Harvard-Westlake • Studio City • Volume 32 • Issue 2 • September 28, 2022 • hwchronicle.com
Weighted GPAs postponed
School updates visions
By Claire Conner
By Chloe Park and Grant Park
The Faculty Academic Committee (FAC) chose not to vote on a proposal by the Upper School Dean Team to add weighted GPAs to seniors’ transcripts this year, effectively postponing consideration of the addition to next year at the earliest. Head of Upper School Beth Slattery said although deans assumed the proposal would be approved for this year, the FAC wanted to take more time to consider the new policy’s potential impacts beyond transcripts. “The deans thought that this would kind of be a no-brainer and that it wouldn’t be a big deal to anybody because it was more about college stuff, but I think the biggest thing the department chairs felt was that we want to make sure we are doing it with all of the information,” Slattery said. “This is the first they had heard of it, and it seemed like we made this big decision three years ago to do it one way, and we’re not going to, in an afternoon, decide to flip that switch.” 80% of 94 seniors polled by The Chronicle said they would like both their weighted and unweighted GPA to be included in their transcripts this year, and 87% of the 149 sophomores and juniors polled said they would want the same policy for their senior year transcripts. Slattery said the committee thought a last-minute addition of weighted GPAs to current seniors’ transcripts would be unfair to students who chose their high school classes with the assumption that their GPAs would be unweighted when they graduated. “It fell to the fact that it was a little bit of a bait and switch to seniors who had made decisions based on information we had given them about it just being an unweighted GPA and that it would not be appropriate to, in September, decide that we were going to change that,” Slattery said.
dents and teachers that transform at Harvard-Westlake in each of the way students think and live. those 30 years is something to reHe [wanted] this very sad event member and be inspired by.” to be a celebration of what’s best Walch was born in Sedalia, about Harvard-Westlake, and it’s Missouri (Missoura, as he called been very difficult to miss his in- it), the youngest of four brothers. tentions about how he wants us From an early age, he engrossed to mourn his passing.” himself in movies, idolizing Commons said Walch had James Dean and dreaming of a uniquely meaningful impact being a Hollywood or Broadway through his teaching, and that actor. Eventually, Walch attendthe wisdom and kindness he ed Kenyon College in Gamdemonstrated bier, Ohio, and over his three quickly became decades at the a part of the draI’ve claimed to school shaped ma program. not be afraid of dying the community After his final for the better. for a while, and it’s time performance as “There are to put my money where Treplev in Kenpeople who have yon’s producmy mouth is.” had longer tention of Chekov’s ures, but there — Ted Walch “The Seagull,” isn’t anybody director and Performing arts teacher drama profesI can think of who’s had a sor Jim Micheal more impactful tenure than Ted told Walch he felt like his acting Walch,” Commons said. “It’s of- didn’t stand out, but knew that ten the case that the older teach- he had the potential to pursue ers get, the harder it is for them other elements of performing to connect with people of a high arts. Micheal took Walch under school age. That was not true for his wing for a four-year-long inMr. Walch, and if anything, he tensive exploration of set design, got better at it. What Ted Walch prop creation, stage management did for students and colleagues and costume artistry.
President Rick Commons presented the school’s renewed Visions to members of the school community at the annual State of the School Address on Sept. 7. The newly released Visions identify the following six areas for growth for the upcoming year: health and wellbeing of students; personal character and community citizenship; diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI); extraordinary teaching and learning; admitting the most promising students in Los Angeles to the school and developing River Park. The Visions for 2020, which were published in early 2015, prioritized students’ happiness and balance, along with commitment to inclusion, new ways to serve Los Angeles, commitment to character and engaging pedagogy, curricular innovation and professional growth. Commons said the Visions for 2020 were created with the intention of addressing the most relevant concern at the time. “[In 2015], we were mainly talking about the well-being of students and focused on happiness and balance,” Commons said. “There was a sense that too many of our students did not have balance in their life and were not finding joy in their experience at Harvard-Westlake. So, we spent a lot of time thinking about how to make it possible for ambitious, talented kids who were working hard and pursuing busy lives to define joy, get more sleep and have more balance in their lives, which is a tough challenge as we all know. That’s been a focus for a long time.” Commons said the evolving challenges students face prompted the school to make health and wellbeing the first of the six Visions. “What has arisen particularly since the pandemic is a fuller understanding that the challenges that high achieving adolescents face include mental and emotional health, and a much higher rate than we understood and were witnessing back in 2014 and 2015,” Commons said.
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Latino Heritage Month: The community reflects on the effect of whitewashing Latino characters in television and film.
Lungs of Steel: Girls varsity Cross Country won their heat at the Woodbridge Cross Country Classic on September 16.
PRINTED WITH PERMISSION OF ALEXIS ARINSBURG
LEAVING BEHIND A LEGACY: Ted Walch poses for a picture in Rugby Auditorium in 2006. The school hosted a memorial service for him in Saint Saviour’s Chapel the day after he passed away. He was 80 years old.
Community remembers legendary teacher Ted Walch after his death By Fallon Dern and Davis Marks
In a crowded St. Saviour’s Chapel, President Rick Commons rings a church bell 30 times in succession. It’s lunch time, and pews full of students, faculty and staff listen to the chimes, one for each year Performing Arts and Interdisciplinary Studies Teacher Ted Walch taught at the school. Walch passed Sept. 8 after a two-month battle with terminal brain cancer. Following the news of Walch’s death, members of the community gathered in the church to celebrate his life and legacy. When reflecting upon the memorial service held on Sept. 9, Commons said he feels it was something Walch himself would have wanted. “I think Mr. Walch decided that he wanted the school to actually benefit from the experience of his public passing,” Commons said. “From the moment he called me in July to say that he had this terminal diagnosis, till the moment he died on September 8, he [wanted] to make it possible for the school to celebrate relationships between stu-
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IN THIS ISSUE
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A10
Celebrating a Decade: The Brendan Kutler Center honored its first 10 years of existence during the month of September.
There’s Levels to This: Jackson Tanner ’24 describes the effect that publishing Annual Giving “circles” has on the community.
B6 Give Me Some Space: Students and faculty examine the social pressure that attending school dances puts on relationships.