EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR REMARKS: Bruce Galbraith

 

MR. GALBRAITH:  I'd like to add my welcome.  I'm delighted to see you.  Welcome to Hilton Head.  As we had thought we might need to, we will ask the people that are reporting about going to Canada and to Great Britain to do that during the dinner hour, and that will keep us more on time.

 

The reception tonight has been moved inside.  It will be just outside the area where we eat.  These rooms have long names, but they're A, B, C, and D, the four ballrooms.  That's the easiest way to remember them.

 

It's been a pleasure to work with the two Susan and Sue women.  They have made this a very, very special conference, and that's one of the great things about NAPSG, is that people step forward and bring us fresh ideas and wonderful local additions to what we do and we think that helps us be fresh and have a very fine conference.

 

Please see me about adding to any of the trips.  The two beach walks are wide open.  There was a $5 registration fee for that, and if you want to add into those, please do that, and give the $5 to the teacher.  That would be an appropriate thing to do, because she's been gracious about donating her time.  So you're welcome to plan on joining those either day.

 

On Tuesday, the schedule is fairly tight, but we will accommodate any of the events in any order.  If you are having the buffet lunch and going on the dolphin cruise, which leaves at 1:00 to get to the 2:00 boat, and then going on the oyster dinner, there will be time to do all of those things.  We'll make it work or we'll wait for you to come back from a previous event.  It looks tight, but it will work.

 

We have a couple of other people in the audience that I would like to recognize.  This is the second time that my predecessor, Carol Lane, has been back to the NAPSG conference.  Her help to me as the new executive director is immeasurable, and John would answer the phone and even help me with some questions, too.  Carol and John Lane, would you please stand so we can thank you and welcome you?

 

We are in the early stages of forming a group that is going to have to have some kind of a great title or an acronym.  We don't have it yet, but there are four or five part-time executive directors of educational organizations.  Somewhere in there, there's a good acronym.  We have had a couple of conference calls on the telephone, and now we are beginning to meet in person, because we have so much in common.  Kiki Johnson has been the head of Headmistresses of the East, and Diana Beebe will succeed, follow her, in that role.

 

Gordon Bondurant is here.  He's the head of Country Day School Headmasters Association.  Don Werner is still recuperating from doing Headmasters. But each of these four groups and NAPSG are getting together, and so Kiki and Diana and Gordon, would you stand?  We'd like to welcome you, as well.

 

The hotel has been incredible about trying to accommodate us and make us feel welcome.  On your telephone there's a button called Service Express. If anything doesn't work, press that.  They are so anxious to try to help you.  There is a shuttle to take you to go shopping at the mall, a shuttle for golf, a shuttle for tennis.  Check with the concierge.

 

Nicole Seitz will be here tomorrow morning signing her books, if you're interested in buying one after you hear her read tonight.

 

Now, most importantly, on the back of your nametag are your drink tickets for the cocktails. I told Carol Lane in my first year as executive director, they told me that you, in one hour, averaged five and a half drinks a person.  If that was true about you, would you -- never mind.  I couldn't afford to pay that much money.  So this is not for you.  This is for me.  I'm going to collect these afterward and we'll make sure that we pay for only what we drink.  But you can use them in any order, and you can use two tonight or four tonight, and then I can give you some more tomorrow.  If you get stopped by the police when you're driving, there's a message on the back of the tickets that says, "Admit one."

 

There will be wine this evening at dinner. It's provided by Aladdin Food Services, somebody that I was delighted to have do the food service at Park Tudor when I was there, and they're represented by -- would you stand, please -- Pam Downey, Candace Hogan, Terry Hicks.  Thank you for the wine.

 

In the dinner, Jery Taylor will be weaving sweet grass baskets and having some of them on display for you, and some of her art.  If you want to wander into the dining area to the B and C ballrooms, you can do that during the cocktail hour, and she'll be doing that all during dinner.

 

And the Hallelujah Singers that Sue so kindly arranged, were the church choir in "Forrest Gump."  They're really, really special.

 

It's going to be wonderful tomorrow night, and we'll play it by ear about weather.  It's tentatively set for outside, but it may have to move in because of it.  They have heaters and that. We'll see how it plays out.

 

And lastly, in my spare time, I have had a lot of fun putting together a book about the seminar, and it has pictures of most of the classes and the lists of all the people that have gone to the seminar.  It will be at the back of the room and you can see it as the meetings go on.  And I have tried to enlarge the pictures because I too am really, really proud of that activity.

 

This meeting will conclude with our memorial resolutions, following which we'll have a moment of silence and a short break before we begin with the keynote speaker.

 

Blair Stambaugh has done this for NAPSG for many, many years, and we are most grateful to her for that.  Let us enter into that in the proper mood and in the proper manner.  We would now begin our memorial resolutions led by Blair Stambaugh.

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