Dear members of the Saint Thomas Choir School community,
The topic of school reopening has been much in the news and much on the minds of all school administrators, teachers, and parents throughout this unprecedented summer. The Saint Thomas Choir School has been no exception. Since early May, a Working Group composed of school medical staff, administrators, and teachers has met weekly to discuss scenario planning. Members of the Working Group have focused on different areas of school life, and have spent hundreds of hours reading articles, studies, and governmental guidance; speaking with infectious disease experts, pediatricians, and school medical personnel; working with experts in risk management and in school legal issues; attending countless webinars; meeting individually with over fifteen heads of other independent schools; and meeting frequently with other key stakeholders in the Saint Thomas community. The goals of our planning, from the beginning, have been to be prepared to educate our students safely regardless of how the pandemic shifts, and to provide a positive educational experience to the boys consistent with our mission and our values.
As the Working Group continued its planning, it became clear that the Choir School’s small size and residential model presented a unique opportunity to create a fully isolated pod that – after an initial period of quarantining and several rounds of testing – would allow all students and residential staff members to act as one germ-sharing family unit. After extensive research, the school and church leadership decided that the best place to accomplish this goal would be on a larger campus that offered more outdoor space and flexible housing arrangements than our building in New York City is able to provide. Consequently, the school community – including teachers, musicians, kitchen staff members, and, of course, students – is planning to begin the year by spending our first six weeks together at the Incarnation Center in Ivoryton, Connecticut.
The Saint Thomas Choir School has a long history with Incarnation Center, spanning half of our hundred-year history. Our annual trip to Incarnation is one of the most deeply cherished Choir School traditions, a period that the boys look forward to all year and about which alumni, sometimes decades later, spend much time reminiscing. While we will be holding school at the Incarnation Center, including a rigorous musical and academic schedule, rather than our more-traditional Camp model, the boys and staff will be able to enjoy all of the benefits of this idyllic 700 acres in coastal Connecticut, including its beautiful mile-long lake and 17 miles of hiking trails.
By returning to Incarnation Center, the students will be able to play together, learn together, and sing together. The school and church leadership feel that, under the current pandemic conditions, a temporary return to Incarnation Center will be the safest way for us to bring our community back together in person, and will provide the best experience for our students. We will also be able to offer a robust musical experience for the boys under Dr. Filsell’s direction, and plans are underway for the choristers to perform in several services each week for our community in Connecticut under the oversight of Mother Turner, helping the boys to stay connected to Saint Thomas Church Fifth Avenue and helping them to continue the tradition of musical excellence upon which the Choir School was founded.
In the Working Group’s conversations with parents and staff members, both groups have expressed their trust in the school and their willingness to make sacrifices in order to create the best experience possible for the boys. We are particularly grateful to the dedicated faculty and staff members who are willing to uproot their lives for six weeks, and who have consistently displayed a deep sense of understanding and of hope despite all of the difficult choices facing them. All of these conversations with our community members have served as powerful reminders of how strong the Saint Thomas Choir School community is and of how resilient we have proven to be both throughout our century-long history and these last few months marred by the pandemic.
The Working Group has completed several site visits to Incarnation Center over the last month. The leadership team members at Incarnation Center have been thoughtful, accommodating, and cooperative partners in the planning process, and we are excited about the opportunity to work with them more closely. The boys and faculty will have ample space to live, teach, learn, eat, sing, swim, hike, boat, run, and play on their campus, and we are hopeful that all of us will remember this experience as an adventure we embarked upon together.
This decision, as all decisions are during this pandemic, is of course subject to change if there is a dramatic shift in health conditions as we approach the return to school date in early September. We will continue monitoring the situation closely. Our temporary return to Incarnation Center will occupy the first six weeks of the school year, ending in late October with a scheduled break. The school’s decision-making about the rest of the year will continue to evolve on a quarter-by-quarter basis: we anticipate that, in November, we would either be returning to our campus in New York City or resuming distance learning, depending on health conditions at the time. The health, safety, and well-being of our community will continue to come first in our ongoing planning throughout the 2020-2021 academic year.
Thank you, as always, for your continued support of our wonderful school. We hope that you and your loved ones remain safe and healthy, and we look forward to sending along dispatches from the fields, trails, and waters of Incarnation Center as our community experiences this unique opportunity to learn and grow together during the beginning of what promises to be a school year unlike any other. We are ready to take on the challenge, and look forward to sharing our journey with all of you.
Best wishes,
Amy Francisco
Interim Head of School
