To kick off the 2018-19 school year, the Upper School held its annual Summer Reading Day where students and teachers spent the entire day discussing the book their group read and participating in related activities. In total, Upper School students and faculty read 34 books that varied in style and topic, including:
- A Good Walk Spoiled
- A River Runs Through It
- All the Light We Cannot See
- Between the World and M
- Born to Run
- Cruciverbalism: A Crosswod Fanatics's Guide to Life in the Grid
- Eleanor and Park
- Exit West
- High Fidelity
- How the Irish Saved Civilization
- I am Legend
- Joy Luck Club
- Killing the Rising Sun
- Kinky Gazpacho: Life, Love & Spain
- Leah on the Off-Beat
- Legacy: What the All Blacks Can Teach Us About the Business of Life
- Living College Life in the Front Row
- Mo' Meta Blues
- Never Caught: The Washingtons' Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave Ona Judge
- One Size Does Not Fit All: A Student's Assessment of School
- Parable of the Sower
- Sacred Hoops
- Stiff
- The Boys in the Boat
- The Damned United
- The Future of Humanity
- The Hate U Give
- The Perfect Mile: Three Athletes, One Goal, and Less Than Four Minutes to Achieve it
- The Perfect Storm
- The Princess Bride: S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure
- The Revenant: A Novel of Revenge
- The Right Kind of Crazy: A True Story of Teamwork, Leadership, and High-Stakes Innovation
- The Two Towers
- Thirteen Gold Monkeys
Head of School Rich Schellhas' group read Never Caught: The Washingtons' Relentless Pursuit of Their Runaway Slave Ona Judge by Erica Armstrong Dunbar.
"As part of the day, we had a private tour of the Germantown White House, where the Washington family and their slaves lived twice during his presidency and which is right around the corner from GA's original campus on School House Lane," wrote Schellhas, who co-led the group along with Middle School/Upper School Library Assistant Rod Thomas, Director of Equity and Inclusion Anika Walker-Johnson, and Director of Institutional Advancement Audrey Schnur. "Then we visited 'old GA,' now home to the Pennsylvania School for the Deaf, where we had a special tour by Head of School Peter Bailey (all in sign language with an interpreter) to see where George Washington Parke Custis went to GA and where we got to see the 'original' admin building and Belfry tower."
Many other groups also took advantage of the day, including Upper School Science Teacher Becky Pizzino and Director of Alumni Relations Heather Durkin's group, who read Thirteen Gold Monkeys by Benjamin Beck. Thirteen Gold Monkeys is a book focused on the conservation efforts to both save and reintroduce golden lion tamarin monkeys to the Brazilian rainforest. With that theme in mind, Pizzino and Durkin's group visited Elmwood Park Zoo where they had a chance to see golden lion tamarins up-close and learn about conservation efforts the zoo is undertaking.
All in all, the 2018 Summer Reading Day was a huge success.