Dear Greene Street Friends School Families and Caregivers,

Whether you are joining us for the first time or returning for another year, I am delighted to welcome you into our vibrant Greene Street Friends community. I hope these summer months have brought your family moments of joy, rest, and connection. Here on campus, the past several months have been filled with preparation, planning, and collaboration as we get ready to launch another year of joyful, challenging, and meaningful learning.

Many of our dedicated faculty and staff have been hard at work this summer—designing lessons, refining curriculum, and deepening their professional practice. Their efforts reflect our shared commitment to integrity, our Quaker and academic theme for the 2025–26 school year. Integrity calls us to ensure that our words match our actions, that our curriculum reflects our values, and that our work with students is coherent, intentional, and rooted in care. Throughout the year, we will ask: How do we have integrity in our work, our mission, and our curriculum? How is that integrity visible to our students, families, and one another?

This summer’s academic work has centered on strengthening curriculum alignment, expanding access to rigorous learning, and deepening the ways we integrate Quaker values into the student experience. Some of the work you can expect to see includes:

• Illustrative Math Expansion (Grades 4–6) – Building on the success of last year’s 7th- and 8th-grade pilot, we are now extending Illustrative Math into grades 4–6. This research-based, problem-solving-focused curriculum moves beyond rote procedures to cultivate mathematical thinking, reasoning, and communication skills. Students will engage in rich, real-world tasks that require them to make connections, justify their reasoning, and apply concepts in multiple ways. The program’s carefully sequenced lessons build deep conceptual understanding, ensuring students master foundational skills while developing the perseverance and confidence to tackle complex problems. With this expansion, our students will benefit from a consistent, rigorous pathway in mathematics that prepares them for pre-algebra in 7th grade, Algebra 1 in 8th grade, and future success in STEM fields.

• Social Studies Curriculum Refinement (Grades 1–8) – We have undertaken a thoughtful, school-wide review of our social studies program to strengthen vertical alignment, ensuring that knowledge, skills, and key concepts build intentionally from year to year. This refinement creates more seamless connections across grades, so students revisit big ideas (like community, identity, and justice) at increasing levels of depth and complexity. Thematic units and lessons are designed to highlight diverse perspectives, integrate primary sources, and connect past and present, fostering both historical understanding and civic engagement. By aligning content and skills across grade levels, we ensure that all students share a strong, coherent foundation while still allowing for rich, inquiry-driven explorations that reflect teacher creativity and student curiosity.

• Literacy Growth Across the School – Teachers across all grades are engaging in a year-long focus on strengthening students’ literacy skills. In the early grades, we are deepening our attention to phonemic and phonological awareness, key building blocks of reading fluency, while ensuring students have daily opportunities to build vocabulary and comprehension through rich texts. Across the school, faculty are examining ways to strengthen and assess writing, from narrative and informational pieces to persuasive essays, with an emphasis on clear communication and voice. In the later grades, our work will focus on sharpening students’ critical thinking and analytical writing skills, helping them construct evidence-based arguments, engage thoughtfully with multiple perspectives, and write with precision and purpose. These efforts will provide students with the tools to express themselves confidently and think deeply about the world around them.

• Quaker Ways Programming – Continued growth of our Quaker Ways program will offer more opportunities for students to engage with SPICES values in meaningful and age-appropriate ways. This work will be reflected in our Wednesday morning Meeting for Worship and Worship shares, as well as interactive Quaker stories that help students experience the impact of our Quaker values in action.

• Spanish Curriculum Enhancements – We continue to strengthen Spanish instruction, with Sonrisas in PreK–6 and enhancements to the 7th/8th grade program, deepening our students’ language proficiency and cultural understanding.

• Life Skills Curriculum Refinements – Early childhood programming will further support social-emotional learning and foundational skills, ensuring our youngest learners develop the interpersonal and advocacy abilities they need to thrive.

• Preschool Curriculum Launch – Our new preschool program is anchored in The Creative Curriculum and will feature specialized programming, including assemblies, designed just for our youngest learners.

This work has been strengthened by the efforts of our Academic Leadership Team (ALT), a group of teacher-leaders, deans, learning specialists, and administrators who collaborate to ensure every student has access to powerful, well-aligned instruction. At our summer retreat, the ALT reviewed teacher feedback, examined curriculum across grades, and mapped out a year-long professional learning plan. Guided by our theme of integrity, we focused on making learning more visible, ensuring coherence across grade levels, and supporting faculty in refining their practice. This intentional planning will help sustain high-quality instruction to create consistent learning experiences for students and keep our community connected around shared academic goals.

We are also thrilled to share our new reimaged playground, with a nature-based playspace designed especially for our early elementary students. This new space will offer a dynamic, engaging environment for students ages 4–8. We look forward to the joy, creativity, and sense of community it will inspire throughout the school day.

I also want to extend a special invitation to our New Student and Family/Caregiver Orientation on Thursday, August 28, 2025, from 8:30–10:30 a.m. This interactive morning will allow new families and students to meet our faculty and staff, explore classrooms, learn about our program, ask questions, and begin building the relationships that make our school community so special.

As we step into this new year, I am grateful for the trust and partnership you bring to our shared work. Together, we will create a school year where joy and challenge live side by side, and where integrity, in word and deed, guides every learning moment. I am excited to see so many new and familiar faces return to campus in just a few short weeks!

With warm regards,

Darien

Darien N. Headen (he/him)

Associate Head of School