Sunday, February 26, 2006. Business meeting.

MS. BRIZENDINE: Good afternoon. You'd better find a seat, because we're expecting standing room only for this business meeting. Yep, it's a good thing you got here, because there's only going to be standing room.

Good afternoon, everybody. How are you? We're going to go ahead and get started, so that we can move on to the festivities of the evening and have a good time.

Welcome to the opening of the 85th annual conference, the business meeting. I'm Bodie Brizendine, and as president, it's my pleasure to welcome you all, which I do wholeheartedly. I want to make sure that everyone knows what they're doing, what we're doing, and how the Council is performing. We will go through our reports momentarily.

I'll begin by introducing Bruce Galbraith, our fearless leader, who is a fabulous, fabulous person. Bruce.

MR. GALBRAITH: Thank you, Bodie. A few quick announcements: The reception has been moved inside, and will be in the area right outside these doors, which is great, because I want you to remember this space. All the meetings are here, in case things blur after the cocktail hour.

The dinner is across the street at the Riviera Theater, an art deco theater that the hotel purchased and renovated a few years ago. We will have a "Welcome to Charleston" start, and dinner follows that immediately.

But following this meeting, there's a half hour before the cocktail time starts. You may recall that we've begun a tradition that, following the memorials, we will leave the room in silence, to bring the proper decorum to that moment. Then there will be time to change clothes or stop back at the registration table and pick up the things you didn't get at registration.

There are nametags and programs for everyone. I think that concludes all I have to say. If you have anything we can do to make your stay better, please find me and let me know what it is, and we'd be glad to accommodate you.

The officers will proceed with their reports as listed on this program, and then Bodie will be back to introduce the four folks who will report about either crossing the pond or flying north to Canada, flying south to the United States, from the various associations, and then memorial resolutions will be done at the end of the meeting. Thanks again to Blair, to whom we are most grateful for doing that so well. Thank you and we'll continue with the meeting.

MS. DAVID: I'm Marlene David. I love having the nuts and bolts of Bruce before the treasurer's report is truly nuts and bolts, but important to do, nonetheless. I'm going to start with the good news, which is that all three parts of our budget are operating in the black this year, as they did last year. The financial committee and the Council monitor the operating budget, which includes this conference, seminars, and the operation of the association.

There were handouts at the back of the room, and there are a couple of things that are a follow-up to our report of last year. We had an audit last year and on the suggestion of our auditors, we've had a review this year, which gave us a clear picture and that move saved us $3,000 to $4,000 - having the review instead of the audit.

Then in December of 2004, about 13, 14 months ago, we moved $125,000 into a Charles Schwab account. The goal there was that perhaps we would do better than with some of the traditional CDs that we had had in the past. It has grown to $139,000 in 13 months, so it's just a little over 10 percent. We're happy with that.

Then we moved some additional funds into one-to-two-year CDs, and that is our reserve fund in case we need to touch it throughout the operating budget. But it's readily accessible.

That is my treasurer's report, and unless there are any questions, I'd appreciate a motion to approve the financial report. (So moved by several people.)

MS. DAVID: We need a second.

MS. BRIZENDINE: I think we need discussion.

MS. DAVID: Do we need some discussion? Hearing no discussion, all in favor of approving the treasurer's report. Opposed? None. Thank you very much.

MR. BLANCHARD: I'm Steve Blanchard, and it's a pleasure to welcome everyone to Charleston, as well, and to introduce six new member schools. The first one is mine, St. Andrew's Episcopal School, in Ridgeland, Mississippi. There are three schools whose heads are not here, but I'd like to recognize them. Woodlands Academy of the Sacred Heart, Lake Forest, Illinois. Gerald Grossman is the head of school.

Cambridge Friends School, in Cambridge Massachusetts. Mary Newman is the head of school.

The Calvert School in Baltimore, Maryland. Andy Martire is the head of school there.

In addition, we have two new schools whose heads are present, and I'd like them to stand and be recognized. The School at Columbia, New York City. The head is Anne Burns. Anne, would you stand? And St. Andrews School -- a popular name -- in Saratoga, California, whose head is Harry McKay. Welcome, one and all.

