Communication is one of 12 character competencies of Crescent School’s portrait of a graduate. Here, Middle School students practise their public speaking skills.IMAGE COURTESY OF CRESCENT SCHOOL
A well-rounded private school education goes far beyond the core academic curriculum. To help develop young people who will thrive and excel, schools need to nurture soft skills, such as empathy, communication, problem-solving, mindfulness and the art of “disagreeing well” – and weave those important foundational lessons into their programming.
Andrew Keleher, head of school at Neuchâtel Junior College, a private Canadian school in Neuchâtel, Switzerland, says that, as AI reshapes the workforce, the human skills that technology cannot replicate, such as creativity, collaboration and emotional intelligence, are more important than ever. Such skills will not only prepare students for exams and university, but for life.
“Success in the 21st century is as much about character as it is about knowledge,” Keleher says. “Being able to communicate effectively, understand others’ perspectives and adapt to new challenges makes all the difference both in school and beyond.”
Experiential learning that is at the heart of Neuchâtel’s philosophy is a key to achieving that. Neuchâtel students live away from home with host families, participate in international travel and find belonging in a close-knit school community that fosters empathy, resilience and communication.
At The Rosedale Day School (RDS), a co-ed school in the heart of Toronto, the mission is to foster students who “adapt confidently and engage responsibly in our changing world.” That is more than ever a priority now, says head of school John Reid, as students navigate their way through “the unpredictable landscape of AI and other technological advances.”
With the rise in technology such as AI, Reid says research is showing that the skills most in demand by employers will be those that cannot be replicated by machines.
“These are the skills that allow for innovation, effective teamwork and navigating complex human interactions,” he says.
RDS has a partnership with Future Design School, focusing on intentionally integrating future-ready skills into the school’s curriculum, including a comprehensive professional development program for teachers and a hands-on learning experience for students. Those skills are grouped into well-being, social-emotional learning, learning skills, character skills and future-ready skills.
Daphne Perugini, head of school at Walden International School, a co-ed International Baccalaureate (IB) school in Oakville, Ont., says the school is not treating character education as a separate add-on, but rather as core to its programming. Walden embraces the IB Learner Profile Attributes and weaves the IB Approaches to Learning into planning, teaching and assessment, so that students practise communication, self-management, research, social and thinking skills daily and across subjects.
“As AI reshapes how we learn and work, soft skills aren’t optional; they’re the human edge,” she says.
“Communication, empathy, collaboration, problem-solving and ethical judgment enable students to navigate ambiguity, interrogate AI outputs, and work across cultures and disciplines. These capacities help young people not just use powerful tools, but use them responsibly, creatively and with purpose. In an AI-rich world, critical thinking and integrity become more, not less, important.”
The COVID-19 pandemic put a lot of things in focus, says Erin Porter, director of student life and belonging at The York School, a gender-inclusive school for junior kindergarten to Grade 12 in Toronto.
“We have all this technology, and we can leverage it and have the world at our fingertips but, at the end of the day, if you don’t have human connection, your mental health is going to suffer,” she says.
“I think placing the focus back on putting the phones down, putting the screens down, and having conversations with people and connecting with people is going to be absolutely critical for humanity’s well-being in the long run.”
Schools are having to focus on best practices and frameworks for socioemotional learning, and how students interact with and manage their own feelings, says Justin Medved, The York School’s associate head of academic innovation. Intentionality needs to be in place concerning what it means to be uncomfortable, what it means to be a human in the technological age, and how to navigate and be aware of the feelings of those around us.
“How does what you do and how you behave interpersonally also translate online?” he says. “We have to help kids understand their responsibility doesn’t end the moment they translate a conversation that started in class onto Snapchat.”
York’s Respectful Discourse Toolkit teaches students that it’s okay to hold a disagreement and not feel unsafe, showing them how to hold two opposing perspectives at the same time, and perhaps a viewpoint they disagree with. The school is working on an age and stage appropriate version for their Junior School students, to be released soon.
“We’re having to rebalance what it means to have a discussion around an idea we may not agree with around so many topics and levels, because it’s not coming to adults and children equally intuitively,” Medved says.
York has social workers in place to help teachers deliver those conversations, and navigate getting to the heart of a challenging issue. “It’s in the moment to moment,” Porter says. “It’s teachers being attuned to conversations, to comments, to the language that our students use these days.”
The Respectful Discourse Toolkit is there for faculty as well, helping teachers manage emotional discussions and the effects of events outside school walls that get carried into the classroom.
Guides such as toolkits tend to be backed by findings from considerable research that are baked into the school experience. At St. Clement’s School, a school for girls in Toronto, educator AnnMarie Zigrossi is the Junior School LINCWell learning strategist. LINCWell (which stands for Learning, Individualization, Nurturing, Creativity and Well-being) is a full-school approach that gives students a toolbox of resources to help them learn and live well. Zigrossi was awarded the International Coalition of Girls’ Schools Global Action Research Collaborative on Girls’ Education 2023 Researcher of the Year Award for her mindful routines research.
Many private schools work intentionally to develop many of these soft skills throughout all aspects of the school experience, such as athletics, outdoor education, service learning, the arts and all co-curriculars.
Heather Thomas, principal and head of school at Greenwood College School, a co-ed school for Grade 7 to Grade 12 in Toronto, says they intentionally work with students to develop these skills. “We support character development using the three domains of 21st-century learning skills as guideposts – interpersonal, intrapersonal, cognitive,” she says.
“Our character pillars – moral, civic, performance and intellectual character – are tightly linked to these buckets of skill development. So, by focusing on the development of these skills, teachers are in turn guiding students to develop character.”
Partnerships in many of these endeavours is vital. Paul McLellan, head of school at Rothesay Netherwood, a co-ed day and boarding school in New Brunswick, says RNS is just one only two schools in Canada to have partnered with Stanford University’s Graduate School of Education’s Challenge Success program, which he says helps the school “take meaningful steps toward building a school culture where students are healthy, supported and actively engaged in the school community.”
In what have proven to be challenging polarizing times, Rich Prosser, deputy headmaster at Crescent School, a boys school in Toronto, students are learning about representing themselves with integrity and taking responsibility to explore larger issues.
“It’s no longer good enough to take this in,” he says. “It’s what you’re doing with this information now that you’ve consumed it. And we want our boys to be acting in a very ethical, responsible way.
“Everybody I talk to out in the business sector, in industry, they are saying we need young people who are empathetic in how they approach their work with others. They must be far more global-minded and culturally sensitive. It’s a global world they are living in now. Can they collaborate effectively with other people and be a complex problem solver? Can they carry themselves with honesty and integrity?”
Advertising feature produced by Globe Content Studio. The Globe’s editorial department was not involved.
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