Skip to main content

Horizons at Saint David's 2020


A Few Members of Horizons at Saint David's Class of 2020 in earlier year of program.

As we proudly celebrate our first graduating class of the Horizons at Saint David's program (most of whom have been with the program since kindergarten), we also reflect on the unique accomplishments that have been achieved amidst a challenging time.

This spring, family engagement rose to new heights and our diligent team, led by Executive Director Hope Lippens, assisted Horizons families to secure necessities that ensured their safety and well-being. We also created the "Horizons at Home" program to encourage continuity in communicating weekly charts of activities to keep students active on all fronts (academic, physical, and arts). As part of this initiative, the "Pen Pal Project" allowed students to send in letters and pictures to their peers.

With the need to run the program virtually this summer, every student had his own device, thanks in large part to our Saint David's community who donated Chromebooks and laptops to the Horizons program.

A constant of our program is the passionate base of young Saint David's School alumni who participate as volunteers during the core activities of the summer (This year, 27 alumni volunteered). In so doing, our weekly themes (relationship building, teamwork, health and wellness, creative thinking, and leadership) moved forward. Re-informing the bond between our high school age alums and our Horizons boys is an essential component to our mission. 

Zoom sports classes continued at least twice per week. Coaches Imbelli and Dominguez brought smiles through the shared screens and promoted good health practices during quarantine time. To complement the activity, “The Relax Room” was offered as a social-emotional learning class to help with daily mindfulness and socialization activities. 

Each week, guest speakers from outside the community added a valuable voice for the boys. These speakers shared stories that inspired our group and brought a diverse array of experience. A special thank you to our Advisory Board members for their aid in coordinating these special events. 


The Horizons at Saint David's summer program began in 2012, as part of Saint David's initiative to contribute to the greater common good. Its mission is to prevent academic slide by providing a rich six-week academic and cultural experience for boys from low-income, diverse families, from kindergarten through eighth grade. For more on the program, visit https://www.sdshorizons.org


Popular posts from this blog

William Burke '10 Explores the Mother-Son Relationship in Special Chapel Talk

William Burke '10 returned to Saint David's this morning to speak to our fifth graders and their moms or special friends about the mother-son relationship. Will, a graduate of Regis and Georgetown who works as an Analyst at BlackRock, reminded our boys of the instrumental role their moms play in myriad aspects of their daily lives. Using the experience of boys who play hockey as an example, he observed, "Mom is always there, she's your gear sponsor, your Uber to the games, rooting you on during the game and waiting afterward with donuts and hot chocolate." Win or lose, a son's biggest fan is his mom. As he referenced our school's mission, Will remarked, " Ut viri boni sint  (that they be good men)  are beautiful words, but how do we learn to be a good man?" He noted that the boys can learn from teachers, coaches, and other students, while adding that they receive vital wisdom, support, and guidance from their mothers. "Behind e...
Read more

"The Wisdom Within" - Writing and Thinking

In our continuing efforts through the Teaching Boys Initiative at Saint David's School ™ , one of our visiting scholars, Dr. Ric Campbell, engages in ongoing reflective practice with our faculty. Below, Dr. Campbell shares an example of a freewriting initiative that was born from the collaboration between literature teacher Jamie MacNeille and history teacher Drew Burton, who sought to address forms of student engagement in their respective disciplines.  WRITING and THINKING:  A Learning Community Engaged in the Knowledge-Making Practices of the Disciplines “Whoa, this freewriting is really helpful !” The above quote by a sixth-grade literature student captures a revelatory moment; he has discovered the wealth of ideas at the end of his pen as he writes to describe what he is noticing in the novel the class is reading and discovers that what he notices leads to questions, and that those questions, in turn, lead to bigger ideas. “All there is to thinking is seeing something not...
Read more

"The Wisdom Within" - Learning as Deliberate Practice

In the following  Wisdom Within post, Visiting TBI Scholar Dr. Ric Campbell continues his blog series on our faculty’s reflective practice program. This entry explores how three Saint David's teachers collaborated to build "self regulated" students: "expert learners who take increasing control over their learning while participating as respectful, caring members of their classroom learning community." LEARNING AS DELIBERATE PRACTICE “If schools are going to help all students become expert learners, the metacognitive capabilities of learners must be acknowledged, cultivated, and exploited. Students must be actively engaged in their own learning and knowledge building; they must be able to effectively direct their personal quest for knowledge and skills, to judge for themselves whether they understand, and to know what to do when they need more information.”  [1] Perhaps the two most important outcomes of learning across the rich and varied curriculum at Saint Dav...
Read more