Announcing Our Next Head of School

Dear Hopkins Community,

 

On behalf of the Hopkins Committee of Trustees, it is my pleasure to announce the appointment of Dr. Matt Glendinning as the 110th Head of Hopkins School. This appointment, effective July 1, 2022, is the result of an extensive national search process that enabled us to carefully select the right person to lead our School forward.

 

We believe that Matt’s proven leadership experience, commitment to academic excellence, lifelong love of learning, as well as his passion for supporting and inspiring all members of a school community will be an exceptional fit at Hopkins. Matt’s appointment was unanimously recommended by the Search Committee and approved by the Hopkins Committee of Trustees. We look forward to Matt building upon the notable and significant work our departing Head, Dr. Kai Bynum, has done at Hopkins during his tenure.

 

Matt will come to us after serving 26 years in three Quaker schools, where careful listening, strategic planning, creative thinking, and empowering all community members to find their voice served as cornerstones of his well-recognized career. A respected individual on both the national level and within the broader independent school community, Matt has presented at major national conferences and has been published widely. 

 

Since 2009, Matt has served as Head of School at Moses Brown School in Rhode Island, a 237-year old Friends school for 800 students N–12. Under Matt’s leadership, the school has thrived. His accomplishments there have included enhancing the school’s curriculum with technological and socially innovative approaches; expanding programming for health, wellness, and individual student support; helping to build state-of-the-art facilities such as a performing arts center, maker space, and library; dramatically growing endowment and scholarship opportunities; significantly increasing racial and socio-economic diversity; and ensuring that equity and inclusion are integral to professional development and practices. Matt’s tenure as Head of Moses Brown School was highly creative and productive, including the completion of a transformational capital campaign.

 

Before joining Moses Brown School, Matt served as Head of Upper School at Moorestown Friends School in New Jersey and Director of the Cambridge Prep Experience in the UK. A former faculty member at Phillips Academy (Andover) and Germantown Friends School, Matt has taught ancient and medieval history, Latin, Greek, and archaeology. Matt’s passion for the classics was a through line of his early career, including working on excavations and leading student trips in Spain, Italy, Greece, and Turkey. After receiving a B.A. in Classical Archaeology at Dartmouth College, he received a Ph.D. in Classical Archaeology at the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill) and a master’s degree in Educational Leadership at Arcadia University.

 

After receiving word from Dr. Kai Bynum this past June that he would be departing Hopkins following the 2021/2022 school year, the Committee of Trustees formed a Search Committee representative of our School community to lead the process of finding a new Head. The Committee engaged Spencer Stuart, a global executive search firm, to assist them. 

 

The Search Committee initiated stakeholder conversations, surveyed our School community, and extensively researched Heads of top-tier, academically rigorous independent schools with a focus on candidates with proven leadership and teaching experience.

 

The process included research into public school educators leading top-performing institutions, selected higher education leaders, National Association of Independent School lists with a focus on BIPOC Heads of School, as well as inviting and accepting nominations from within the Hopkins community.

 

The initial prospect pool included over 200 individuals. After comprehensive vetting, the Search Committee reviewed 35 profiles of candidates with a diverse range of experience and backgrounds. The Search Committee invited a diverse group of seven candidates for interviews, before ultimately making a unanimous recommendation of Matt Glendinning to the full Committee of Trustees.

 

On behalf of the Committee of Trustees, I extend our gratitude to the members of the Search Committee, especially to its Co-Chairs, Gwen Evans and Aaron Sack, for their tireless service to Hopkins in leading an extremely robust and thoughtful search. I also thank each and every member of the Hopkins community who shared their vision and thoughts as an integral part of the process. 

 

We are looking forward to welcoming Matt and his wife Katherine to New Haven, where they will make their home beginning this coming summer. With his appointment, our future remains bright and we are extremely enthusiastic about the next chapter of our School’s storied history.

Dear Hopkins School Community,

 

I am truly honored to have been selected as the next Head of Hopkins School. My wife Katherine and I look forward to our move to New Haven next summer and to joining what is clearly a very special and vibrant community.

 

Choosing a new Head of School marks a significant moment in the life of a school, a chance to reflect on the past, clarify priorities, and step boldly toward the future. During the search, I learned a great deal about the exceptional work taking place at Hopkins and discovered a fortuitous match between the School’s hopes and my interests and experience. Dr. Bynum clearly will leave Hopkins in a strong state, and I look forward to building on his legacy.

 

I’d like to extend my thanks to Gwen Evans ‘84, Aaron Sack ’89 P’22 ’24, and the entire Search Committee for leading such an exemplary process on behalf of the School. From the first interaction, I found the search to be thorough and exacting. Throughout, I felt welcomed, I felt tested (in the right ways), and most importantly, I felt inspired by the people I met.

 

As I shared with the Committee, there are many things that attracted me to this opportunity. I’m excited by the history, mission, and values of Hopkins, the unambiguous focus on academic excellence, and what seems to be a productive dialogue between tradition and innovation. The clear emphasis on valuing each person and fostering a community where diversity of thought, background, and identity is embraced mirrors my experience working in Quaker schools over the past 25 years. And the alignment between Hopkins’ strategic goals and the priorities of Moses Brown School is almost uncanny. 

 

I look forward to getting to know all members of the Hopkins community and to partnering with you to advance the School in areas such as global and experiential education, access and affordability, wellness, facilities design, and deepening involvement with the city of New Haven and the larger Hopkins community. 

 

Thank you for your invitation to become your next Head of School, and for the trust, confidence, and optimism you have invested in me. I look forward to what I know will be a productive partnership.

 

In friendship,