Blog

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, I don’t always think about the origin of that word “milestones”, but likely because I have been using that word frequently lately, I have been thinking about its history. The word originally (and sometimes still) referred to large stones that were placed on roads to help travelers find their way and mark their progress in ancient times. Of course, transportation was different then. People traveled in slower ways and without the many devices we have which tell us how fast or how far we have gone, how to get where we are going, and if there are any dangers ahead. When we are on familiar journeys, in addition to the mile markers and signs customary on our roads, we also have all the familiar sights to help us understand our progress. Given Parker’s educational philosophy and unique academic program, many of our milestones are similarly distinctive. We spend a lot of time helping students understand and prepare for their milestone moments. It starts as early as 7th grade when students go to see Senior Project Exhibitions and the gateways of friends moving into division 2—or even earlier when they complete oral presentation assignments (OPs) is class. It happens when we include the Juniors in the graduation ceremony, not only to acknowledge the transition from one class to another, but also so that they know what to expect at a Parker graduation. They hear different examples of student speeches, and we hope they can start to think about if they want to speak and what they might say at their own graduation. Milestones, whether literal or metaphoric, help us to understand and recognize where we are on our path and to think about the next bit of progress we want to make. That is as true of the Division 1 and 2 gateways that will start next week as it is for the Graduation of the Class of 2026 which we celebrated on Wednesday evening. I hope you have had and will have an opportunity to celebrate and witness some of these important milestones with us in these last few weeks of the school year. I would also invite you to join us in celebrating the last Parker milestone for our most recent graduates. Congratulations and best wishes to the Class of 2026! We are excited for you and so proud of what you have already accomplished. Wishing you a restful weekend, Bex

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, The last month of the school year brings a mix of emotions for all of us. We are excited, tired, and hopeful. We are busy preparing for Senior Exhibitions and Gateways, authentic demonstrations of learning that are both celebratory and stressful. We are so proud of all our students for whom this is a major milestone and capstone experience. We just set up the tent and staging for graduation, the final milestone on their Parker career. Congratulations to our Seniors and their friends, family and teachers who supported them. Graduation is a celebration for our whole community and an important moment to say thank you. This will be our 27 th Commencement exercises on Wednesday, June 3 rd . We will miss our Seniors as they head off to life after Parker. Thank you for making us proud. Many times across the school year, we have asked our students to represent Parker to the outside world. Whether welcoming prospective students and families, competing in athletics, robotics, math team or other co-curriculum competitions, speaking at conferences, or welcoming visitors – our students show the value of a Parker education. We are sad to say goodbye, but honored to share our graduates with the rest of the world! Later next week, we welcome everyone to join us for an end-of-year celebration. There will be live music, fundraiser raffle baskets, and good cheer for families and friends of Parker. Join us on Friday, June 5 th at 4:30 pm at Sterling Street on Devens. Please RSVP here so we know you’re coming. Thank you for celebrating our students!  Brian

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, This is a busy and exciting time of year—in schools generally, and certainly here at Parker. On Wednesday night alone, we hosted Noche Sabrosa, where our 8 th graders made and shared an important dish and spoke about their choice and why it was meaningful to them in Spanish, there was an art competition sponsored by Youth Venture and we capped off the evening with the final Café Wednesday of the year. Busy is not bad. There is a sense of excitement and momentum that can come with busy. It means we are still moving forward, that there is progress to make, that we can be productive. At the same time, there are events at this time of year that have us looking ahead to the future; we are planning celebrations for the end of this year and even looking ahead to the start of next. Seniors are in the final days of portfolio piece revisions, reflection writing, and making decisions about their graduation ceremony. On Tuesday afternoon, thanks to the help of the PPCC, incoming students and families to the Parker community joined us for ice cream and had an opportunity to make connections with each other and with current Parker students and families. Finding the ways to both be in the here-and-now and to stay focused on what we are doing, while also looking ahead to what’s next and getting excited to mark accomplishments with meaningful celebrations creates a dynamic tension in the busyness of this season of the school year. These weeks can be about dedication and hard work. They can be about joyful celebration and reflection. They can be everything in between. I hope you each can experience and appreciate the full blend of the “here-and-now” and “what’s next” in the weeks to come. Wishing you all a restful holiday weekend.  Bex

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, At last night’s Board meeting, I reflected on the many ways that Parker shares our model and learns from other schools and school leaders. Charter schools were designed to be laboratory schools, pockets of innovation from which others could learn. Every charter school writes a mission statement and does school a little bit differently, so new ideas may flourish. That certainly describes Parker, our Ten Common Principles, and the many ways that we put students at the center of all learning. Last year, Parker went through our sixth Charter Renewal, a process led by the Department of Education to ensure that charter schools are honoring their mission, ensuring student success, and sharing their learning. We did exceedingly well in our charter renewal. Of the many schools that went through the process at the same time, we were the most highly rated school in the state. One of the highlights was our personalized approach to learning and exemplary dissemination efforts. Over the course of the year, we have welcomed Fulbright teachers from twenty different countries and school leaders from the countries of Georgia and the Netherlands. We hosted aspiring teachers from Harvard College and educators from all around New England. We welcomed state representatives and state senators from our 40 towns, sharing our educational model and asking for their support. We presented at conferences and led workshops, focusing on student engagement, portfolio-based assessment, Senior Exhibitions and more. We showcase our students and their work at each of these sessions. We are typically the only school who attends conferences with our students, providing a platform for students to share their portfolios and reflect on their learning. Our students are always the highlight of the day! These are always rich learning experiences for us. As we reflect on our own struggles and success at Parker, and consider how other schools approach similar challenges, we are better able to meet the current needs of our students. Thanks to these efforts, we are never alone in the hard work of educating our students. Brian

