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This column,
“
Our Common
Ground”, was
created specifically
for an alumni voice.
If you would like to
write an “Our
Common Ground”
article, contact
Lynn Crevling,
Director of
Leadership Support,
at 845.458.7517 or
lcrevling@sks.org.
Perhaps most important, Mr. Meisel wants students to recognize the perspective of their sources.
“
Everything is biased, so what is the bias? To pursue truth, you need to question, and continually question,”
he tells them, “and in this process of exploration, research, questioning and examination, we should be open
to changing our viewpoints, and our writing will change, too.”
One School, Your School, The Same School
O
ften alumni say to me “SKS is not the same as when I was there.” “No, it’s not,” I will sometimes say,
“
It’s better.” We could debate this, and sometimes we do. What
is
the same anymore? There are pros and cons
with change and that come with “progress”. There are many more courses of study today at SKS than “back
in my day.” We just had plain old English (and it was my favorite class). Today, there is Middle School Eng-
lish; American Literature; Introduction to Literature; Modern American Fiction; Philosophy, Film and Litera-
ture; Honors British Literature; and AP English.
The coursework of today has the variety, breadth,
depth and richness that gives students an edge for
increasingly competitive college admissions. With
almost unlimited access to sources on the Inter-
net and through electronic library systems, there
is much more information available for students
to sift though. As Mr. Meisel says, “It’s like trying
to fill a thimble with a fire hose.” It seems that
our students’ world today is much more complex.
Yet, and still, what really matters can also be
quite simple.
“
What does matter is that students come
away from their brief interludes with us better
able to stand on their own two feet” says deRosa,
who taught English at high schools and at Hart-
wick College.
He says that the years he spent at SKS pro-
foundly shaped him, inspired his career, and were
the best years of his life “and I am enduringly and
profoundly grateful.”
I came to SKS as a shy girl who had felt invisible in the large public school classrooms pre-Storm King, but
my education and support here prepared me to go forward confidently into many experiences in work and
life in an ever-changing world. What
hasn’t
changed at SKS is the caring faculty and staff, the attention to
each student’s needs, and an emphasis on the building of sound character and independent thinking.
Now, after more than 40 years, I’m back where my inspiration started, on our common ground. Like my
fellow alum Dick deRosa eleven years before me, I am grateful, profoundly grateful.
Lynn Crevling ’72 received an English award at SKS, received her BA from Hobart and William Smith Colleges,
and earned a master’s degree from the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs at Syracuse University. She
has worked in government, nonprofits, and in schools teaching English as a Second Language (including the teach-
ing of writing). In her work as a development director, she has written many grants, always seeking words to express
the feeling and spirit.
