Today’s young people are reckoning with a harsh social-political climate. Some of our students are also grieving the loss of their parents or guardians since the onset of the pandemic. It can be difficult to be hopeful during these times and to find healing, joy, and even mercy. 

Carver programs provide students with opportunities to feel safe and supported while engaging in critical thinking and diverse thought. Our programs also offer mercy — a word deceptive in its seeming softness, for beneath its surface lurks a dark core: the very concept of mercy only exists because of and as a counterpoint to the world’s capacity for cruelty. We work hard to make sure our support reaches out and reaches out and reaches out. We always give our young people another chance, another day, over and over and over.

Framing “learning loss” caused by the pandemic, for example, can be paralyzing, demoralizing, and demotivating. Instead of “learning loss,” we embrace a framing of mastery. Instead of disengaging from school because some are so far behind, we help our students focus on making learning fun and helping them to believe achievement is attainable no matter how far they must go. Carver students are setting goals, and they are planning on how they are going to reach them. They are learning, and then they are showing evidence of what they’ve learned. That informs what they do next. That creates a successful cycle of positivity.

Carver has the time and resources to offer an agile educational experience for our students designed to innovate, bend, and stretch to meet the needs of every student, including our most complex learners. Examining data helps us to identify which students are not getting what they need. We are constantly inventorying community-based learning opportunities and resources, as well as the extent to which they are accessible to our students and families. 

A great truth, attributed to Emily Dickinson, is that “hope inspires the good to reveal itself.” Gravity and sadness yank us down, and hope and mercy give us a nudge to help one another get back up. Carver’s tagline is “Building Lifetime Achievers.” This entire website is replete with technical writing about project-based and hands-on learning, STEM education, workforce development, and so on. But what truly makes the Carver culture as nurturing and joyful as it is, are much bigger words like mercy, hope, and goodness.