September bring connection and growth

9/23/2025

Heather Thomas, Principal, Head of School

The 2025-2026 school year is well underway and September has already brought many opportunities for connection and growth.

Students and staff started the year on Outdoor Education Trips – a chance to connect with each other and with nature. This immersive experiential week is a cornerstone of the Greenwood program and enables students to develop collaboration, problem solving, leadership, resilience and perseverance. Well-being is supported as students get outside, develop bonds and are physically active.

Just last week, the Greenwood alumni and parent/guardian communities got outside and connected at our Greenwood Community Golf Tournament. Thank you to all who participated in and/or sponsored this memorable event!

During September we began both of our partnerships with pluralism leaders: ConnectEd and Irshad Manji. Staff engaged in a powerful professional development session with Yoni Buckman from ConnectEd, who guided us through a workshop on how to plan for and facilitate courageous conversations in our classrooms. Tomorrow we will host Irshad Manji at Greenwood to facilitate workshops for students, staff and parents/guardians throughout the day. This work is important as we strive to create an inclusive community in which everyone feels they belong.

Throughout the month, the innovative Greenwood teachers have again embraced AI to enhance student learning. Supporting our teachers’ ability to grow and leverage technology are two Coordinators of Learning Technology, Lucas Tompkins and Charles Jennings, as well as Jonathan Tepper who is our Executive Director, Information & Learning Technology. We have a cohort of teachers who are participating in an AI Professional Learning Community with teams from other independent schools and much cross-pollination of strategies and technology use will occur throughout the year ahead.

And, there has been a great deal of activity south of Balliol Street as the Greenspace development emerges from the dirt! We are all looking forward to the day in late October or early November when we will be able to get outside and start using the field, outdoor classroom and social space that this development will provide.

As the year unfolds, we will continue to Venture Further Together as we move through our fifth and final year of our current strategic plan. The imperatives of this plan guide our growth and community initiatives:

Define and communicate a vision, strategy and role of mental health & well-being;
Create a diverse, equitable, and inclusive community that fosters a sense of belonging;
Inspire discovery through personalized experiential learning;
Continue to lead in the smart use of technology on and off campus to enable innovative learning approaches;
Develop a bold masterplan to re-imagine Greenwood’s campus of the future.

I look forward to keeping you informed about our progress throughout the year.

Thank you Greenwood. I look forward to another fantastic year together.

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Greenwood College School

443 Mount Pleasant Road
Toronto, ON M4S 2L8
Tel: 416 482 9811

We acknowledge with gratitude the Ancestral lands upon which our main campus is situated. These lands are the Ancestral territories of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation, Anishinabek and the Wendake. The shared responsibility of this land is honoured in the Dish with One Spoon Treaty and we strive to care for the land, the waters, and all creatures in the spirit of peace. We are responsible for respecting and supporting the enduring presence of all First Nations, Métis and Inuit peoples. When away from this campus we vow to be respectful to the land by protecting and honouring it. We will create relationships with the people and the land we may visit by understanding the territories we enter and the nations who inhabit them.