C H A R L E S. E. T O D D '64

The following feature story appeared in the campus publication MOSAIC in November, 1999.

LEAVING AN IMPRINT OF INNOVATION AND EXCELLENCE ON EDUCATION

For the past 27 years, Charles E. "Charley" Todd has been a father figure to hundreds of students who have passed through the doors of Hartford’s Watkinson School. As headmaster, Todd took great pains to create a nurturing yet challenging environment, one that acknowledged personal differences and individual learning styles. And he had great results. Students flourished, went on to prestigious colleges and universities and to fulfilling careers; and the school won the notice of national educators. Although Todd recently stepped down from his duties as headmaster, Watkinson is still foremost in his mind and on his agenda. He is hard at work as president of the recently formed Watkinson Trust, through which he plans to create one of the nation’s leading small-school endowments by the year 2020.

In 1971, when the then-28-year-old Todd took the helm of the 118-year-old independent day school, Watkinson was characterized by an unclear identity, declining enrollment, heavy debt, and a questionable future. During his tenure, Todd gave the school a distinctive new personality, one that emphasizes innovation and inclusiveness. Under his stewardship, enrollment climbed from 97 to 230, an enormous debt was paid off, a $1.6-million endowment was created, and the physical plant nearly doubled.

In 1984, the U.S. Department of Education named Watkinson an "exemplary school," citing its individualized approach to teaching: signature programs in creative arts, writing, technology and learning skills; and the diversity of the student body. In 1990, Watkinson joined the Coalition of Essential Schools, a school-renewal movement established by Theodore Sizer, one of the nation’s leading educational reformers. Four years later, Watkinson was named a "Lead School" of the Coalition, one of only five independent schools to be so honored.

Todd traces his pedagogical roots back to his high school years on Maryland’s eastern shore. Todd’s parents, avid sailors who hoped their son would come to embrace their love of the sport, arranged for him to teach sailing to a group of young people in Gibson Island, MD, on the Chesapeake Bay. "It was a serious sailing community, so it was especially intimidating to teach there with such a thin layer of knowledge," Todd says. "So, I employed the ‘student-as-teacher, teacher-as-coach,’ strategy -- now an aphorism for the Coalition of Essential Schools -- and had the kids teach each other knots, terminology, and tactics. The students liked me, which I hadn’t expected. I seemed to have a way with kids."

American history and more
Todd remembers having Trinity professors in his history major who were stimulating and, perhaps unknowingly, far greater inspiration for his eventual career choice than his early experience as a sailing instructor. "Northam Professor of History George B. Cooper was terrific," he recalls. "I was most interested in American history but expanded that interest after being introduced to European history and political history."

Todd’s interest in history broadened even further to encompass art history. One of his professors, Instructor in Fine Arts Charles B. Ferguson, who later became the director of the New Britain Museum of American Art and with whom he stays in contact, made a particularly deep impression on him. "He made high art accessible," Todd recalls. "He opened up a whole world of visual arts for me."

After graduating from Trinity, Todd heeded a suggestion by Ferguson, who lived next door to Watkinson, and applied to teach at the school. He began his Watkinson career teaching art history part-time. "I never had any intention of going into education," Todd explains. "I thought I was just sort of biding my time until I figured out what I wanted to do." Todd switched to teaching history, and after three years was named head of the department. Then, in 1969, he was appointed assistant headmaster. He returned to Trinity to pursue his master’s degree in history, which he was awarded in 1970, and in 1971 he became head of Watkinson School.

One of the most important contributions Todd has made to Watkinson has been the atmosphere he has helped to foster at the school. Founding board president of the Gay, Lesbian, Straight Education Network (GLSEN), an organization that seeks to end homophobia in schools, he has vigorously worked to see diversity well represented at Watkinson. As a measure of his success, he cites an event that occurred at a recent program on tolerance conducted at the school by the B’nai B’rith and Anti-Defamation League. During the program, a student, who had privately revealed his homosexuality to Todd and another teacher last year, came out to the entire school. Says Todd, "The cutting edge issue in schools or colleges still revolves around differences in sexual orientation because it’s the most raw issue in our culture. A school that is respectful and nurturing to gay kids is more likely -- than a school that isn’t -- to be nurturing to all of its kids."

Recently, Todd himself experienced how good Watkinson’s nurturing environment can feel when alumni gathered to celebrate his long and auspicious tenure as headmaster. "In one way it felt like hearing your eulogy when you’re awake," Todd quips. "I often think people don’t ever get the opportunity to be celebrated in life. The evening was absolutely, unreservedly joyous."

                                                                                                                                                    Suzanne Zack