House Retreats Archives - Eagle Rock Blog

House Retreats Are All Fun and Games With a Side Dish of Seriousness

At the beginning of each trimester here at Eagle Rock School, student residents and staff of our half-dozen on-campus houses participate in informal house retreats that last the better part of two solid days. And fun is right there on top of the agenda.

In anticipation of another trimester of hard work and community building, these house retreats place an emphasis on fun, community building, and great food.

It’s also a time for students and staff members to work on relationships, conduct serious conversations about the trimester ahead, build community and continue to develop their house culture. But it’s also the final hurrah before attending classes, and receiving and working on homework assignments.

There are house meetings to be attended, leaders and intramural captains to be elected and a no-nonsense discussion of the mission statement for each house. All necessary, considering these houses are, essentially, a smaller community within Eagle Rock that encourage and foster camaraderie and team membership.

In other words, what comes around goes around. And when we build a positive community within the houses, those aspects then spread to the Eagle Rock community at large. And not to neglect the fun part of these two-day events, students and staff do cook and share meals together, and reconnect through games, activities and one-on-one discussions.

Specifically, here’s what each of our houses have been up to this Monday and Tuesday… Continue reading…

Latest House Retreats Rekindle the Fire for a New Trimester

In our ongoing efforts to “engage youth in their own education,” Eagle Rock School goes to great lengths to see that most of that educational engagement is interesting, positive and — in the case of our pre-trimester house retreats — rejuvenating.

Like waking up after an afternoon nap, sometimes it’s difficult to jump to your feet and get back into action. Same goes for returning to campus after a well-deserved trimester break.

House retreats enable our students to reestablish the camaraderie they had before break and reconnect with their fellow house dwellers. It’s two and a half days of “what I did on break,” punctuated by meals, competitions, sightseeing and time to refocus on the trimester immediately facing these students.

Mixed in with all that frivolity and fellowship, there are house meetings where house leaders and intramural captains are elected. And there is serious discussion about topics of importance to each living community, as well as a sober revisiting of the house mission statement.

Recently, four of our six campus houses handed us notes and photos of their house retreat happenings and we’ve related those activities below: Continue reading…

A Day On The Slopes Reinforces Life Lessons

At the beginning of each trimester Eagle Rock students and several staff members participate in house retreats — a pair of days that enables members of each house to reconnect and bond with each other.

This trimester, Juniper, Ponderosa and Aspen houses took to the mountains and went snowboarding at Vail Resort. A number of staff and students had been on the trip in previous years, but for many, this was their first experience on a snowboard. There was plenty of anticipation and excitement as students suited up for their day on the slopes.

Vail Resorts sponsored eagle Rock’s Ride School and SOS Outreach, a nonprofit that uses adventure sports to engage youth, took care of getting the students the professional instruction they required to snowboard at Vail. Students began their day by thinking about discipline — which is among SOS Outreach’s six core values — and what it means to them. With these thoughts in mind, students strapped in and began their day.

The students and staff began by learning how to balance on their boards, with many mastering how to turn and stop. Falling was fairly typical as it is with all new snowboarders, but positive attitudes prevailed and laughter was the general response after nearly each wipeout.

Eventually many were Continue reading…

House Retreats Convene to Re-energize Students and Staff Alike

On-campus housing at Eagle Rock means much more than a place to hang your hat or fall asleep. It’s a culture within a culture, with students building an intimate identity around one of our half dozen houses and then expanding that identity and familiarity to include the entire school. By concentrating on building a positive community and culture within the houses, these positive efforts encompass the larger Eagle Rock community and campus life.

Because one thing our houses do is promote camaraderie, team spirit, good-natured competition and a sense of belonging.

That being said, sometimes it’s difficult to return from a break and immediately recapture that feeling of oneness that was there when you last walked out the front door. Thus, the advent of the Eagle Rock House Retreat, which let us reconnect with our fellow housemates and spend some time focused on the culture of each individual house.

Below is a recap of the activities that highlighted our latest House Retreats in mid-September:

Aspen House: In addition to preparing several meals and enjoying delicious food, members of Aspen House went go-carting, bowling and teamed up for laser tag at Boodocks. They wound down their retreat with a move in comfy recliners at the Flatirons AMC theater in nearby Broomfield, Colo.

Juniper House: Things got off to a festive start for Juniper House residents with a barbecue at Lake Estes complete with a campfire with s’mores. Students created a house mandala with a statement written by each student about their roots, following by personal learning plans. What followed was some Ultimate Frisbee training and a photo scavenger hunt at Continue reading…

Eagle Rock House Retreats Are Essential To Our Community

Three times each year, my calendar has appointments at places like Boondocks, Apex Center, Morning Cartoons at the Lyric, the Denver Zoo, and the Science Museum. And for each of those 20 or so hours, my “meetings” are centered around epic laser tag battles, Top Chef competitions, and meals highlighted by fistfuls of Hot Cheetos and copious amounts of Kool-Aid.

House retreats are an opportunity to reconnect after break, strengthen meaningful bonds with both my colleagues and our students, and spend some time focusing on the culture of Pinon House. To me, those days represent a new beginning.

If you’re unfamiliar with the structure of our on-campus housing, students and staff at Eagle Rock are members of one of the six houses: Pinon, Ponderosa, Juniper, Aspen, Spruce or Lodgepole. Michael Soguero, our director of professional development, reminds us: “Houses were conceived as a smaller unit within the school to form an identity around, to encourage camaraderie and team membership in a positive way.”

In other words, if we concentrate on building a positive community and culture within the houses, then those positive efforts should filter back into the larger Eagle Rock community. House retreats were created with the inspiration of being a smaller, more manageable group in which to work on community and culture building within the houses.

Here’s a Fun Fact: Back in the day, Eagle Rock existed without house retreats? The first week consisted of schoolwide community building, until former Eagle Rock Math Instructional Specialist Jason Cushner proposed a change. Now, there are 2.5 days each trimester set aside for staff and students to work on relationships, have difficult conversations, build community, develop house culture, have a lot of fun and share delicious food. It’s 2.5 days — before homework is assigned, notebooks need to be graded and the business of Continue reading…