STARTING SMALL
THINKING BIG

Designing GVHS: A Prospective Student Gathering

Since we are interviewing families individually, the GVHS staff slowly has been able to picture the school one student at a time.  But prospective students have only been able to imagine Greenwich Village High School.  That was true until Saturday, January 10th.

In the late morning 45 students arrived at 30 Vandam Street.  They had RSVP’d for “Designing GVHS: An Interactive Discussion with the Architect.”  We had two goals for the morning.  First, we wanted to give students the chance to meet other “pioneers,” the term we’ve been using to describe the members of the founding class of Greenwich Village High School.  Community is central to our effort, so it was important that students have a chance to get to know one another a bit.  Our applicant pool is wonderfully diverse.  If the board of directors and mission of our school reflect “a commitment to diversity,” then our applicants embody it.  Prospective students hail from 38 public and independent schools and all five boroughs of New York plus New Jersey.  47% are students of color, 53% Caucasian.  All embrace the GVHS motto, “Work Hard.  Be Kind.  Take Risks.”

Our second goal for the event was to model some of the teaching methods we will use. We asked our architect and his team to give students a brief overview of a task: using a printed floorplate of 30 Vandam, how would they lay out the basic architectural program for GVHS: classrooms, lab, art studio, common areas?  Such a task, extended over days or weeks, might involve math in the form of geometry, history, science in the area of physics, even literature and world languages.  Those are the traditional components of any high school curriculum, and we often describe GVHS as “a traditional curriculum taught in innovative ways using the resources of New York.”  The innovation comes in the form of how we teach.  Giving students the opportunity to interact with professionals, discuss real challenges with them, and investigate solutions reinforces learning.  (Adults often learn that way, and high school students do, too.)  GVHS will balance the obvious need for students to learn to read and write well, tackle mathematical problems, understand and apply the scientific method, and appreciate global cultures.  But we’ll also take advantage of being in one of the world’s most vibrant, diverse, and engaging urban centers to bridge the classroom and city when and where it makes sense.  Saturday was an example of the right time and place.

Most gratifying to me as head of school was the fact that a group of students who had never met dove into a task with energy, humor, and excitement for two full hours.  As they presented their solutions to parents, friends, board members, and the staff, I knew that Greenwich Village High School would be the place of my dreams.  I hope to make it the place of those students’ dreams as well.

David Liebmann
Head of School

Hiring Superior Teachers

Founding faculty positions were posted on the GVHS website just after Thanksgiving, just as David Clarke and I had planned.  By posting positions now, we are many months ahead of the typical independent school hiring cycle.  In most private schools, hiring for teachers begins in February or March and can extend well into summer.  This has to do with the timing of student enrollment agreements, faculty contracts, and budgeting.  Suffice it to say that GVHS is well ahead of this cycle.  That means we have our pick of the best teachers out there.

When The New York Times carried the story about our founding in September, we were flooded with resumes.  Unsolicited, we received nearly 75 resumes from teachers in a range of disciplines.  Now, we have added to that pool by calling for resumes from among experienced teachers around the country and around the world. Word about our call for founding faculty has hit list serves and electronic bulletin boards, and the response has been excellent.

We have begun the exciting process of interviewing prospective teachers already. Applicants bring energy, a genuine love of teaching and students, and a hopeful enthusiasm about the prospect of starting a dynamic interdisciplinary curriculum that takes full advantage of our spectacular city.  As we find the best teachers, we will offer them contracts and build the founding faculty of Greenwich Village High School.  They will come together beginning next summer to plan for the opening of school in September 2009.  Just as we seek students who aspire to our motto, “Work Hard.  Be Kind.  Take Risks.” we also expect teachers to embody these ideals in their professional and personal lives.  First and last, a great school is built upon the students who enroll and the faculty who have the privilege to work with them.

David Liebmann
Head of School

We Have a Home!

Every day, Greenwich Village High School moves closer to bricks-and-mortar reality. And never more so than now: we’re pleased to announce that GVHS has found a home at 30 Vandam Street.
The building sits on a quiet block between Sixth Avenue and Varick Street, with townhouses on the north side and large, airy loft buildings on the south side. GVHS will occupy the first two floors of a loft building. We will have our own entrance, allowing safe and easy ground-level access. This wonderful location will afford plenty of space for classrooms, studios, and offices for the first several years of the school’s life. Additional space in the building will become available as enrollment expands, allowing GVHS to operate from this location for years to come.

