For a while now, we’ve known this:

A pandemic hasn’t stopped us; a heat wave in Cleveland and flooding in New York were no match for determined Partnership educators, who are already deep in the work of this school year.

And weeks of work by operations and facilities colleagues, who were busy ordering supplies and updating classrooms, meant we were all ready to start learning from Day 1.

The youngest learners dove in—with help and encouragement.

Kids who have been waiting for months to get back to learning and growing with their classmates got right to it.

Already, teachers and students had questions.

And the thrill of working for an answer came back, as strong as ever.

Students resumed building each other up and helping each other learn—because they know we are made for greatness, and we are better together.

And they mastered classroom routines, like signals to let their teachers know they’ve got an answer.

Sure, there was some waiting. But that can mean time for a good book.

With everything else going on in our world, it is delightful to know that this week, in all nine Partnership Schools in two cities, over two thousand students were doing just what we hoped: working hard, playing hard, and—as St. Mark the Evangelist principal John Bacsik noted about some of our littlest learners—resting harder.