MR. GALBRAITH: I'm subbing for Susan. This is the nominating report. It's on the back of your agenda, if you please. I'd like to read it, starting from the bottom, but I will skip those concluding their service, because Bodie wants to say a few things about each of those people. We've investigated them and looked up some things about their pasts.

The nominating committee was chaired by Susan Haberlandt, and included Keith Shahan and Ellen Stein, and the two ex officios, Bodie and yours truly. There are a number of people who continue on the Council, Marlene David as treasurer, Ellen Stein, Bill Christ and Karan Merry as vice presidents from one of the five regions; and Woodie Price as a member at large.

Past presidents stay on the Council for a year, and past secretaries stay on the Council for two years.

Just above that are some annual appointments announced by the president: Yours truly, Steve Blanchard, Shep Shanley, and Blair Stambaugh as resolutions chair. And Bodie announced that she had appointed Susan Haberlandt to finish the term of Joan Beauregard as a member at large.

That brings us to the top of the page, and the nominating committee presents the following slate into nomination for the offices as listed. Burch Ford is on her way. Her flight was cancelled but she got on the next flight, and she'll be here shortly. Burch Ford is nominated as president for a three-year term. Bo Lauder, secretary, a two-year term. Charlotte Rea, vice president from region 1, as a three-year term. Brad Lyman, vice president from region 3, and two members at large, Jean Brune and Stephanie Hull. If you are here, would you please stand so we can recognize you?

Are there nominations from the floor? If not, we'll ask the secretary to cast unanimous ballot for the nominees as recommended by the nominating committee, with your approval. In favor, please say aye. Thank you.

MS. BRIZENDINE: Thanks, Bruce.

At this time it's my pleasure to honor those departing Council members who have served many, many hours on lots and lots of meetings. First and not least is Keith, who probably has been on the Council for a total of six years. An excellent secretary, and a wise and thoughtful leader, with great influence. Keith, could you stand up so we can say good-bye to you, sadly? Thank you.

We are saying good-bye, too, to Deb Richmond, sadly, who brought us through audits and reserves and got our finances in absolute order and is handing them over in stellar fashion to Marlene. So Deb, thank you so much for your service. Could you stand and be honored?

Clayton also leaves at this time. We know Clayton, and we know that he's ambassador extraordinaire, and he has brought in membership to the highest degree. We really appreciate his service and his great big belly laugh. So Clayton, thank you very much.

Jeannie Norris couldn't be with us, sadly, but she's served with me on the search committee that brought Bruce to the helm and is always, as you know, wise and thoughtful in her work. We will see her at our next meeting.

Last but not least is Tom. Tom also served with me on the search committee that brought Bruce, and I'd like to acknowledge all his hard work, too. Thank you all.

We're going to move now into our guest speakers. Our first one is someone whom we know well. As you know, we send ambassadors out to the world and also welcome them here. So we'll start with those we sent out to the world, bringing back their reports and wisdom. First is Gene Bratek, who's been on the Council and served as program chair, co-chair. Gene went to Canada.

MR. BRATEK: I don't have a lengthy report, but I do want to tell you that it was great fun being with the Canadians in Ottawa, the capital of their country, for those of you who have forgotten momentarily.

One of the highlights of being there, in addition to some great speakers, was that we had a chance to do something which is rare, I'm told. We had a chance to visit the Prime Minister's house, which, unlike the White House in Washington, does not have regular visits scheduled. But the Prime Minister's wife happened to be a good friend of the head of one of the Canadian schools, and they brokered the deal and a number of us were given the chance to visit the Prime Minister's house.

It's sort of an interesting comparison between the American White House and the Prime Minister's house in Ottawa. They have a very, very humble home. I venture to say that most of the parents at your schools have homes more elaborate than that house in Ottawa. But it was great fun to visit, and to see our friends from Canada. Their organization, the Canadian Association of Independent Schools, has about 70 members. If you compare them to NAIS, for example, which is, I guess, about 1,200 members now, they're a very small organization, but a very close-knit one. There was a lot of camaraderie, it was great fun, and a great privilege to represent NAPSG to that organization. Thank you.

