San Antonio Academy - Blue Bonnet Yearbook (San Antonio, TX)

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Major W. T. Bondurant, Jr.

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rm Sh Be oe x A Message from the Chairman of the Board There have been ever-changing trends in education since the | earliest days of formal training. When the perapetetic teacher, such : as Socrates, began to teach while walking about instead of being seated in the garden or the atrium of his home, he was viewed with skepticism and hailed as someone to be feared for his was a new way. Today this is still the case since we have changed very little in our ability to accept | change. What was good enough for grandfather should be good enough for his grandson! Lately around the Academy many parents have been hearing about the “new math.” ‘This has caused not a little consternation and some questioning as to whether or not this type of mathematics is going to answer all the needs. It is still too early to be completely definitive in a discussion of the true value of the math in the rather complex vastness of what we b) term “the future.” However, we do know that as long as such a thing as education exists with freedom of choice, it will be the obligation of schools such as the Academy to introduce students to such methods and techniques as tend to be the most advantageous among the changes or trends. Each boy here must have an opportunity to Know what is going on not only in the fields of science, literature, history, geography, etc. . . , but also in the field of education to which he is so closely allied each day. We, as your instructors, and you, as those who have been exposed to all that we can give, face an everchanging world together confident that all have their eyes on those distant horizons but with strong beliefs in the past as well as the future. PAGE 7

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The President's Message During the past few months, I have been very concerned over an increasing tendency on the part of all parents to begin to concern themselves with the question, “Isn’t too much being expected and demanded of my child at too early an age?” Fathers and mothers wondered this same thing when the draft age was lowered from 21 to 18. They wondered if children weren't finishing school too early, and they finally added another grade to keep them from attaining college too soon. Always questions arise and those who would seek the hardest to foster their feelings usually can bring about those changes that satisfy their deepest convictions. Beliefs that are strong enough usually manifest themselves in concrete accomplishments. Today we live in a world that demands more of each man than any time that we can think back to in our retrospection. Our time has been one of much tension and pressure, but only few of us know a childhood that can parallel that of our children who have been raised in an,atmosphere of almost continuing war and a constant fear of atomic destruction. To most of us they are the means of stabilizing the world and solving its complex problems. If this Rito be the case, then they must bear the burden and must be far better prepared than we. Cf J, In our seventh.grade we learn the poem by Longfellow, The Builders, and we might well take our cue from one of his stanzas: “Build today, then, strong and sure, With a firm and ample base: And ascending and secure Shall tomorrow find its place.” PAGE 9