1. We have on-campus turtle tunnels and even wrote a song called “Turtles Gonna Roam!”
2. There’s an uncanny number of snakes here, and students have very strong opinions on their favorite…(It’s Candy Corn).
3. Our weekly Middle School FLEX offerings include options like Dungeons & Dragons and Frazleerham.
4. 2nd grade gets to play with fire!!! (Well, kinda. They learn about the importance of controlled burning on longleaf pine ecosystems).
5. Everyone knows (and loves) Martina’s Spanish puppet, Búho the Owl.
6. Students don’t say “bird” or “bug.” They know and use their scientific names instead. Golden silk orb-weaver, anyone?
7. Our class pets are anything but typical. Bearded dragons and snakes and hedgehogs, oh my!
8. Students’ favorite science experiment? The “poop lab,” where they simulate digestion.
9. Sorting trash is an actual part of the curriculum.
10. We once had an elective dedicated to “circus arts” in the early 2000s.
11. Our most popular school play is about aliens learning how to recycle and compost.
12. We sing. A lot.
13. Our most-used call/response is the Ghanaian ago/amé!
14. Early yearbooks had entire pages dedicated to quirky nicknames for each student.
15. 8th graders design their own yearbook pages—and they’re peak Middle School.
16. Students are on a first-name basis with their teachers. (Hey, that’s the coolest part of attending a Quaker school, right?!)
17. We’ll find ANY excuse to get together outside of school. A full-moon picnic on the beach??? Count me in!
18. Why read about buoyancy when you can sail a cardboard boat around the Intracoastal Waterway?
19. We named our preschool classrooms after the world’s most terrifying fish: the stargazer.
20. Bald Head Island becomes a special studio for Middle School artists each year.
21. The Quaker consensus process can be hilariously long—like the time we debated what to do with a goose nest for MONTHS.
22. Our after-school CARE counselor (and ‘19 alumni) is a black belt in jiu-jitsu and teaches kids martial arts!
23. Candy Cane Grand Marshal, David, is more popular than Santa himself.
24. Your best friend is your peer buddy—even when there’s a four-year age difference.
25. We spend a lot of time outside. So much so that we now have a 3-acre EE campus with... you guessed it…more snakes!
26. Students probably spend more time reading in, on, or under a tree than at a desk.
27. Our Middle School teachers write special haikus to celebrate each graduating student.
28. 8th graders write and deliver graduation speeches, so they can share their unique journeys in their own words.
29. Learning how to quiet the body and mind is a skillset that students truly master here.
30. Some of our earliest alumni now send their own children to FSW. (A truly beautiful full-circle moment).