MS. BRIZENDINE: It's also fun to introduce Coreen Hester. Many of you know her well. We sent her to England. Coreen also served with me in the leadership seminar on the West Coast. She's been by my side for that and serves the organization beautifully. Coreen.

MS. HESTER: It was a great pleasure and an honor to represent NAPSG at the first International Girls School convention in London this past fall. As most of you know, this was the first conference jointly planned and supported by the UK Girls School Association, the GSA. We've got Pat Langham here, whom we're going to hear from, and the National Coalition of Girls Schools here in the US. It was a very successful venture.

The group in attendance was made up predominantly of UK headmistresses, but there was a serious American contingent of heads of girls' schools from all over the world. Australia, of course, was well represented, but also Malaysia and the Philippines, and other areas.

The quality of the program was quite good. There was certainly a sense that all benefited from the international discourse and our worldwide commitment to the education of girls. We heard from Laura Liswood, currently the Secretary General of the Council of Women World Leaders. Ms. Liswood, an American, reported her findings from having interviewed all 15 living presidents, women presidents and prime ministers from around the world in the late 1990s. She was quite inspiring, made several telling remarks about women in leadership.

This is how she began her speech, whereas great men have King Arthur or the work of Joseph Campbell in fairy tale and myth for inspiration, women are generally reduced to Cinderella, cleaning the fireplace and talking to the mice. She encouraged us to study gender, race, and age schemas, and quoted that revealing information about the success of women in being selected for competitive orchestras worldwide once auditions were conducted behind a screen. After the behind-screen auditions, women comprised 30 percent of competitive orchestras, but that number reached 50 percent only after women took off their shoes and had a man walk beside them -- or they walked in men's shoes -- to the position behind the screen before the audition, so that judges would not assume the gender of the person playing.

We received some great recommendations for books. Ms. Liswood recommended Necessary Dreams: Ambition in Women's Changing Lives, by Anna Fels, for us to read. She was also enthusiastic about Howard Gardner's book, Leading Minds. And she underscored the power of the mirror in girls' lives, citing the so-called problem in Iceland at one point where the president for nearly a generation was a woman, and all the young boys assumed that they, in fact, could not be president.

She quoted some statistics about the average number of words used by women, and she did not give the source for this, so I have not been able to look it up. She said women, in general, use 20,000 words a day as opposed to men, who use 7,000 words a day, and she remarked on the positive aspect of women's attention to the relational aspect of the workplace and the possible downside of our talking everyone under the table.

We also heard from Ann Cotton, the executive director of CAMFED International, who began baking cakes in her house in England to support the education of girls in Africa, and who now helps lead CAMFED, the Campaign for Female Education. CAMFED is dedicated to fighting poverty and AIDS in rural communities in Africa by educating girls. It began in 1993 by supporting 32 girls in rural Zimbabwe through these bake sales, and by 2004 supported more than 70,000 children, predominantly girls, in some of the poorest regions of Zimbabwe, Zambia, Ghana and Tanzania. Poor girls from rural areas are being educated to contribute to the social and economic regeneration of their countries. CAMFED has also been asked to take a lead role in the UN Millenium Goal work for gender equity in education worldwide. This was a truly inspiring presentation.

I'll just mention some of the other terrific women we heard from. Believe it or not, a chemist whose name is Dr. Sue Ion, who has worked her entire career in the nuclear industry, inspired by her A level chemistry teacher. Lamenting that only 5 percent of the Royal Academy of Engineering are women, she was also fearful that women will not support the use of nuclear energy because we've not studied it well and do not understand its value.

We also heard from Jocelyn Bell, who's a physicist, from the University of Oxford, another girls' school graduate, who is one woman out of a class of 50 in the 1960s who studied physics in Glasgow, whose female guidance counselor encouraged her only to be a teacher or a civil servant, never a scientist, who went on to perform seminal work for her thesis advisor, who won the Nobel Prize in physics. She implied that she had more to do with it with it than perhaps he did. She took to wearing shoulder pads in her jackets to, quote, "be more like the blokes," and she cited the following sad current statistics: The number of women astronomers in the United States: 10.5 percent, similar to the UK, 10 percent. But in Argentina and France, 36 percent and 26 percent respectively. Fascinating data.

