It’s a nice way to bring the whole community together and it’s different every day… there’s announcements and performances and sometimes a Chapel Talk, which can be someone from SPS or a visitor. Today’s speaker was a Fifth Former named Isabelle, who talked about using your time well at SPS and how you can control what you do with your time. It was great.
Ballet is one of the biggest things that brought me to St. Paul’s. It used to be that I had to drive an hour to ballet every day. Here, I have classes that are part of my academic day and the SPSBC, which is my afternoon activity. It’s so great to have both of those things already built into my day.”
LAUREN, FOURTH FORMER
French class
Bonjour! I’m in French 2 this year with Ms. Windsor. Last year was my first time taking French, and this year is definitely a step up. Later in the semester, we’ll have French café, which is a chance to share French culture with the rest of the community and share French pastries, French music… stuff like that. It’s fun!
Hum 4
I have Ms. Lamb for Humanities this term. She’s one of the teaching interns, and she’s super nice. Hum at St. Paul’s is discussion-based — we sit at a Harkness table, where everyone can see each other — and we don’t work from a textbook. We’re reading a novel, but Ms. Lamb ties it into American history and what’s happening in the world right now, which is pretty cool.
Ballet, and then more ballet
I spend at least a couple of hours every day on ballet. My B block classes are sometimes just a quick opportunity to focus on one aspect of technique, and then I’m off to my next class, and then I come back at 3 to spend the afternoon with the ballet company. I can’t say enough about how great the ballet program is here. We have amazing teachers, amazing visiting artists who do special choreography, and everyone who’s in the dance program is just so supportive of everyone else. Some nights we do “BC din” — all the members of the ballet company eating together. It’s kind of like a family.
Onyx meeting
I’m a member of Onyx, which is an affinity group for students who identify as Black, African American or of African heritage. I joined last year as a Third Former, and it was a really nice way to get to know other people with a similar background to me. Dr. Justinvil’s the faculty head. We just had our first meeting, and I think there’s about 30, maybe 35 of us this year.
8 p.m. Time to study
Most nights, I study in my dorm, which is in Brewster. I love being on the quad, because you’re close to everything — the Upper, the dance studio, Friedman. Our common room was just renovated last year, and now there’s also this study pod, which is a room dedicated to studying, with desks, a printer and couches. Sometimes my friends and I do our homework together there. My dorm is also a great place to just hang out with my friends. Some of my friends got a Monopoly set downtown the other day, and we ordered in food and then spent like two hours just playing Monopoly.