Amanda Marshall, founder of Fair Chance and co-founder of Families4Families, received the award during a school-wide assembly honoring the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 

Lower School students recently participated in an educational program with visiting musicians, arranged by the Embassy of the Republic of Indonesia in Washington, DC. The students learned about the angklung, an Indonesian musical instrument made from bamboo, which symbolizes unity and community.

Last week, the SERC-11 Independent Research class welcomed Jason Lu, Potomac’s new science fellow, who shares his time between Lower School science classes and Upper School anatomy and physiology class. As a recent graduate in neuroscience from Pomona College, CA, Mr. Lu answered a variety of questions that the juniors in the SERC program had prepared, including “What advice would you give your high school self?” “What does a career in neuroscience look like?” and “What career paths will you follow using your neuroscience degree?” 

Using anecdotes from his college experience, Mr. Lu took the students on an exploration of the brain sensory reaction to bicultural norms and discussed preliminary evidence indicating that social media could trigger brain stimuli similar to addictive drugs. He also stressed that a major in a STEM field opens up a variety of job opportunities beyond science. He emphasized the importance of a holistic college experience to become “more than your major” and the influence that history, philosophy, and arts classes have had on him. Thank you, Mr. Lu, for such an amazing conversation!

Precious Barnes, Head Athletic Trainer

While working at The Potomac School, I have had the opportunity to complete two post-graduate degrees. I have been able to broaden my skill set by focusing on topics that complement athletic health.

The students in Robert von Glahn's Civil War, Reconstruction, and the Lost Cause elective took a day away from Potomac to explore the Gettysburg Battlefield last week. The focus of the trip was a 2.5-hour tour of the battlefield, where students explored the grounds and listened to engaging stories and explanations of the battle from their official guide. Reflecting on the trip, students appreciated how the battle impacted the residents of Gettysburg and how the destruction from the battle shaped the region. Several students questioned why slavery was not more central to the tour. The class will investigate this  question in their final unit on memory and the Lost Cause.

This month, 10 members of the Potomac School community were certified as Virginia Save Our Streams (VA SOS) stream monitors. The extensive certification process taught the volunteers how to properly collect and identify a variety of benthic macroinvertebrates. The Pimmit Run stream on Potomac's campus is a rich teaching tool for all grades. Our certified stream monitors will track Pimmit Run's water quality, report their data to VA SOS, and help provide remediation as needed. In Virginia, the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) relies on VA SOS volunteers to provide an accurate picture of stream health. In fact, VA SOS volunteers supply 12% of the data for DEQ’s water quality reports to Congress.