Taken from Tom Gibian's remarks at the Sandy Spring Friends School End of Year All-School Assembly

Remarks made by Head of School Tom Gibian to the participants of the 2015 EastEd Middle School Diversity Conference, which has been hosted by Sandy Spring Friends School for the past four years. See photos from the event online...

I have been thinking about Michael Brown: his shooting; the investigation; the grand jury; the reaction of the Ferguson community to his death. We have learned much. We have learned that things are more complicated than they first appear, that there are two sides to every tragedy, that we may never have all of the answers. But this does not prevent us from certain realizations as, over the past few weeks, place names have taken on new meanings. Ferguson, Cleveland, and Staten Island have become bound together and together symbolize a lack of fairness, a lack of respect, a lack of care. Specifically, there has been a pattern of excessive force applied disproportionately against people of color. This result has had a devastating effect on trust between those charged with the keeping of the peace and the citizens of a country founded on the concept that all people are created equal.

I remember watching Easy Rider (two hippie bikers set out to discover "the real America") when it debuted in 1969. Pretty racy stuff back in the day and, not surprisingly, full of action and drama. I had gone to the movies with some friends, and we talked about it on our way out. Bill’s comment was that he liked the scene where Dennis Hopper and Peter Fonda pushed their motorcycles (they had broken down) past an old guy who was shoeing a horse. He liked the irony. I think that may have been the first time I had heard the word “irony” used in a way that caused me to light up. I felt like Bill had understood something unspoken about the movie, about art.

Adapted from Tom Gibian’s November 2014 report to Sandy Spring Monthly Meeting

Adapted from an email message from Tom Gibian, sent to all faculty/staff before a called Meeting for Business to continue discussions begun during our Professional Development Day. Marilyn Gilmore and Jen Cort led the diversity training workshops for all SSFS faculty/staff on Oct. 20, 2o14. You can find out more about the diversity training online: http://www.ssfs.org/about/diversity/index.aspx

The following post was adapted from SSFS Head of School Tom Gibian's remarks at the beginning-of-the-year all-school assembly on Sept. 23, 2014:

One of the great pleasures of parenthood is how the things our kids go through remind us of our own early lives, early mistakes and, occasional, early triumphs.

We spend a lot of time thinking about happiness. We prepare, we scheme, we sacrifice so that we can be happy. In America, in 2014, we expect happiness; we can taste it, it is our due.