Headmaster Messages

14 Sep

Posted at 15:56h in Headmaster Messages

​​Dear WA Community,  Over the years, our family has developed a kind of short-hand and sayings that both reflect our culture and values. One of those sayings is “normal is just a setting on the dryer.” While that colloquialism captures a number of different ideas, it often is our way of saying that normal really is a bit relative. For example, when our children were young, and we were struggling to parent well, a normal dinner looked nothing like a normal dinner for our empty-nester status today. From a more spiritual point of view, “Normal is just a setting on the dryer”...

17 Aug

Posted at 15:37h in Headmaster Messages

​​Dear WA Community,  With more than 50 years of Christian education to call upon, Westminster Academy is a school rich in tradition. Among them are special events that reflect the values of our school. The two most significant events are bookends of the school year. Our year begins with Convocation—a school community chapel and ends with Commencement—a community celebration of our graduates. While every school experiences a first day of the year, Westminster Academy uniquely marks the beginning of each new school year with an opening chapel highlighting what makes our school unique. We experience community. We worship. We fellowship. We are...

11 May

Posted at 15:16h in Headmaster Messages

​Dear WA Community, As the old poem goes, “April showers bring May flowers.” Perhaps that saying is more reflective of my native Kentucky than South Florida, but it does seem to indicate that May is a month for flourishing. Perhaps the horticultural cycle fits within that sentiment, but not necessarily the realm of schools which instead fits a theological theme—the already and not yet. For us, the month of May is fraught with wrapping up the current academic year while at the same time forging ahead for the next one. The idea of “already and not yet” captures the tension between what...

13 Apr

Posted at 15:12h in Headmaster Messages

​Dear WA Community, In times gone by, the Sunday afternoon drive was a popular pastime. The notion of “just going for a drive” as a form of entertainment has gone the way of the Dodo bird (a replica of which one can view at the American Museum of Natural History in NYC, which I visited while watching our students perform in Carnegie Hall). Riding along and gazing at the scenery with wonder at new sights and sounds has been replaced—all too often—with some sort of virtual reality. My point is not to yearn for a purported genteel and cultured age but...

16 Mar

Posted at 15:46h in Headmaster Messages

​Dear WA Community, When our girls were little, they loved the movie The Sound of Music. As a result, I’ve watched it more times than I can remember or count. However, those days are long gone, and while I can no longer recall the dialogue, these words of Julie Andrews are forever etched in my memory, “Let’s start at the very beginning, a very good place to start….” The Westminster Academy lexicon includes something with a similar theme, “Begin with the end in mind.” I never had the chance to ask Dr. Wackes if he was inspired by the singing Van Trapp family...