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An Episcopal, co-educational 100% boarding school in Middletown, Delaware for grades 9 – 12

Why Our Integrity Matters
  • Head of School's Blog
Joy McGrath ’92

I love this month of January at St. Andrew’s, as we settle back in after the long winter break and prepare for the first term examinations. In the coming week, many of you will give your child advice about exams, and I thought it would be helpful to share some of my thoughts. These are thoughts I have already shared with the students, so they have heard this before! But I am sure you agree that it cannot hurt for all of us to be singing from the same song sheet. 

Why do we have exams? Students often ask this existential question, which is one that I welcome. What we do at St. Andrew’s is practice, and exams are a part of that practice. And the purpose of our practice is not perfection—it’s progress. In this exam period, we practice thinking, practice studying, practice writing, practice test-taking. We show our progress, whatever that progress may look like. If we were perfect, we would not need to go to school, and we would not be very interesting pupils! 

So, exams and assessments are for demonstrating what we know, and how we’ve grown. Improving and strengthening ourselves is the necessary precursor to everything else, always; any change must begin with changing ourselves. This is not just the posture we have as high schoolers, but a way of being we can practice for our whole lives. 

As we approach exams, we always speak clearly with students about the expectations embedded in the school’s honor code. It’s human nature to look for a shortcut, especially when we are under pressure. But as teachers, we want to witness each student’s thinking, each student’s practice, each student’s performance. When a member of our community cheats, or takes that shortcut, whether via the new general AI tools like ChatGPT, or Sparknotes, or some other source, that person is denying themselves the chance to learn and grow, and denying their fellow Saints of an opportunity for authentic intellectual engagement and collaboration. Cheating prioritizes the “ends,” but at St. Andrew’s, we are really all about the “means.”

A friend recently texted me from the Hofgarten in Düsseldorf, Germany, where he had found a plaque near a sculpture called “The Admonisher” by Vadim Sidur. What was written there was as good a place as any for us to start when we are thinking about honor and schooling. I love this passage, because it gets to the heart of what education really is, and why it’s not just important, but necessary, for us to do our own work. Here is what it says, translated from German: 

human of this earth
whoever you are
no matter where you come from
wherever you go
consider
god almighty
lent you this life
to learn to distinguish
the good from the bad
seize your life
to do the good

Our life was only lent to us for the purpose of learning—learning for the purpose of discerning the good, seizing the good, and doing the good. I love these words. The big picture is this: What our students do matters. Who our students are matters. And this is why our integrity matters. 

Over the break, I read a marvelous essay in the New York Review of Books by Marilynne Robinson. In it she says, “Most people in the world would say that their lives are insignificant, historically speaking, but it might be prudent to consider whether the relative blamelessness that is assumed to come with insignificance can be relied upon. We are not competent to decide how much we matter in the long term.” I was reminded of this essay while sitting in Chapel on Wednesday night, listening to a beautiful reflection by Ashley McIntosh ’25. The service, organized by the Student Diversity Committee, was held in honor of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Ashley encouraged her peers to recognize the power for positive change that lies within each of them, individually. “We have the power to make a difference at SAS,” she explained. “SAS has the power to make a difference in Delaware. Delaware has the power to influence the U.S., and the U.S. has the power to impact the world. If you notice, the spark that lights the fuse in it all—is you.”

Therefore, my hope for our students in this winter season is that they will learn, and grow, and seize their life, and do the good. What they do and who they are, in the smallest details, in the stillest moments, really does matter. I hope that in conversations with your children in the coming week, you will help them focus on the big habits of “goodness” within the minutiae of exam week. These habits might be summed up as follows: 

Ask for help when you need it. 
Keep it simple. 
See God in yourself and in the other humans around you. 

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