Here are some highlights from the last two weeks—January 6 through January 16—in the Upper School.
🏀 It’s DAM JAM week! The excitement is palpable on campus as students look ahead to Dam Jam, Beaver’s annual evening of winter athletics and community gathering. This year’s Dam Jam was preluded by a spirit week planned by Student Council, with themes like “jersey vs. jersey shore,” “dress up,” and “all black” encouraging students to get involved. The hype continued on Friday during a teachers vs. student basketball game held to kick off Dam Jam day.
To follow along with all things Dam Jam, visit Beaver and BVR Athletics on Instagram!
📲 All about algorithms. Author, researcher, and professor Jill Walsh visited campus to speak to Upper School students about social media. Walsh detailed how algorithms work, including how they tap into human psychology to purposefully aggravate and retain user’s attention. She provided several tips for students including:
- Pay attention to how much tech you use in one sitting.
- Follow accounts that post positive content you actually want to see more of, purposefully “disrupting your feed” for the better.
- Consider how you want to react to inflammatory posts before engaging with your feed.
🔍 Justice, in action. Students in Theories of Justice visited the Call & Response Exhibit at Harvard Countway Library as part of an inquiry into reproductive justice. The art exhibition—which explored the exploitation of enslaved Black women in the founding of modern gynecology—expanded students’ ongoing conversations surrounding the topic.
This visit showed me that justice means more than fairness today. It means acknowledging and honoring the people who were harmed in the past.
Kaili Griffin '27
🔬 Full STEAM ahead! Nine female-identifying students attended the Girls in STEAM Leadership Summit at Cushing Academy to dive deeper into all things science, technology, engineering, art & design, and math. The day featured a number of hands-on workshops and gave students a chance to learn from female experts in various fields including biochemistry, dentistry, and architecture.
🧮 Math, reimagined. Michela Fletcher ’27 visited students at Wellan Montessori School to pilot a math activity book she designed as part of of an SDP focused on different learning styles. Inspired by her Hiatt Summer Fellowship at Lexington Montessori School, Michela set out to design a resource that enables students to take different approaches towards developing the same foundational math skills.
To learn more about the work students are doing with SDPs, click here!
🎼 Aca-scuse me? Yale a cappella group Mixed Company visited Beaver to meet and perform for students. Following the performance—which was open for all student to attend—the group led a workshop for B-Side A Cappella to strengthen skills such as blending, harmonizing, and performing.