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, I did a little internet digging into the etymology of the word appreciation, having been inspired by the Teacher Appreciation surrounding us at school this week. There’s the meaning I think of as somewhat economic—when something goes up in value—and there’s the meaning I think of as more emotional—when you feel gratitude and recognize the worth of someone or something. This week and every week I am deeply appreciative of the incredibly challenging, time-consuming, and critically important work our teachers do in and out of classrooms. Parker teachers put their time and energy into getting to know students well, supporting and challenging students to develop critical thinking skills and good habits of learning, communicating with families, and working with and supporting each other in their daily work and professional learning. While there might be questions about whether our society understands or appreciates the valuable work of teachers, I am grateful to work at a school where our community recognizes the incredible depth, complexity, and importance of what teachers do. As Brian mentioned last week, Senior Project exhibitions are underway now and these incredible projects and demonstrations of learning are just one beautiful representation of the incredibly powerful work our teachers do and how it supports the important work and learning our students do. Thank you to the PPCC for organizing and coordinating this year’s Teacher Appreciation Week activities. Thank you to all the students and family members who have volunteered their time, ideas, messages of appreciation, and other resources to that project. Thank you to all of the educators and teachers in our community—those of you who work at Parker and those of you who work in other schools. Thank you to our Senior Advisors, the class of 2026, and all the community members who have been Senior Project mentors and who are participating as jurors. I am deeply grateful for the dedication and commitment our teachers bring to their daily work and to our community for the appreciation and support you show our teachers regularly. With appreciation,  Bex

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, This is an exciting time of year for our Seniors and their team of supporters. Clearly none of our students do it alone. Thanks to their families, teachers, and friends who shaped the values and aspirations of our students – we share in their success. Tonight is a fitting way to kick off the next few weeks as we head up the street for Junior and Senior Prom. We look forward to seeing our students all decked out, celebrating and enjoying one another. Next Thursday, we host the first of four days of Senior Exhibitions, during which every senior shares their senior project in front of a juried panel. This final OP provides every student an opportunity to “demonstrate mastery and exhibit their expertise before family and community.” It serves as the culmination of six years of authentic engagement, hard work, and exhibitions of learning at Parker. This is also a moment of pride for the institution and our approach to learning. Last year, voters in the state of Massachusetts decided that MCAS would no longer serve as a graduation requirement. That prompted state leaders to engage in a year-long process of considering alternatives that could be used to determine a student’s knowledge, skills and dispositions for graduation. Two of the top three competency determinations come directly from our work - student portfolios and capstone projects. We have increasingly shared our approach and welcomed visitors from around the world who want to see our Senior Exhibitions. I was one of those visitors 15 years ago, my first exposure to Parker. What makes our approach unique is the school-wide commitment to academic rigor, personalization and public exhibition – for all students. We are thrilled to celebrate the success and growth of our students in this public way. It is a celebration for our whole school community!  Brian

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, Wishing you a wonderful spring break with those who you love! We hope the week off is restful and rejuvenating. We look forward to seeing everyone back at school on Monday, April 27, for a rigorous and celebratory end of the year at Parker. Have a great break! Bex

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, There is a classic cartoon that I have been thinking about quite a lot lately. The image has two different drawings under the heading “success.” The first image has a straight arrow moving up to the right at a 45 degree angle which is labeled “what people think it looks like.” The second image has an arrow that also moves up to the right that quickly turns from a straight line into a massive, messy tangle before straightening out for the last little bit. This image is labeled “what it really looks like.” I have a longstanding love-hate relationship with this image. Sometimes I look at it and find it a useful reminder that mistakes, wrong turns, and feeling like I might be going in circles is completely normal and to be expected. Sometimes I look at it and yearn for the clean, clear, simple straight line of accomplishing something as and when I planned. At this point in the school year, I often need the reminder of this image. As a student, this was when at least one of my teachers might realize we were “behind” and then speed through the remaining curriculum. This can also be the time of year when students wonder if they are making progress or when they become convinced they are not making progress. Either of these feelings can make it hard to sustain the energy and attention necessary to get out of the tangled mess. This can be a time when we are sitting in that tangle, on the way to some success, that we can’t quite see yet. It’s a time when we have to really focus, work hard to get through the complex challenges, and be willing to revise our original plans. No matter which image resonates with your current experience, I encourage you to remember that what we think about how things will go, and how they actually go, don’t always line up perfectly. I believe that if we pay attention to those points of discrepancy, that just might be where we can find our richest learning. Best wishes for a restful weekend. Bex

Dear Parker Students, Families and Staff, We are delighted to celebrate Parker students who were recognized for their outstanding performance at the 45th annual Elizabeth Haskins Mathematics Contest at Fitchburg State University. In the 90-minute competition, students answer 50 challenging math questions written or created by members of the Fitchburg State Mathematics Department faculty. This year, five students from Parker participated in the competition. The high scorers in each grade level were recognized in an awards ceremony at the competition. All five students from Parker were among the top scorers! Three Parker seniors earned Honorable Mention, placing in the top 15% of all scores: Chrys Olsen Dylan Stark Oliver Gillen Two of the three top scorers were Parker juniors. Andrew Roberdeau earned 3 rd place in the 11 th grade division, repeating his performance from last year, when he placed 3 rd in the 10 th grade division. Daniel Hendrickson won 1 st place in the 11 th grade division, earning the highest overall score out of all scores at the entire competition. We appreciate the leadership and coaching of Diane Kruse, MST Domain Leader, and Nathan Soule, MST Teacher. We are very proud of our students and the adults who help them thrive.  Have a great weekend. Brian