News Detail
2021-2025 Strategic Plan Update: Making our Strong Academic Program Stronger
In January, we shared that the Upper Schools continue the work of maturing their 'coordinate' programming as part of the first strand of our 2021-2025 Strategic Plan: "Making our Strong Academic Program Stronger." As the year progresses, we wanted to share the ways in which this effort has begun to take shape and the ways in which it continues to develop and mature.
- As the benefits of curricular alignment continue to reveal themselves, the Upper School faculty has increasingly and intentionally become a single faculty. This progression has reduced the number of “preps” carried by individual teachers while simultaneously ensuring curricular consistency across departments and grade levels.
- Hand-in-hand with having one faculty, space has become intentionally more fluid, with students in both divisions taking classes in the main building and the New Academic Building. At the same time, the School remains committed to maintaining single-division lounges for both USG and USB students.
- Travel and extra-curricular experiences continue providing space for both coordinate and single-division opportunities: the USG Grade 10 retreat just before Spring Break continued a wonderful long-standing tradition of team building, and the USB Grade 10 will leave on their annual Rock trip retreat on April 19. Simultaneously, (s)Electives have begun re-exploring the community beyond Tacoma with coordinate trips to New York, Portland, San Francisco, and others.
- As we begin planning for year-end events, we also recognize two important moments: Graduation, as a culmination of divisional academic experiences, will remain divisional with USG and USB ceremonies occurring separately, like last year. May Day, however, as a historical celebration of the Senior class, will be a coordinate event. We look forward to what will surely be a series of joyful and festive days celebrating the Red Tie Class of 2022!