Just three blocks south of Houston Street, 30 Vandam is convenient to the 1 train at Houston Street and the C and E trains at Spring Street. The West 4th Street stop of the B, D, F, and V lines is also nearby, at Sixth Avenue, and the M20, M21, and M6 buses all stop within blocks of the school. The athletic fields of Pier 40 are just minutes away by foot, and the campus of the New School is a short walk northward, allowing students to take advantage of the special relationship GVHS has with the university.

MESH Architectures has been engaged to design the space, which will incorporate “green” practices throughout. A combination of seminar spaces, performance areas, and student commons will form the heart of the school. MESH founder Eric Liftin will lead the architectural effort and has already completed initial concepts. A construction schedule has been implemented.

Greenwich Village High School is New York City’s first coed, nondenominational independent school exclusively for students in grades nine through twelve. GVHS’s founding freshman class of 45 students will first walk through the doors of 30 Vandam in September 2009. The school will build toward a full enrollment of 300 students by the year 2013.

For further information please call us at (646) 435-1144

First Floor Plans

Second Floor Plans

These are the preliminary drawings by architect Eric Liftin of MESH Architecture.  While they are still subject to change, they look into the future of GVHS.

Building the Curriculum

Over the last three months I have begun to put into place the curriculum for Greenwich Village High School.  The academic program plan that continues to develop begins with a freshman year comprised of an interdisciplinary humanities course centered on a study of the history, literature, and art of Greenwich Village and the greater New York City region.  Ninth grade students typically will also take a course in mathematics (geometry/algebra II or algebra I), science (physics), a foundation course in the arts (drawing, painting, sculpture, dance, drama, music, and filmmaking), and a world language (Mandarin or Spanish).  We are exploring the idea of using environmental science as the lens through which we teach all of our foundational science courses (physics, chemistry, biology).  As often as possible our math and science courses will be taught in coordinated fashion with field work relevant to both disciplines.   To start off the year, ninth grade students will join the faculty in an orientation program with both in-city and outdoor retreat components.

We have the chance to create an exciting blend of theoretical knowledge, practical experiences, and personalized guidance in the courses and activities we offer.  The questions “what will we teach?” and “how will we teach?“ are not often asked in schools that have well-established traditions.  Over the last three months, I have sought information to answer these questions by visiting a variety of schools and programs, exploring and creating relationships with individuals and institutions in, around, and beyond the New York City area, and researching pedagogical approaches and curricular models that seem particularly well-designed and relevant to GVHS’s aims.  Some of these include Commonwealth School in Boston, City Academy in Tucson, and CityTerm here in New York.  I have also witnessed or consulted with individuals from programs, schools, and cultural institutions that are known for their outstanding academics and/or are especially good at developing a sense of community and fostering kindness including Browning, Buckingham Browne & Nichols, City and Country School, De La Salle Academy, the Ethical Culture Fieldston School, Friends Seminary, Greenwich Village Society for Historical Preservation, the Klingenstein Center at Teachers College, Columbia University, Mott Hall II School, New York Theatre Workshops, Phillips Exeter Academy, the School at Columbia University, and Shady Side Academy.

Recently I spent a full day on campus at Philips Exeter Academy to better understand the Harkness Table teaching methodology and to speak with the mathematics department chair about the sequence of their math classes and the in-house designed problem sets they use in lieu of math textbooks.  Prior to that visit, I spent an afternoon at De La Salle Middle School and met a most astounding group of eighth grade students who feel the deepest pride for their warm, welcoming, and rigorous school.  How they create and foster the tangible sense of community and kindness was of particular interest to me.  Earlier in the year I spoke with the science department chair at Shady Side Academy about the Physics First curriculum and the other modeling-based science courses they have implemented.  Last week I met with an educational technology professor at Teachers College-Columbia University to discuss exciting and innovative uses of technology that GVHS may employ to further enhance the curriculum and to diversify the ways in which students demonstrate their mastery of the subjects they study.

