Editor’s note: The following was written by Walter Dunham in 1969. Dunham was Sachem’s first Superintendent and the mastermind behind the development of the school district. The most telling line is the last line, that a school district should be a part of and a model for the community.
Our Sachem Philosophy
The Sachem School District accommodates young people from a wide variety of backgrounds and of a wide variety of abilities, needs, and interests. We hold to the philosophy that our programs must satisfy all of these young people. The intellectually underprivileged must be trained to lead healthy, productive lives; the average must be provided with a core of knowledge, skills and understandings to enable them to become useful citizens; and the gifted must be taught to use their talents and be given opportunities that will encourage them to tap their resources.
Co-curricular offerings must help our youngsters meet their vocational goals, and, in addition, our training must produce citizens with both moral and social responsibility that cannot but strengthen our society and promote the individual well-being of each member of that society.
Our schools should set an intellectual tone from which our townspeople can profit; they should operate with order, imagination, and dignity, thereby setting an example for the daily affairs of the community; and they should reflect a love and understanding among people that will carry over into local public life.
We hold that the differences among our student charges do not make equality of educational opportunity an impossible goal. Rather, these differences make the goal more important. And we hold that a school cannot be separated from its community. Rather it should be a part of and a model for that community.
-Walter C. Dunham, original Superintendent of Sachem Schools