Contact: Nancy Kang Rosin
Friends Select School is finalizing the design process for the publication of a booklet that will reflect the ways in which Quaker testimonies are enacted in the daily life of Friends Select’s lower school division. The booklet will be available by June 2008.

As part of a school-wide initiative entitled “Drop Everything And Write,” all divisions of the school collaborated on this booklet. Specifically, middle or upper school students partnered with lower school students, where they were provided with specific questions based upon the Quaker testimonies of simplicity, peace, integrity, community, equality and stewardship. Each group of students was then given the opportunity to discuss and to provide examples of how these Quaker testimonies specifically apply to their classrooms and to the Friends Select community. The examples provided and quotes from this reflective day of work serve as the textual basis for the booklet as seen on the attached sample pages of the booklet. As part of the Graphic Design course, upper school students have received a rare opportunity to gain real-life experience in the creation of a publication. These students have designed the cover and the layout of the booklet as well as compiled and edited its contents. This booklet now will become a meaningful addition to each student’s academic portfolio. Once the booklet is published, Friends Select intends to distribute the booklet to all classrooms at the school in order to serve as a teaching resource. Copies also will be sent to each Friends Select family and to other Quaker schools as a resource on Quakerism.

Through this project, students and other members of the Friends Select community have obtained a fuller understanding of the ways in which the school explicitly and implicitly teaches Quaker values. It demonstrates how Friends Select is a school rooted in Quaker values. All families of the school – Quaker and non-Quaker families - ultimately will benefit by having a clearer picture of what makes a Quaker school, like Friends Select, different from other schools. This collaborative project also deepened the sense of community among all members of the Friends Select community because students from every division of the school were involved in the creation of this booklet. This project provided a unique forum where students from every division and with varying interests were able to interact for a common cause. It indeed was a powerful way of teaching students the importance of community through their participation in a common and shared endeavor to benefit Friends Select and the wider community.