Parent Bulletin
Phillips Academy Head of School Office
Rebecca Sykes, associate head of school
January 6, 2012
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New Year’s greetings! Students and faculty returned to
campus earlier this week and the winter term’s smooth beginning has been
enhanced by only short-lived frigid winter temperatures and a complete
absence of snow and ice. What a change from last year!
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Martin Luther King, Jr. Day 2012
One
of the highlights of the Academy’s celebration of Martin Luther King,
Jr. Day on January 16th will be an All School Meeting presentation by
Freeman Hrabowski, President of the University of Maryland, Baltimore
County. In 2011, Mr. Hrabowski was named one of seven Top American Leaders by Harvard’s Kennedy School and The Washington Post and he was recently featured on 60 Minutes.
Mr. Hrabowski has dedicated his life to educating America’s youth from
all backgrounds and has a strong message for our students about racial
conflict, justice and the importance of education born of his
experiences as a child leader during the Civil Rights Movement. I
encourage you to watch Mr. Hrabowski’s presentation when it is posted on
the Parent Portal (It will be available January 20th.)
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In Touch With…
Elisabeth Tully, Director of the OWHL library
Despite
the gloom and doom predictions for libraries that seem to dominate the
popular media, the Oliver Wendell Holmes Library (OWHL) is alive and
flourishing in the electronic age. That is partly because we realized
long ago that “it’s not about the stuff.” Rather, our core mission is
to educate your students to be efficient and effective users of
information in support of their academic needs and person interests.
To fulfill that mission in the 21st century we collect a rich array
of resources in all formats. While we continue to be committed to
offering an exemplary print collection, the percentage of our total
materials budget devoted to electronic resources has steadily inched
upward over the past decade. It has become difficult to answer the
question “How many books are in the library collection?”
In addition to our collection of more than 100,000 printed books we
offer electronic access to more than 60,000 full text reference and
academic titles and countless academic journal articles, newspapers, and
primary source materials. These resources are available with unlimited
simultaneous user access, 24/7. (Just in case your student does
homework after the OWHL has closed for the night.) The books may be
accessed using a computer or mobile device, and most may be organized,
annotated and cited using tools provided in the software. We have a
collection of ebook readers that students may borrow.
It’s a very exciting time to be a student researcher, and your kids
are capable of making excellent use of these extraordinary
resources—with a little help from the friendly information professionals
at the OWHL.
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Summer and Gap-Year Opportunities Fair on January 22
Students
and parents are invited to attend PA’s 22nd annual Summer Opportunities
Fair on Sunday, January 22. The event, which will be held in the Smith
Center from noon until 3 p.m., provides an opportunity to meet with
representatives from more than 90 local, national, and international
summer programs. This year’s fair will also provide an increased
emphasis on opportunities for a gap year, which is a year high school
graduates can use to pursue other experiences before going off to
college. A Gap-Year Information Session, featuring speaker Jane
Sarouhan, will be offered from noon to 12:30 p.m. More information »
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Upcoming Events
Sunday, January 8
Solar Winds Quintet, 3:00 p.m., Graves Hall
Free and open to the public. For more information, email music@andover.edu.
Sunday, January 15
Faculty Jazz Concert, 3:00 p.m., Graves Hall
Free and open to the public. For more information, email music@andover.edu.
Monday, January 16
Martin Luther King, Jr. Day
Friday, January 20 & Saturday, January 21
College Counseling Kick-Off Weekend for Parents of the Class of 2013 (see the Parent Portal for details).
Sunday, January 22
Summer Opportunities Fair, 12:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m., Smith Center. Free and open to the public.
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