Wednesday, September 4, 2024, was a historic day at Oak Knoll School of the Holy Child. Students in pre-K to grade 12 returned to campus to inaugurate the school’s 100th year as a remarkable independent Catholic educational institution. Members of our co-ed Lower School gathered outside Bonaventura Hall to meet new and returning classmates. They celebrated a cherished tradition by ringing the bell to start the year. Meanwhile, new and returning members of our all-girls Upper School gathered in the Mother Mary Campion Center for the Performing Arts for a rousing opening day assembly.

During that assembly, the Core Council of the Upper School, a leadership subset of the Student Council, was charged with presenting a year-long theme for the upcoming academic year. In front of an expectant crowd of students, faculty, and staff, they enthusiastically dubbed the coming milestone year “OK, Yes!”

Student Body President Betsy Burton ‘25 addressed the assembly before revealing the theme. She spoke of lessons learned during the summer as she participated in a 22-day backpacking trip along the Appalachian Trail. 

In referencing the ups and downs of the hike, she quoted the noted physicist Arthur Gordon Webster, who once said, “No one lives at the top of the mountain. It’s fine to go there occasionally, for inspiration, for new perspectives, but you have to come down. Life is lived in the valleys. That’s where the farms and gardens and orchards are, and where the plowing and the work is done. That’s where you apply the visions you may have glimpsed from the peaks. ”

“I love this quote because it shows that while these peaks may symbolize moments of great successes or joys, that isn’t where life is sustained,” explained Burton. “It isn’t practical to live indefinitely at the top. The valleys don’t have to have a negative connotation. They get to symbolize the everyday parts of life where change and development can occur.” 

Speaking to the pursuit of excellence as opposed to simply success, new Upper School Division Head Laura Hollenbaugh alluded to the process of personal daily growth as a higher achievement than medals and accolades.

“It’s about you against you,” Hollenbaugh explained. “The starting point is wherever you are right now, but there’s not a specific endpoint. You don’t stop trying to be excellent. Excellence is about the process of making steady and constant improvement and maximizing your potential over time.”

The assembly concluded with a short message from Head of School Jennifer G. Landis. She spoke of how humans come together to ascribe communal meaning to things like sounds and scrawls that eventually become language and written words. She quoted the poet Mary Oliver, who famously posed the question, “Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?”

Landis posed a similar question as students find meaning in this centennial year and celebrate Oak Knoll’s 100-year-old tradition of pursuing excellence. “What will you do with this one wild and precious year, at this special place, at this particular time in history?” she asked.

“You may choose to make meaning in a big way, like at the Mass next week, when more than 800 people will gather in prayer to honor our heritage. Or maybe in something small, like a favorite spot in the library, or a sweatshirt with the Centennial logo that you get this year and maybe pass down to one of your kids in 25 years. Whether in a big or a small way, Cornelia Connelly perhaps has already given us the answer. She said, ‘Be yourself. Only make that self all that God wants it to be.’ Make meaning of this year in a way that makes sense for you, knowing that you are children of God, you are here for a purpose, and we are so excited to share this year with you,” she warmly concluded as the auditorium exploded with applause.