Guest Essay | Dr. Elizabeth Pomeroy, School Board President | Pasadena Unified School District Opening Day 2022: A Letter to Families and Community

Opening Day!  there’s something magical about those words.  What is it?  A promise of new beginnings, a return to something we have loved in the past, a launch, a shimmering mixture of anticipation, anxiety, and a touch of moxie.

Thursday, August 11 is Opening Day for about 15,000 students of the Pasadena Unified School District, their teachers, school staff and families.  I hope that all those people have enjoyed a healthy summer share of relaxation, renewal, perhaps a mountain trail, or learning something new.  (I was a student again myself, in a class of Rare Book School at the University of Virginia.)

As the new year opens, I hope that you will take pride being in a new grade, or new courses, or for some, promotion to a whole new campus and level.  After two difficult years touched by isolation, you can again be surrounded by peers, friends, and the adults who are so excited to see you again.  I am reminded of a song we sang long ago at Girl Scout camp – we sang it as a round:  “Make new friends, but keep the old, one is silver, the other gold.”  These bonds can endure through the pandemic times.  Our opening will be cautious but joyful.

Over the summer, every PUSD campus has benefited from facilities work and care.  Plus new program opportunities will greet returning students.  A shining light will be the green playground makeover at Jackson Elementary, known as the Watershed Discovery Project.  Managed by a team from the nonprofit Amigos de los Rios, much of the old playground asphalt has been taken up and replaced by permeable pavement, mulch planting beds, trees, logs for sitting and exploring, several outdoor “classrooms” created by big sittable boulders.  It’s a setting for rainwater harvest, incorporating many science lessons, knowledge of ecosystems, and examples of many professions these young students might later follow: environmentalists, arborists, landscape designers, science teachers.  Butterflies were around us as I walked the playground today.

Other new programs: an exciting pilot course for an educational careers pathway: Introduction to Teaching classes at  John Muir and Pasadena High.   PUSD will acknowledge the nationwide teacher shortage and inspire some of our own students into this most rewarding and vital occupation.  PUSD adds elementary Armenian studies at Webster, which will link with the already thriving Armenian Academy at Blair.  And the artistic ties are strengthening between Altadena Elementary and nearby Eliot Arts Magnet Academy (a middle school), so we can anticipate more joint productions and shared energy there.  (Could there be a yellow brick road between Altadena and Eliot?)

This is just some of “what’s new?” in PUSD.  Trusted programs like Dual Language Immersion and International Baccalaureate continue strongly.  Last spring saw the first graduating seniors from the high-level Math Academy, and it continues.  The State funding for public education is more promising than it has been in years.  PUSD also has many avenues now for tutoring, support, and mental health resources to rebuild the confidence of each individual student after the difficult years  — and to face with resilience whatever is ahead.  We so much appreciate all that teachers and staff are doing to prepare for the coming year.

So a warm welcome to you all.  Look for the things that are new on your campus.  Reconnect, and know that the PUSD Vision Statement calls for fostering the joy of learning in every student.  The School Board wishes you an academic year with many discoveries, along with those silver and gold friendships

Onward, PUSD!            

Dr. Elizabeth Pomeroy is President of the Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education

For more information on PUSD, including Covid safety precautions, visit the District website at  pusd.us