Weekly Message from HOS 2026/04/20-2026/04/24
Dear Keystonians,
Happy Friday! As many students and teachers return from their ELPs this week, I want to share a thank you letter to our teachers who travel with students. All of our teachers across campus devote themselves in extraordinary ways to our students. Maybe this message can encourage you to send a short note to a teacher or staff member who has impacted you or your child. Gratitude is as meaningful to the grateful as it is to the appreciated.
Dear Teachers,
It is hard to explain why you do what you do. Why year after year you devote yourself to the exhaustion that comes with supporting the kind of learning we privilege at a school like Keystone.
This week many of us were out on ELP trips. Some of us have already done our trips at other times in the year. Some of us are busy preparing the youngest children to have the confidence and self-regulation to thrive in the programs to come. Others of us are focusing on the final academic push of the DP program for 11th and 12th graders.
Job descriptions for people who work in schools have this little sentence at the end of the list of professional tasks and responsibilities that says, quite clinically: “Other duties as assigned.”
That’s because the real list would be impossibly long. For example:
Wake up before dawn to make sure student IDs are all in order, because the slightest mistake could be the end of a trip for someone.
Clean vomit off a bus floor.
Hold a child who is away from their parents for just the second time in their life and is having trouble falling asleep.
Stay up late after a 16-hour day to write a summary for families dying to know what their kids are up to.
Respond to emails on your phone while supervising over 100 students on a high-speed train.
Teach the same child how to tie their shoes twice in one day. And then again the next day. Using the same kind tone.
Say “please keep your hands to yourself” 1,300 times a week. Without getting frustrated.
Yell “do not put that in your mouth” in a calm voice, but loud enough to ensure the guidance is strictly followed.
Say “Shhhh” in a stern way, but with enough warmth that doesn’t damage a relationship.
Teach students to connect to China’s history—and to each other.
Leave your partner and small children at home to care for other people’s children. Say goodnight to them on a video call and tell them not to cry, you will be home soon. Promise it as much to yourself as to them. Hang up. Cry. Then go back to the students.
Keep a constant eye out for open backpacks, dropped items, fatigue in children or colleagues that puts things at risk. Think of ways to mitigate the risk. Act on those things immediately, and continuously, for 96 hours.
Care so much about your students that you forget how tired you are.
Care so much about your colleagues that you will go even further to support them as they care for the students.
Ask if anyone needs to use the restroom. After everyone says no, don’t be mad when three minutes later they change their mind.
Give up your last pair of clean socks because they forgot to pack enough and have developed a blister.
Help bandage a blister.
Remind students to apply sunscreen.
Remind students to wear their hats.
Give the student your hat when they forget theirs on the bus.
Take deep breaths so you can assume positive intent and respond to repeated “When will we get there?” with kindness and accuracy.
Think about the fire escape route of every building you enter.
Help dozens of chatting students get across the street safely.
Count how many stops remain on the train. Calculate how many kids have to get off with their luggage in that amount of time. Worry about it for 15 stops. Then make it work perfectly.
Take a breath when you count the right number of kids and colleagues on the train platform.
Sit down. Count heads one more time. Fall asleep for a minute.
Remind yourself why you care about this.
Help students prepare a meal for a large group.
Clean the dish again because they didn’t do it well.
Sleep in a bed that isn’t yours so that your students can see the world and start to know their place in it.
Believe that your small and large sacrifices are making the world better and better, one young person at a time.
Love the challenges of traveling with children because of what you believe it does for them.
Laugh with your colleagues about the absurdity of what we do.
Smile with your colleagues about the amazingness of what we do.
Sleep fast.
Know that you are making a difference. Know that your life and sacrifices are having a transformative impact on the lives of children.
Thank you for all your attention and diligence to the millions of unmentioned “other duties as assigned.” It is in these things that our school culture is defined and strengthened. I could not be prouder or more grateful.
With love, admiration, and gratitude,
Emily
