As I See It
Dear Alumni,
I’ve been a teacher long enough to know that a hallway to a boy is an invitation to run. The difference this year is there are more speeders than usual, particularly among the younger boys. They travel solo or in twos or threes, sometimes skipping or loping as boys can do or sometimes moving at too fast a clip. Speeding is against the law, and I’ve handed out "all-the-way-back-and-walk” corrections and in several cases threatened speeding tickets and even suspension of licenses. These encounters with the younger boys are one of the pleasures of being back in the schoolhouse, encounters which make me wonder if the shut-in nature of COVID might not account for the boys running in greater numbers.
Coming-of-age seventh-grade boys have always needed to bang up against one another, but this year’s tussling among the boys in my history classes seems to have increased and is more pronounced. Too often I find myself reminding them of the social distancing rules. Is the increased speeding and bro-hugging a reaction to the restrictions of COVID? I am not sure. Educational researchers are looking into this subject, and, as yet, the effects of the pandemic are not fully understood, but this is what I am seeing in the corridors and the classrooms of the School. And their ebullience—the excess of it—makes sense to me, and I kind of like it.
All best,
D. Kersey
