won’t be laughed at for saying or doing the wrong thing. We are learn what to do when you finish an assignment early. We learn that a friendly “good morning” or “will you play with me?” is very much appreciated.

In these first six weeks, we talk about our goals, hopes, and dreams for the school year and we articulate a set of rules that will help each child achieve these aims. We create a predict-able, orderly classroom that reduces anxiety and fosters a supportive and collaborative atmosphere. The work is both exhilarating and exhausting but it is an investment that pays off all year long for all of us.

-- Shawn, Noah, Emma & Jane The Kindergarten Team

circle back - september 8

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