Students enjoy the snow on Head of School Day.
There is not a clear beginning to the tradition of HoSD. One origin story is from 1978, when the February Blizzard dumped 27 inches of snow on campus in a 24 hour time span. Andover canceled classes on the day of, though students expressed fury in that week’s issue of The Phillipian about not having classes canceled for longer. Additionally, Former Head of School Theodore Sizer would give students a spontaneous day off in Fall Term if the football team won Andover/Exeter from 1978 to 1981. Finally, in Winter of the 1990-1991 school year, Former Head of School Donald McNemar canceled classes for a day in response to surges of influenza.
The way HoSD has been announced has also changed over the years, with each Head of School eventually using their own interests to announce it. Paul Murphy, Instructor in Mathematics, described how different Head of Schools would announce the event.
“[McNemar] would walk into the dining hall the day before, and announce it in all four dining halls. Once he got up to one dining hall everyone understood what was happening, so sometimes he would sneak in, so nobody knew he was coming into the dining hall. Then Barbara Chase [Head of School from 1994-2012] changed it a little bit, because I think she didn’t like how every time she walked into the dining hall in the winter, everyone thought that there was going to be a Head of School Day. She made it so that if she came into the dining hall with her field hockey stick and waved the field hockey stick, that signaled that no classes would happen the next day. Then John Palfrey changed it to the squash racket, and then Dr. Kington has his hat that he wears,” said Murphy.
This year’s HoSD was announced during the ASM as many students were already packing up to leave. Kington appeared on the balcony above the stage and lifted his hat, to cheers from the audience. Ozochi Onunaku ’25 described the scene and noted that an announcement at ASM allows everyone to celebrate together, as opposed to other announcement methods.
“Dr. Kington tipped off his top hat, and I remember people just standing up, giving a standing ovation, and applauding him for announcing Head of School Day would take place on that Monday. I was jumping because that would be my birthday… I think there’s a very tangible difference in between the levels of hype generated at each event, because in [Paresky] Commons, people are very happy, but there’s probably just a tenth of the school eating at Commons at any given moment. Whereas at ASM, everyone is there, and everyone is just universally celebrating with cheer and joy,” said Onunaku.
Many students expressed their desire to use the long weekend to find their footing with academic work and relax with friends and family. Colette Ruiz ’27 spoke about her plans for the long weekend, noting her hope to take it easy.
“Personally, I have been battling two bouts of sickness these past couple of weeks. [The Head of School Day] is a really great opportunity and also considerate of the school to give me another chance to catch up on stuff, spend some time with family, and [take] care of myself too.… I took Friday semi-off just because I wanted to spend time with friends and family, and I thought [because] I have an extra day so I could kind of treat myself,” said Ruiz.
Overall, students enjoyed HoSD very much. Onunaku elaborated on the value of HoSD, noting that it is both a meaningful tradition and gives students something to look forward to throughout the long winter term.
“The most important thing of it all [is that] it’s tradition. You can’t take away tradition, even if it might be a slight minor inconvenience for the amount of class time that a teacher has. Tradition is what really builds up the school’s community and the school’s culture, and without tradition, if you begin chipping away at the foundations of these traditions, I feel like students won’t have the glimmers of hope that they would want in terms, such as the dreary winter term,” said Onunaku.
