School's Underway!

Penn Charter students, teachers and staff kicked off the 2024-25 school year with smiles, high-fives and an opening assembly that welcomed the community to the 100th year on PC’s present-day campus, known as Pinehurst.

In her remarks, Head of School Karen Warren Coleman shared with students the theme of the school year, Community: Together We Thrive – Listen, Lean In, Build Trust.

“One of the many things our faculty do so well at Penn Charter," she said, “is to educate and prepare students for the world that ought to be – as it could be. 

“Robert Lawrence Smith, a Quaker educator and author of The Quaker Book of Wisdom, posed the question ‘What makes a good school?’

“Smith’s response to this question always makes me beam with pride,” she said, “as it describes everything I know about and have experienced here at PC. He says, ‘A good school is one that is constantly engaged in self-examination, in improving itself, in becoming wiser in its ability to teach and inspire. It’s a school that is intent on turning out good people who make a better world.’” 

Louella Whitaker, senior class clerk, shared her own perspective. “To create a strong community, we must find things we share in common – points of connection that will bring us together rather than pull us apart. Yes, we each bring something unique to this community, and that is what makes this place so beautiful, but finding similarities, even with our differences, is what will allow us to grow as individuals and as a community.”

Other highlights of the assembly included Coleman presenting the Class of 2025 with its official class banner; the Quakers Dozen performing “Meeting for Worship (After a While)” – based on a poem by Helen Morgan Brooks, with music written and arranged by choral director Tony Yoo; and Paul Hough OPC ’77, in his first address to the PC community as clerk of the Board of Trustees, articulating his wish for students: “May those red doors inspire you every day to do great things.” 

See photos of the Opening Assembly and the first day of school in all divisions, including pre-K and kindergarten.