Welcome back to Breck: 2024-25 School Year

Dear Breck Community,

Welcome, Mustangs! Coming back to Breck after summertime feels like a joyful reunion. There is nothing like the energy of our Mustangs returning to campus reconnecting, welcoming new friends, and meeting their teachers. On behalf of our faculty and staff, I want to share that we are thrilled to have our students’ exuberance flowing through our hallways and classrooms! As a special note, I want to express how excited we are about the leadership of our Class of ‘25 Seniors. They are a phenomenal group of caring students who will lead our school well.

From the Head of School's office, I can share that we are entering this school year with incredible success and enthusiasm. This 2024-25 school year is being shaped by the unity, continuity, and clarity that comes from our strong mission and values as well as the guidance of our five year Future Focus strategic plan. Here are just a few highlights as we start the year:

• Breck had a third-consecutive year of strong enrollment. We will begin this school year with just over 1,200 students, which is our yearly goal. The continuity of strong enrollment allows us to maintain our class sizes with our exceptional educators, offer a wide variety of clubs and programs, and provide outstanding support to our students and teachers alike. 
• We welcomed a strong group of new faculty members this year. This year’s cohort of new faculty and staff is small in number and mighty in experience and expertise. With turnover returning to a pre-Covid level, we are extremely proud to introduce this group to our community. 
• We already have strong momentum with the first priority of our strategic plan entering this school year. We are Deepening Academic Excellence through an expansion of our top level coursework with the addition of the Advanced English Scholarship and Research class. We are also making excellent progress on our budding partnership with the American School in Madrid as we expand our global connections. 

These successes are a result of great teamwork. For the past four years, I have had the privilege of partnering with Mark Garrison in his role as Breck's Chief Academic and Innovation Officer. I am happy to announce that Mark is taking on a new role as Breck's Assistant Head of School. In his previous role, Mark led our distinguished academic program, supervising our department chairs and program directors as well as a variety of other program areas. He has played a critical role in his support of hiring our diverse faculty and staff and a trusted partner in solving complex problems. From his leadership in our response to the COVID-19 pandemic to his development of our strategic plan, we are incredibly fortunate to have Mark in this new role. In addition to his experience at Breck, Mark has more than 30 years of experience in education ranging from being a classroom teacher, to innovation, to school-wide leadership. Mark’s new role will serve to support our entire campus with full responsibility to ensure the effective operations of our day-to-day programming. 

These are just a few of the many highlights we have leading into this school year. We cannot wait to share more throughout the year at your divisional meetings with your directors or at the All-Parent meetings hosted by our Parents Association. Please watch the weekly Bulletin Board each Thursday afternoon for more information. Importantly, I invite all of our returning families to make an extra effort to welcome new families. Our school is like no other and welcoming new families is a special part of creating our culture of community.

As we begin Breck's 138th year, I am reminded of the privilege we hold in leading and participating in the life of our incredible school community. We have so much to celebrate and much to anticipate. 

With warm regards,

Natalia