A Welcome from the Head of School
As I walk the campus at The Gooden School, I listen for laughter and look for dirty hands to gauge how we are doing as an institution. For me, dirty hands signify an engaged and student-centered learning environment. Laughter tells me our students are having fun, and I think everyone learns more when they are having fun.
Schools measure success in so many ways: standardized test scores, athletic titles, art competition victories, and admission to elite institutions at the next educational level. Of course, we like it when our students bring home trophies for us to display and when they share the news of high school acceptance letters at some of Los Angeles’ most selective schools. We also know and realize there are other ways of measuring student success.
We are a small school by design, which affords us the opportunity to know each student as if he or she was our own child. This personal relationship allows us to tailor lesson plans and assignments to each child’s unique strengths and gifts as well as areas where they want to improve. We have time and energy to devote to communicating with you as parents and guardians regarding your child’s progress on stage, in the lab, and on the field.
We watch them grow as individuals from their earliest days in kindergarten until they leave us at the end of eighth grade. Along the way, they are afforded opportunities to grow and mature as scholars, athletes, artists, and principled young men and women. This last aspect of a Gooden education, the underlying moral and ethical education that comes at an Episcopal school such as ours, is how we like to measure student success. It is not really about the grade or score, it is helping nurture people who will go into the world with the tools and mindset to demonstrate the unique worth of all humans and strive for justice and peace.
We are glad you have stopped by the Gooden website to take a look around. We invite you to come by to hear the laughter and shake some dirty hands.
Sincerely,
Carl Parke, Head of School