We heard from Sarah-Jayne Blakemore about her work in cognitive neuroscience related actually to some of the work we're going to hear from Louann Brizendine; Barbara Cassani, vice chair of the London Olympic bid, the successful one, and an American, who is an ex-pat living there; and a terrific presentation from Joline Godfrey on the performance of financial literacy for girls. And some of us have heard Joline before through women's organizations. And we also heard from the British gold medalist in pentathlon at the Sidney games, Stephanie Cook, who has since gone on to become a physician. There was actually a real theme through this conference of the real concern in Britain about the drop-off of the interest in sports for girls. I think we may take Title IX for granted a little here in the US. It was fascinating, the number of articles and the amount of discussion on this topic.

We had breakout groups, which met three times during the conference. This was a first for the British administrators. It was directly attributable to Whitney Ransome's participation in the planning of the conference. And there was a great boat ride on the Thames in the evening.

I will say, Pat and I were just talking about it; they get really dressed up at this conference in the evening. Women had strapless evening gowns on, these headmistresses, so of course, the Americans were terribly underdressed.

My favorite new piece of British language -- because you can't spend very much time in the UK without having a great new thing to say -- was that when Sue Ion told her headmistress about attending a local college rather than the more prestigious Imperial College, the headmistress had a "duck fit." Somehow, the image of those feathers flying and that water going was very appealing when the head wanted to make a point, much more appealing than the American equivalents. I can only think of, "She had a cow," "She had a fit," or "She put her foot down."

I think we should indulge in a few more duck fits when we know that something is important from one of our girls. So I want to say that I do recommend these speakers, their book recommendations, and I recommend your participation in this conference when it next convenes because it was wonderful to be in an international conference about girls. Thanks very much for sponsoring my attendance.

MS. BRIZENDINE: Thanks, Coreen. It's my honor now to invite greetings from our Canadian partnership. Claire Sumerlus, president of the Canadian Association of Independent Schools.

MS. SUMERLUS: Thank you very much. It is a pleasure to be here, and I do wish I was from California, but it's a particular pleasure for me, because when I got on the plane yesterday, it was minus 39 Celsius with the wind chill, and even though my plane was delayed three and a half hours in Chicago, I wasn't complaining, because the weather here is beautiful to me.

I would like to thank Mr. Bratek for joining us at our conference. It was a pleasure to have him there, and to have dinner with him. Although we are very humble, we are growing. We now have 79 schools and hopefully next year when I'm back we can say we have over 80. It's always a pleasure for us to come here, because there are so many more people here that we can learn from, and we always enjoy your conferences. So thank you very much.

MS. BRIZENDINE: And from the United Kingdom, it's my pleasure to welcome Pat Langham to the podium.

MS. LANGHAM: Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you very much indeed for inviting me. And I'm having a wonderful time already. I'm very grateful to Coreen's summation of the conference, because I wasn't there, and I feel now that I was. And I would like to apologize in advance because I have come dressed for the GSA conference, and I do have a strapless evening gown for this evening. But as always with headmistresses, I put two formal outfits in, so I have got something else to wear, as well.

GSA is growing. We currently have about 207 schools, and following the conference have had applications for dual membership from several international schools for girls.

I have been a head for the last 18 years. I was a child headmistress, and I like to throw that in very early on. I had a photograph taken of me when I was looking good one day ten years ago, and it sits outside my office. They said it's a bit like the picture of Dorian Gray in reverse. It stays stunning, and I just get more lines.

I'm actually the principal of the Wakefield Grammar School Foundation, which means some 2,200 students, boys' school and girls' school, working side by side. And no competition whatsoever between them in examination results or anything else. But we do tend to beat them.

I have already learned a great deal just from chatting with people. I can't thank you enough for inviting me, and now that I have seen where you're going to be next year, I fully intend coming back, but in the right clothes.

MS. BRIZENDINE: Two years ago, Bruce put into place a moment for us called honorary reflections, and I think it's a terrific addition to the program. I am honored to introduce Evy Halpert, whom we all know, a longtime supporter of this organization, and a woman who for me personifies the perfect blend of heart and mind. Evy.

MS. HALPERT: Whatever the blend of heart and mind may be, I was absolutely horrified when I heard that I was going to be called on to address this august gathering from the distant past.

