About
Leadership
From the Desk of the Head of School: Ransom Everglades teachers never stop learning
After school has let out and students have departed on one of our half-day Wednesdays, you will find teachers working in groups, discussing best practices and honing their approaches in the classroom. To ensure that our faculty remain among the top educators in the nation, our inaugural Director of Teaching and Learning Jessica Merrick and Assistant Director of Teaching and Learning Matthew Helmers have been facilitating opportunities for growth while providing state-of-the art educational tools and high-level support. They are working with our department chairs, coordinators and faculty not only to adhere to best practices in teaching and learning but to set the standard for educational excellence.
Even as we continually work to strengthen our curriculum – bolstered last spring with the addition of the Pathways signature program – we know that teaching is at the heart of our students’ learning. I have frequently said that teaching is both art and science. Whether in their first year or their 40th, Ransom Everglades teachers are continually advancing in the art. When they are not teaching, they – like their students – are learning.
To succeed in a 21st century classroom, our students need the highest-caliber academic instruction – and so much more. They need inclusive environments that promote belonging and facilitate a student-centered mastery of material. They need dynamic approaches that inspire curiosity and critical thinking while also allowing for cognitive resets during our 70- and 80-minute block periods. They need instructors skilled in managing the ever-evolving challenges presented by technology and artificial intelligence, as well as lesson plans that align across different sections of the same course to create equity and trust.
All of that requires planning, work and support.
Many of our faculty participated in summer professional development, and all of our first-year teachers attended the early-August Summer Institute for Teachers at the upper school that was directed by Dr. Helmers. Together, our faculty read the book Permission to Feel, met virtually with the author, and have brainstormed on ways to put lessons into practice in their classrooms. Our first- and second-year teachers have been paired with faculty mentors, and our department coordinators are being trained as instructional rounds coaches to help promote consistency and advanced approaches in the classroom. One Wednesday afternoon every month is devoted solely to faculty professional development.
The RE Board of Trustees showed its commitment to attracting and retaining the best teachers by creating the Patrick and Kristen McMahon Faculty Endowment Fund just over a year ago. Also known as the COLA endowment, that innovative initiative provides generous annual stipends to our full-time faculty to help cover the high cost-of-living in Miami and incentivize teaching at Ransom Everglades.
In their new positions, Mrs. Merrick and Dr. Helmers are working together to ensure an impressive return on that investment. And, in so doing, they are helping us advance our goal of providing a student experience that is without peer in Miami and beyond.
Rachel RodriguezHead of School
Middle School
2045 South Bayshore Drive, Coconut Grove, FL 33133Phone: 305 250 6850
Upper School
3575 Main Highway, Coconut Grove, FL 33133Phone: 305 460 8800
Accreditations and Memberships
FCIS | SAIS | NAIS | NACAC | SACAC | ACCIS |College Board | CSEE | INDEX | One Schoolhouse
Founded in 1903, Ransom Everglades School is a coeducational, college preparatory day school for grades 6 - 12 located on two campuses in Coconut Grove, Florida. Ransom Everglades School produces graduates who "believe that they are in the world not so much for what they can get out of it as for what they can put into it." The school provides rigorous college preparation that promotes the student's sense of identity, community, personal integrity and values for a productive and satisfying life, and prepares the student to lead and to contribute to society.
Ransom Everglades School®, The RE Way™, RE Pathways™ and Bowden Fellowships in the Humanities™ are trademarks of Ransom Everglades School.
Ransom Everglades School®, The RE Way™, RE Pathways™ and Bowden Fellowships in the Humanities™ are trademarks of Ransom Everglades School.