After twenty-two years of working at Lovett, Ms. McLeavy, our Head of Languages at the Upper School, still gets excited about returning in August.
As I sat down with her for our interview in her room, it was clear that her decor was minimalistic. She even said so herself! However, she managed to bring a lot of personality to the few decorations she had in her room. A poster saying “love is love” with beautiful pink hearts on it really stood out to me.
She’s feeling ready to start another year, thanks to her rejuvenating summer. She spent a month in Charleston and two weeks at a Florida beach, decompressing from last year and getting herself ready for this one.
“It was maybe too serene because it made me want to stay there!” she jokes. But she loves the fact that teachers get summers off because it “gives teachers a break to be able to kind of regroup” and “gives everyone a fresh start.”
Fresh starts are also a theme for her since this year, she’s taking on a new advisory. A junior advisory. “It’s always hard to come into an advisory that’s already established," she says, "but I wanted to take a junior group.”
Junior year is clearly very stressful but she wants to help them build their resume and have them feel like someone is looking out for them once they leave Lovett. She also wants to help because this time is a “hard time to have an advisor leave,” and hopes to be someone they can rely on.
The start of the first “normal” school year since the COVID-19 pandemic began is also something that she’s excited for. She looks forward to being able to have a year “where it’s not crazy… or with everybody being uncomfortable.”
Still, it was a bit scary for her due to her experience with cancer last summer. She says that we’ll just have to wait and see how the year goes for her healthwise (we love you Ms. McLeavy and are here to help!). This is also her first year not wearing a mask, and she says she likes not having to feel like she’s the only one that’s wearing a mask anymore.
Original source can be found here.
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