This research will culminate in a complete ninth grade curriculum by mid-January.  I will publish a curriculum guide that will lay out the specifics of the program as well as provide a preview of the tenth, eleventh and twelfth grade years.  As we begin to interview faculty in over the next few months, we will look for excellent teachers who can bring Greenwich Village High School to life.

–David Clarke, Academic Dean

New Beginnings

New students walking through the doors of Greenwich Village High School next fall will arrive carrying the memories of elementary and middle school, their families, and their friends.  Some will come from schools where they have known all of their classmates since kindergarten.  Others will come with a yearning to belong to something larger than themselves.  Without doubt, if the range of applications we have received in these earliest days indicates anything, it’s that our students will represent a wide variety of backgrounds and experiences.  All of those students will cross the GVHS threshold and begin anew.

Starting fresh, Greenwich Village High School will allow students the chance to refine and redefine themselves.   When everyone starts from scratch in a school, it’s possible to shed an old identity.  Academically, artistically, and athletically, students will be able to “take risks” and try new things.  Everyone will begin at the same social starting point.  Unlike an ongoing school where there might be just a handful of new ninth graders, Greenwich Village High School students will all be pioneers together.  They’ll have few preconceived notions of each other.  Teachers will welcome each student as the individual he or she is, and nurture the individual that he or she might become.

We believe that as a new community, each student will have a voice.  Our work together will emphasize cooperation and camaraderie rather than competition.  And we’ll encourage a feeling of ownership for the school.  Teachers will create myriad opportunities for students to “work hard, be kind, and take risks.”  All we ask is that the students who join us jump in, willing to start fresh.

David Liebmann

Living It!
The Rise of Experiential Education in the 21st Century

I have had a career-long interest in innovative teaching models.  An article I wrote that recently appeared in the National Association of Independent School’s quarterly journal highlights programs from around the country, including the Maine Coast Semester and Shady Side Academy, two schools at which I was a teacher and administrator.  Picking among curricular models like these, the best practices from some of our country’s best schools, will allow Greenwich Village High School the chance to balance tradition and innovation in its academic program, engaging students in hands-on learning experiences that bring authentic relevance to their education.
David Liebmann

The Perfect Classroom, or What I Learned Over My Summer Vacation

In ways that I’ve found fascinating, the city of New York provides living examples of so many academic principles, the economic concept of supply and demand being one of the most obvious. 1.5 million of the city’s 8.5 million people reside on a 22.7 square mile island. That works out to about 70,000 human beings per square mile. Where do you put them all? And where do you teach the teenagers?

As I tried to answer these questions over the summer, I began an education in real estate the likes of which I could have never imagined. Along with members of the Friends of Greenwich Village High School board of directors, I visited small commercial buildings and large offices, sprawling industrial structures and intimate residential spaces. I walked the halls of a former school and I heard my steps echo through a vacant shipping center.

In each case, I stood in the space and imagined students and teachers. I listened for their voices in my mind. I pictured seminar tables around which students and teachers could engage in analysis, discussion, and debate. I’m a firm believer in the notion that the built environment strongly influences our attitudes and actions, so I thought about what kind of space would nurture a hard-working, kind, and risk-embracing community. (The GVHS motto is the standard for me by which all decisions are measured.)

Three months into my portion of a search that began over a year ago, I’m excited to say the field has been narrowed and GVHS will announce its location shortly. We’re negotiating for a space that will allow students and teachers to get to know each other well. It will be large enough for specialized academic and arts spaces and accommodate future growth, and it will be small enough to feel like we see each other regularly over the course of the day. We’re looking at a space that is very close to subways because, with our intention to use the resources of New York City as a regular extension of the classroom, quick access is vital. The space is also conveniently near fields for athletics, which will contribute to creating an efficient schedule. And we’re looking at a space that will allow students to call it their own. We want a space that encourages an intellectual spirit as well as a social vitality. Students have to feel at ease in that space for these to happen.

Even with all the excitement of finding a home for GVHS, I know that space is less important than a vibrant and possibility-rich academic program. The demand for a reimagined, reinvented high school experience far outstrips the supply. As GVHS comes into being, it’s that part of the school that I think about the most.

David Liebmann
Head of School