An Announcement from the Director of Schools and Head of Upper School

I want to share with you a change that will be happening within our administrative team at the conclusion of this academic year: a change that is bittersweet to me.

However, Charlie will not be retiring from Cranbrook Schools. Instead, he will be joining our development office as an important contributor in the effort to make our ambitious plan for the future of Cranbrook a reality. I cannot think of a better ambassador for Cranbrook Schools or a more compelling advocate for all that we might yet become.

Cranbrook is beginning to look ahead to the realization of its master plan, a plan that includes new athletic and performing arts facilities as well as a state-of-the-art, cross-programmatic innovation center. We also look ahead to further advancing connected and online learning, the application of educational technology, the concepts of innovation and entrepreneurship, the maker space model, and STEAM education across the curriculum at all grades. These are important and exciting changes that will help keep the school a leader in education and relevant to the highly talented students and faculty that compose the Upper School.

Charlie is no stranger to innovation and change. He has been an important force behind managing the steeply climbing pace of change in the past 10-15 years brought about, in part, by the technological revolution. On-line comments, CranNet courses, SMART boards in classrooms, new usage for the Kingswood Lower Level, a new upper school academic schedule, and an expanded reach of the College Counseling office are just a few of the changes that have happened on his watch and with his considered input. Few administrators have the experience and the vision to help shape the next stage of Cranbrook’s growth, Charlie is certainly one of them.

Even the love of his professional life, the teaching of English, makes him a one-in-a-million find for the work he will be doing. He is a master of the American Story, and it is entirely fitting that he will now be telling Cranbrook Schools’ story across the country and the world.

We will be conducting a year-long, nation-wide search to identify the next head of the Upper School. We will be utilizing the consulting firm of Carney, Sandoe & Associates to help us conduct that search. The committee tasked with leading the search will be co-chaired by Assistant Director of Schools Tom De Craene and Upper School Dean of Faculty Claudia Schuette.

Please join me in thanking Charlie for all his years of service to the students of the Upper School. Likewise, please join me in congratulating him in his newest role at Cranbrook.

Sincerely,

Arlyce M. Seibert,
Director of Cranbrook Schools

Dear Cranbrook Schools Community,

Today I announce that I will be stepping down as head of the Upper School at the end of this school year, in June, 2016. This decision comes after long and careful consideration of timing and with some keen moments of both anticipation and pause. This decision seems to be a fitting capstone to a profoundly satisfying forty-year run, which has taken me into a deep and cherished engagement with English classrooms, dorms, soccer and lacrosse teams, Horizons-Upward Bound, and 21 years of administrative work. From my first year of appointment in fall of 1976, I knew that I had fallen headlong into the greatest good fortune. Here I have known the most dedicated and nurturing of collaboration with an infinitely resourceful faculty and administration. I have known the support of the most gracious and most grateful of families. Above all, I have known the deepest love and loyalty of students for their school and their faculty, even when the bloom of childhood was a distant memory. Forty quick years on, I turn around to notice that Cranbrook—the place and its people—has metamorphosed from prose into poetry.

The Cranbrook Kingswood Upper School has staked out positions of excellence and leadership widely acknowledged in the independent school world; however, a very critical moment faces us. No challenge is more pressing than insuring a future for our Schools that is sustainable, competitive and accessible. I am fortunate to be able next to turn to that challenge and to work in our development office. Urgent needs for a new performing arts center, a new athletic field house, and an innovation center will keep me in conversation with students, faculty, and alums. New pedagogies in the areas of STEAM, discipline-crossing, knowledge production, connected learning, and entrepreneurship are asking for our full engagement.

To all, I extend gratitude beyond measure. I believe that the next Cranbrook is already beckoning to us and I am eager to put my shoulder to the wheel.

Sincerely,

Charles Shaw
Head of Cranbrook Kingswood Upper School