Convocation Sets the Tone: Look Up, Slow Down and Take Notice

The first day of school moves fast. There are schedules to decipher, classrooms to find, friends to catch up with, and new names to learn. But at Kingswood Oxford’s Opening Convocation, the community did something Head of School Tom Dillow hopes students will continue doing throughout the year: slow down and take notice.

Middle Schoolers Maddie Leyden ’31 and Jack Ritter ’31  helped welcome the community by speaking directly to their peers at every stage of the KO journey. Their message reassured newcomers and reminded returning students: “No matter how you are feeling, everyone has the opportunity to learn and grow together. Everyone here has something that makes them different, and that is what makes KO such a special place.” Everyone arrives with different experiences, goals, and emotions, but everyone has the opportunity to learn and grow together. They encouraged students to take risks, ask questions, explore new interests, and make the most of the teachers, coaches, and friends around them.

A tradition dating to 1989 continued with the presentation of the class flag. Members of the senior class, Anna Burnham and Logan LaCroix, presented the Class of 2033 flag to CJ Griffin and Emily Eastman, representatives of Upper Prep, KO’s newest class. In turn, Anna and Lincoln received the Class of 2027 flag that will eventually fly over the Senior Green during Senior Week.

The Class of 2027’s Ida Chapman and Danica Arwen De Dios also received the class’s wooden senior shields. During Senior Week, each senior will carve t their initials into the wood before the shields are presented back to the school on Class Night. They will then join the shields of previous graduating classes displayed in Roberts, a permanent record of the students who have come before and the mark they left on KO.

Speaker Ashton Binalla ’27 also challenged classmates to recognize that belonging to a community requires participation. Students were encouraged not simply to leave change to elected representatives, but to speak up, attend meetings, advocate for ideas that matter to them, and become involved in shaping the year ahead. For seniors in particular, the clock is already moving quickly: just 269 days separated their first day from Commencement. The message to the Class of 2027 was simple: make them count.

That sense of time and how we choose to spend it became the centerpiece of Dillow’s remarks. Drawing inspiration from one of Dillow’s favorite movies, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Dillow reminded students of the film’s famous observation that life moves quickly and that we can miss it if we don’t occasionally stop and look around. The sentiment connected directly to KO’s core value and theme for the year: intellectual curiosity.

But curiosity, Dillow explained, is about much more than being interested in a subject. It begins with attention. “We become more curious by looking up, slowing down, and taking notice,” he told students. By paying attention to what’s actually in front of us and then asking questions about it, curiosity doesn’t start with an answer; it starts with noticing something worth asking about in the first place. It’s about paying attention because attention is where curiosity begins.”

Dillow illustrated the idea through his own newfound interest in birding. For years, birds had been outside his window, but they were essentially background noise. Once he began listening carefully, he could distinguish a blue jay from a goldfinch or house sparrow. Nothing about the world around him had changed. What changed was his attention to it. “A whole world had been sitting right in front of me,” he said.

He said the lesson extends well beyond birds, paintings, or classroom learning. Perhaps the most important form of curiosity, Dillow said, is curiosity about other people: asking why someone thinks differently, listening to another side of an argument, noticing when a friend is struggling or when a new student is sitting alone. “Curiosity about the world and curiosity about each other come from the exact same habit: slowing down, noticing, and asking the question instead of walking past.”

For new students, Dillow suggested that unfamiliarity can actually be a gift. Rather than rushing to make KO feel routine, he encouraged them to explore, ask questions, and introduce themselves to someone new. For returning students, the challenge is different: resist autopilot. Familiar hallways, teachers and even friends can begin to fade into the background if we stop paying attention.

And for seniors, the message carried particular weight. This is a year filled with lasts: the last Convocation, the last Homecoming and the last time experiencing so many familiar KO traditions as students. “Don’t let this year become background noise,” Dillow told them. “Pay attention on purpose.”

Life and a school year move pretty fast. Whatever you’re not paying attention to right now, it’s still there. It’s just waiting for us to notice it