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Strategic Plan

The Courage to Climb: Berwick Academy's Strategic Plan for the Future

Vision
Propelled by its aspirational mission and the courage to evolve, Berwick Academy's innovative curriculum prepares students for a rapidly changing world. A Berwick education positions students to confidently take on and adapt to the dynamic opportunities that will exist for them in the future.
Objectives
Berwick will harness its culture of innovation and continuously reflect on the ways it can challenge and support students to reach their full potential. Inspired by the high aspirations of our students, this plan will enhance the tenets of the Berwick curriculum:
  • Student-directed learning
  • Skills over content; depth over breadth
  • Innovation
  • Wellness, character education, and public purpose 
  • Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI)
To accomplish this, the strategic plan enhances student opportunities through after-school and summer programming; partnerships that provide internships and learning opportunities; and a focus on environmental stewardship. The strategic plan fortifies Berwick’s approach to justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion and ensures that our essential academic systems fully support this work in our curriculum. The parallel support of The Campaign for Berwick will ensure Berwick’s future durability and flexibility to thrive for generations to come.

Systems for the Future

Berwick will strengthen the infrastructure that supports its student-centered, skills-based curriculum. With a continued emphasis on the positive relationships between teachers and students, a cornerstone of success at the School, we turn our focus to key initiatives that facilitate instruction and learning on campus. This work will be strengthened in several important areas, including division-to-division transitions for students; faculty professional development; faculty hiring and retention efforts; and the use of data to inform future decision-making.

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    While Curriculum 2020, a key component of the previous strategic plan, focused on what Berwick needed to do to enhance the preparation of its students for a world beyond the School, the plan for the next five years will address the how. The School is evaluating how departments are structured, how chairs are selected, how long they serve, and how to offer the best professional growth opportunities for faculty.

Justice, Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion (JEDI)

Berwick will finalize a curricular JEDI approach, increase opportunities to host creative programming and partner with local organizations to solidify the School as a resource both on campus and throughout the Seacoast, and continue to build a community that more closely reflects the world beyond the Hilltop.

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  • Read More on JEDI

    Critical to Berwick’s success is the School’s work around justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion (JEDI). Building on the work of the previous strategic plan, which focused on increasing cultural competency at Berwick, this essential goal of the new plan will incorporate inclusive programming into all three divisions. When evaluating JEDI, the School will look at how that translates in terms of faculty and staff hires, who sits on the Board of Trustees, and what it means in general to be a community that values diversity and inclusivity.

Auxiliary Programs

Auxiliary programs will provide Berwick and the greater Seacoast community opportunities to engage in innovative after-school and summer experiences. This additional programming will provide families with services to enhance the Berwick student experience and increase local visibility. Auxiliary programming will also create access to campus facilities and generate additional revenue sources to bolster financial sustainability.

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    To limit the draw on endowment and augmented tuition, the School must seek alternate sources of income in the form of auxiliary programs. This includes offering after-school or summer programs for both Berwick and community children and making school facilities more available for rental. Offering “one-stop shopping” for current Berwick families—music lessons or dance classes, for example—would benefit families and also generate additional income for the School. 

Strategic Partnerships

Berwick will create and foster strategic partnerships that will provide opportunities to enhance the student and faculty experience. These partnerships will provide students with job shadowing, increased mentoring for Innovation Pursuits, and off campus trips to augment their classroom experiences.

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    The development of strategic partnerships is a goal that will carry over into many areas of school life. Among the initiatives is for Berwick to create an internship program that facilitates opportunities for students in a variety of industries on the Seacoast. This could mean providing practical experiences for students within the fields of medicine, law, engineering, and sustainability, among many other areas. Relationships with strategic partners will help make these job shadow opportunities happen and Berwick hopes to form alliances with other schools, the University of New Hampshire in particular.

Sustainability

Berwick will build a culture of environmental sustainability that empowers community members to be stewards of the natural world. This initiative will be pursued through education, partnerships, action, and self-assessment.

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    The School is steadfast in its desire to grow its commitment to the environment. In addition to recently hiring Sarah Jeanne Shimer as Berwick’s first Sustainability Coordinator, environmental stewardship will find its way into the classroom across all three divisions. Younger students will learn about what it means to be aware of their natural surroundings early in their Berwick careers through a planned outdoor education program.

Financial Durability

Berwick will secure its financial future through a $15 million capital campaign — a transformational investment in the School — and other fiduciary efforts that will provide financial durability and flexibility to support talented students and faculty for generations to come.

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  • Read More on Financial Durability

    A significant part of enhancing financial sustainability at Berwick is a $15 million capital campaign with a mission of “securing a financial future.” Growing the endowment is a top priority of the campaign, billed as a “transformational investment for our school” that comes with the “flexibility to thrive.” 

Berwick Academy

31 Academy Street
South Berwick, Maine 03908

Contact:
Admission | 207.384.6300
Main Office | 207.384.2164
Berwick Academy, situated on an 80-acre campus just over one hour north of Boston, serves 520 students, Pre-Kindergarten through Grade 12 and Postgraduates. Berwick students are from Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, and several countries. Deeply committed to its mission of promoting virtue and useful knowledge, Berwick Academy empowers students to be creative and bold. Berwick strives to graduate alumni who shape their own learning, take risks, ask thoughtful questions, and come to understand and celebrate their authentic selves.

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