The Archivist’s Closet: Reflecting on the 2019-20 School Year

With the temporary closure of our building this past spring and the transition to iSelectLearning for the last quarter, the 2019–20 academic year certainly established its place in Friends Select’s history. It’s difficult to say, for sure, whether it was the first 
time the school closed for an extended period; I can imagine the 1918 flu pandemic affected how Friends Select operated, but without files from those years, it’s hard to say for sure. In the five decades I’ve worked at Friends Select, however, I’ve never experienced anything like the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
 
There are many instances during the school’s history in which students were affected by circumstances that were, at times, unforeseen. In 1968, a surprise thunderstorm forced the graduating class (pictured above) to take their group picture on the facing benches in the Meeting House, making them the only class without a picture outside. The global oil crisis of 1979 led to a closure of the building for one week as the nation panicked over a gasoline shortage. During the 1986-87 school year, the back doors of the building became the front entrance as construction on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway restricted access; the Class of 1987 commemorated the project with a yearbook that opened from the back. I believe we are the only Quaker school to close twice for papal visits to Philadelphia, in 1979 and 2015. And, of course, there are the students from 1967 to 1969 who attended classes in the YMCA during the construction of the current building. 

On Friday, June 12, Friends Select honored the Class of 2020  with a graduation ceremony unlike any the school has previously experienced: students and their families attended a drive-in style celebration in the parking lot of Enon Tabernacle Baptist Church. Families arrived in cars decorated for graduation and honked horns in place of applause, and students hung out of windows and sunroofs to greet their classmates and teachers. Head of school Michael Gary, upper school director Chris Singler, board president Ingrid Lakey ’89 P’27, and classmates addressed graduating students safely in their cars as they tuned into the audio through an FM transmitter. Jumbotrons projected speeches, student musical performances, and the names of the Class of 2020, and there was also a livestream of the celebration. Although we could not gather in the Meeting House, the school retained as much of the graduation tradition as possible to appropriately send off our seniors.

I can imagine, for many students, being apart from classmates and teachers was difficult, especially for those who were preparing to say “goodbye” to Friends Select. Missing final athletic seasons, last performances in the Blauvelt Theatre, special traditions, and rites of passage—or experiencing them as Zoom calls—was far from what our graduating seniors expected. But, with that, the Class of 2020 will forever hold a unique place in the school’s archives.