as "a city on a hill"

 the challenge of community

what is at the heart of Carolina Friends School?

is it community?

if so, then what makes a community?

early on, those called to create a school

sought, like the early Puritans,

for the school to be as "a city on a hill,"

which cannot be hid,

and which would eloquently speak

to the moral conviction that all of God's children

are equal in their souls,

still each difference craves

to be seen, and treasured,

celebrated, and enabled,

for each, and for each group,

to be upon their own hill,

and yet somehow the disparate connect,

as if in a quilt within which

the glory of each square

only becomes real when it is part of the larger whole,

these days I feel heartened by the high quality of people

drawn to be part of the CFS staff,

who live the calling to be themselves, fully,

to connect with their students and help them be themselves, fully,

a truth that CFS has lived since its beginning

is that every structure we as a school live

must fit the people who are the school,

and fit the truth of what we can learn of child development,

we then can implement those leadings into our structures,

I feel a challenge CFS has now is 

to fix our structures

to connect more fully with alumni

who still are part of who we are,

if we do not learn from who they were,

and from who they still are,

our community diminishes,

for it takes all available

to see who we are,

and to see who we can be,

the word "radical" means to be of the roots,

CFS needs to be radical,

and to make sure we are true to our beginnings

and to the future that calls to us,

I know that we can do this,

I pray that we will.

by Henry H. Walker

June 17, ‘26