Let’s Get Gritty
Each of the last nine years, Dalat has chosen a theme to focus on together as a community. Previous themes include:
- It’s Not About Me – Life is not just about what you can get out of it, but what you contribute to it.
- What’s the Difference? You! – Every person can have a positive impact on the people around them.
- Walk the Talk – Being a school and community of strong character.
- Satu Dalat (One Dalat) – Striving for unity and an even stronger school community.
- Do Hard Things – Challenging the cultural mind-set that teenagers are to focus on selfish goals of fun and little responsibility, and instead encourage them to pursue big goals.
- Road Less Travelled – Life is about choices, their consequences, and following your principles, not the crowd.
- DISconnect: Relate, Recharge, Reconnect – In today’s world we need to remember that the most important things in life come through relationships not technology.
- Radical: Living a Life of Conviction – Encouraging our kids to be unusual and extraordinary – to be radical.
- First Things First – Learning the importance of being able to set and keep priorities.
This year our theme is “GRIT: Growth, Resilience, Integrity, Tenacity.” Last year I wrote a number of articles about “grit,” and the response to them was strong and so positive that the administration thought we should spend a whole year talking about it with students, parents, and the community as a whole. The overall theme will be “GRIT,” but it breaks down into four different concepts, and we will look at one each quarter of this year. We will start this quarter with looking at the idea of “growth.”
In the coming weeks and months, we will bring the theme alive in our classrooms and in other activities around school. Dalat also chooses each year to focus on one of our ESLRs (Expected School-Wide Learning Results), and for 2015–16 it will be “Faithful Steward.”