The Magazine of Memphis University School • Winter 2003-04 HHeadmaster’seadmaster’s MMessageessage by Ellis Haguewood What if Maine encumber my friends at other schools, and I don’t feel as if someone is always looking over my shoulder in the classroom. Has Nothing to Say I have colleagues who support me, the school doesn’t often schedule activities that interfere with my class time, and my to Texas? students treat me with respect.” All good teachers want to teach in a school that honors Our inventions are wont to be pretty toys, which distract our attention teaching, offers a solid academic program, and exercises the from serious things. They are but improved means to an unimproved end independence to do what is right, not just what is expedient. ....We are in great haste to construct a magnetic telegraph from Maine to Good teachers want a school that teaches respect for authority, Texas; but Maine and Texas, it may be, have nothing important to respect for one another, and respect for property. Good teachers communicate. Either is in such a predicament as the man who was earnest want a school that encourages teachers and students to interact to be introduced to a distinguished deaf woman, but when he was outside the classroom. Most of all, good teachers want a school presented, and one end of her ear trumpet was put into his hand, had that refuses to substitute fads for the hard work of teaching students. MUS is such a school. nothing to say. Walden, Henry David Thoreau The true test of any school is not how many computers it has, how many sports it offers, to which educational guru it Each year before we send out contracts to current teachers kowtows this month, or what educational buzzwords it can for the next school year, I like to offer them the opportunity to throw around. It is this: is the school teaching its students to sit down with me to talk about their future at MUS—what they think clearly? Is it teaching its students to write precisely? Is it like about what they’re doing, what they don’t like, what they’d teaching its students to read critically? like to do here that they’ve not been given the chance yet to do. Taught by a faculty with an average of 18 years’ experience, And each year, I learn some interesting things, especially from our MUS curriculum of scientific inquiries, mathematical analy- our newer teachers. sis, distillations from history, readings from Western literature, What comes through clearly is that our teachers love this ancient and modern languages, summers in Europe or Central school. They want to stay because Memphis University School America produce students with disciplined thinking and intel- supports and rewards teachers who are serious about their calling. lectual integrity. One new teacher told me, “At MUS I am allowed to teach. I’m free Our faculty guarantees that our students have something from the mountain of forms and bureaucratic paperwork that to say to Texas. The MUS faculty includes 64 men and women; 54 have master’s degrees, two J.D’s, and five Ph.D’s. The faculty averages 20 years teaching experience, all achieved in a variety of ways: William Matthews encourages students to Molly Burr, takes advantage of take a hands-on approach the weather by moving her to learning science and Guy Amsler has taught social studies and class to the Morrison Courtyard. says he has enjoyed history to both Upper and Lower School She has been teaching at MUS Mindy Broadaway, in her teaching for the past students for 21 years. Under his guidance, for 11 years. first year at MUS, assists 19 years at MUS. the MUS Government Club participation has seventh-graders who are grown to include over 100 boys each year. eager to use new software in the Spanish lab. 2 MUS TODAY OperationOperation IraqiIraqi Freedom:Freedom: OneOne YearYear LaterLater By Gaye Swan stories of what lay ahead. To Embed Or Not To Embed? “Our biggest fear was, of Last spring, two MUS alumni met up unexpect- course, chemical warfare,” edly and happily renewed their friendship, catching he explained. “I don’t think up over a meal. Not very noteworthy, you might there was a doubt in think – happens all the time. True, but not usually in anyone’s mind at the time the Middle East right before the breakout of war. that Saddam had the chemi- Not when both men are scheduled to embed with cal weapons and would use front-line military units to report on the war, sharing Griff Jenkins sporting a new haircut them – on us. I wasn’t sure I the lives, and the acute danger, of the troops. wanted to be the one that And this unexpected meeting had an unexpected result: proved the existence of these weapons.” one of the men would change his mind, thanks in part to a In the training sessions to brief journalists on how to timely phone call from the other man’s older brother, a protect themselves against chemicals, Sides found his classmate and close friend. When Griff Jenkins ’89 called doubts intensifying. “I realized how incompetent I was with his brother Kim ’80 from Kuwait to wish him happy birth- my chemical and biological equipment, how unprepared. day, he also mentioned the coincidence of running into And all this week, the week the troops were delayed, I was another MUS alum – and one of Kim’s best high school getting phone calls – don’t go, don’t go. My wife was very buddies – Hampton Sides ’80. understanding and supportive and never urged me one way Sides had arrived in Kuwait three days after his deci- or another — only later did I find out that she’d taken out a sion to cover the war for Men’s Journal – a decision that he very large life insurance policy on me — but we have three had to make in less than two hours. The day after he ar- children, and that was another factor in the feeling that rived, he got his assignment: “first recon,” the Reconnais- maybe I shouldn’t have done this.” (For more details on sance Battalion of the first Marine Division. Sides’ training experiences, check out his article in the In other words, the front line. March 24, 2003, issue of The New Yorker, excerpted in the “That’s when I had my first doubts,” sidebar on page 5. His description of what will happen if you Sides said. “Had I been able to sleep on it, “blow chunks” in your gas mask is especially eye-opening.) I probably wouldn’t have gone in the first Then he got the phone call that tipped the balance. place.” Men’s Journal, like other publica- “When I ran into Griff, he mentioned that it was Kim’s tions, had worked hard to get a slot for a birthday, and he was going to call him and would tell him journalist; there were a limited number of slots that he met me. Well, that night I got a call from available. The editors finally got one at the Kim, and he just read me the riot act. ‘What the eleventh hour – then faced the difficult &*#@ are you doing over there? You’re not a task of finding a journalist to go on such war correspondent! Just say no!’— and more short notice or risk the Pentagon as- to that effect. And I realized he was right. I signing the slot to another publication. didn’t really have to do this.” The troops’ departure was delayed Jenkins, meanwhile, felt compelled a week, so Sides and his fellow journal- by the challenges ahead to proceed. “I ists hung around Kuwait, waiting and knew this was a great opportunity to “freaking each other out” with horror cover our heroic men and women, and Author and journalist Hampton Sides WINTER 2003-04 3 I knew it was a just cause,” he said. “For me, it was a no-brainer. I don’t know if that is bravado or stupidity The on my part! But I don’t regret going.” In fact, not only did Jenkins embed once, but he re-embedded Ultimate immediately after his first assignment and returned to Iraq a third time this fall. Sacrifice So, on the morning of March 20, 2003, Jenkins By Griff Jenkins headed off with his boss, Oliver North, with the First Marine Expeditionary Force, a medium helicopter On the day of the squadron nicknamed The Red Dragons, to cover the first air and ground first wave of battle for the freedom of Iraq. assault (March 21, In Kuwait, Sides opted out the same morning, 2003), the confidence rather than give it a try and then leave. “I couldn’t and courage of the have gone with them, eaten their food, accepted their U.S. Marines and British Royal Marines was reassuring to protection, made friends with them, and then left,” he me. But there was also tension and anxiety in the air which was very real, and that was perhaps the most frightening of said. “So I told the Marine in charge that I wasn’t all — after all, fear of the unknown is often the most uncom- going and then called Men’s Journal. They weren’t too fortable situation to be in, and I didn’t have a frame of happy at first, but they understood.” reference to compare it or past experience from which to In fact, they told him to find another story.