I wanted to read to you from what I wrote at the end of the 75th annual report, in honor of the anniversary of this association. My husband and I once knew a Boston judge who used to quote his opinions at cocktail parties, so I'm just trying to keep up with a great tradition.

"From its inception, this distinguished professional association has given its thoughtful attention to issues of education for young women in a complex and rapidly changing world. Its programs and its membership have responded to changing times and changing needs, but its focus has never wavered."

And its focus has always been on the education of young women in primary and secondary schools. NAPSG was started as a spin-off of the Association of Collegiate Alumni and held its first annual meeting in 1920. So from the beginning, it evolved in the link between secondary education and college education for women.

In 1923, a committee on conferences with colleges was set up to review the admissions criteria of women's colleges, which required entrance exams, and there weren't a whole lot of them back then. They were Barnard, Bryn Mawr, Mount Holyoke, Radcliffe, Smith, and Wellesley; later on also Wheaton. In those early days, the meetings of the NAPSG were very formal, very impressive, and Coreen and Pat, don't be sad, because evening dress was required not only at the opening dinner, but at all the dinner meetings, and there was still a vestige of that tradition when Blair and I and other people first joined in the 1970s. There were some people who still appeared in long dresses, though I don't think anybody was daring enough to appear in a strapless dress, and unlike the GSA meeting I attended years ago, we didn't have to toast the Queen, but nobody said to be upstanding, there was no toasting, but it was very formal.

The ladies who were among the early members of this association were absolutely formidable. There are illustrations in this booklet, to give you some idea. These were ladies with chatelaines and lorgnettes and all the appurtenances of being a headmistress in the '20s and '30s.

In 1936, college representatives began attending the NAPSG meetings, and even in my day, Tuesday afternoons were set aside with tables set up in a room where heads of schools could make a last-ditch effort to talk their students into one of the colleges represented at the meeting. I think that ended about, oh, 15 years ago, as the number of college representatives dwindled to the present two attending these meetings, and the whole college admissions process became much more complex than the Seven Sisters and the handful of other schools that most of the girls from girls' schools in this country were going to.

In 1961, heads of co-ed schools were invited to join the NAPSG group, and by 1970, about half the membership in the National Association of Principals of Schools for Girls were men. I vividly remember a session at which Anne Lenox, the great head of Agnes Irwin, then president of NAPSG, talked about the change in the faces that she was looking out on at the meetings, and she said in her day, when she first became a member of the national association, there were giants walking on the earth, and they were all women. They were these marvelous, distinguished ladies. And then she said, gradually, over the years -- this is now the late 1970s -- one by one they retired, only to be replaced byí little slipsí of boys.

This conversation that she launched led to a panel at the 1984 session of NAPSG on the vanishing headmistress. And it wasn't that we were all dieting. We were disappearing. That in turn led to the creation of the Administrative Leadership Seminars for women to train up a new generation of young women who would become leaders of our schools, girls' schools and co-ed schools, and the success of that enterprise you all know and some of you have actually experienced. Some of you are here today because of the inspiration provided to you by the women school heads that led the discussions.

Over the years, many issues have been discussed and explored at the NAPSG meetings and I was delighted in looking through this history to discover that even in the old days, the ladies who were running the NAPSG were addressed by the likes of Eleanor Roosevelt, who spoke at a NAPSG meeting in 1935 in Atlantic City, which seems to have been a favorite location until the gambling dens took it over.

I don't want you to think that all was grim and dignified, even in the old days, even in my time, because although I didn't actually experience it -- and this is on the subject of mythology and women -- I heard from many, many people who were there about the headmistress of a girls' school in New York who, as an honorary or as a retiree, came back to give her sage advice to the new generation who were taking over schools.

This formidable, dignified lady made a brief presentation. I believe it was on relationships between heads of schools and their trustees and the parents in the school. At the end of her short presentation, she must have taken off her lorgnette and she leaned forward over the podium and said, "I want to leave you with one piece of advice, and I think it's as valid now as it was then, so I'm going to share it with you." She leaned forward and she said, "Don't let the bastards suck your blood."

And with that thought, I thank you very much.