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St. Mark’s School

Private K-12 School

Mailing Address
25 Marlboro Road
Southborough, Massachusetts 01772
Phone
(508) 786-6000
School Information
"St. Mark’s School is a coeducational, Episcopal, preparatory school, situated on 250 acres in Southborough, Massachusetts, 25 miles from Boston. Founded in 1865 by Joseph Burnett, who developed and marketed the world-famous Burnett Vanilla Extract. St. Mark's is one of the oldest private boarding schools in New England and is a member of the Independent School League in competitive athletics." The school enrolls over 370 students, has a 6:1 student-faculty ratio, and offers an academic program requiring students to complete "four years of English, one year of courses in both the arts and religion, three years in mathematics (Algebra I, Algebra II and Geometry), three years of one language, two years of lab science, and U.S. History." (Source: https://www.stmarksschool.org/about/about) (Source: https://www.stmarksschool.org/about/school-profile)
General Information
St. Mark's School's head of school announced that it "will incorporate antiracism content more fully into the St. Mark's curriculum" and "will incorporate antiracism practice more fully into all elements of our educational program outside the classroom," though the content of the curriculum is not yet known. Additionally, faculty and staff were required to engage in "mandatory antiracist professional development programming."

Actions Taken

Anti-Racism, Bias, and Diversity Training
  • The school had student-led workshops, such as “Tracing the Roots of Colorism," “A Privilege ‘Walk’,” and "“Navigating Blackness vs. Whiteness."
Curriculum Changes and Requirements
  • The head of school announced that the school "will incorporate antiracism content more fully into the St. Mark's curriculum" and "will incorporate antiracism practice more fully into all elements of our educational program outside the classroom."
  • The school "Completed more intentional antiracist curriculum work, such as developing a IV Form English course focusing on social justice identity development, and an environmental science course unit on vulnerability of Black and Brown Americans to COVID-19 due to urban inequity."
Disciplinary Measures
  • The school has a bias incident reporting form "to collect instances of insensitivity, bias, and discrimination." The information will be used "to monitor the campus climate, inform training, program planning, and policy development."
Faculty/Staff Requirements
  • "Faculty and staff members will engage in mandatory antiracist professional development programming," the school announced, "Every year, all faculty and staff members will participate in at least one daylong on-campus professional development program on race. In addition, all faculty will be required to attend a regional or national diversity conference at least every three years."
Resources
  • The school has created an Office of Community and Equity, which "creates the conditions for this kind of self-discovery and growth through programs and initiatives that help every student better appreciate their many identities, as well as the identities of their peers and classmates."
  • The school launched its Antiracist Strategic Plan, which will "bring us closer to our goal of becoming an antiracist institution."
  • The school created an "Anti-Racism Task Force" to "identify action steps for St. Mark’s to take both inside and outside the classroom so that St. Mark’s is an antiracist school."
  • The school's magazine listed Ibram X. Kendi's "How to be an Antiracist" and Robin DiAngelo's "White Fragility" on its reading list.
  • The school created a "Board of Trustees Antiracism: Community and Equity Committee to oversee the School’s progress in its advance to doing the ongoing work of becoming an antiracist school community."
  • A writer for the school paper, The St. Marker, said that, "This year’s C&E day centered around anti-racism. Although not all 13 student-led workshops on the C&E day may have included the word race in their titles, all of them certainly had an influence in promoting anti-racism in our community, in one way or another."
Symbolic Actions
Last updated July 26th, 2022
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