on the third floor in the Emery building? That is the home of Waynflete’s Humanities Center. In November 2023, Waynflete’s Upper School welcomed the Humanities Center, a space for embracing literature, history, cultural studies, philosophy, arts of all mediums, and much more. Students who feel interested in the humanities, and want a place to share their ideas have the ability and space to do so through the new Humanities Center. 

 

John Radway, chair of the English Department, and Asra Ahmed, Upper School Head, held a ceremony on the third floor of Emery building to commemorate the opening of the center. Many festivities were prepped in celebration of the event. Cupcakes, cookies, and all sorts of treats were provided to excite the energetic crowd. Once the intrigued audience settled, the mission of the Humanities Center was given:

 

“The Waynflete Humanities Center seeks to encourage, cultivate, and support deep co-curricular engagement with the humanities among students and faculty; to acknowledge the history of these disciplines while striving to amplify historically underrepresented voices; to create and maintain accessible spaces, physical and virtual, for the exchange of ideas about human culture and social organization; to model, encourage, and elevate critical thinking about and across all academic disciplines; to expose interested students to new fields of study they may encounter in higher education; and to increase the visibility of student and faculty achievement in the humanities.”

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Located on the corner of the second hallway on the third floor, with new and improved green couches as the hub of the setting, the Humanities Center is home to future lectures, discussions, and presentations on topics ranging from art history, linguistics, cultural theory, history of science, philosophy of mathematics, and beyond."

 

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However, there’s no need to worry about the formality of the work produced and presented there; all are welcome to showcase whatever they are interested in sharing. Recently, a spontaneous student poetry slam competition took place. To further understand the story behind the Humanities Center and how it came to be, I spoke with John Radway, long-time English teacher at Waynflete. John was the driving force in creating the space in the Upper School. He started the idea because, “the humanities are a little more intangible, and [unlike] in fields like science or engineering, we can't have a lab or robotics team or something like that…so we wanted a way to honor, recognize and promote the humanities at Waynflete.”

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The Humanities Center will not only allow the Upper School to embrace the various subjects of the humanities, but also provide students the opportunity to explore different areas of study that they wouldn’t typically be able to pursue on a regular school schedule. According to John, “when one gets to college, [you realize] that there are entire fields of study that high schools just don't have time to teach you. We can't have a philosophy department, you know, there wouldn't be enough time in your schedules for you all to take the classes. So we also thought that the Humanities Center would be a way to let interested students have 20 minute mini classes.” The new space will allow students to explore their interests and expand their education in fields of studies that they otherwise might not have the chance to interact with. 

 

The idea to start the Humanities Center came to John last year, in the spring of 2022. As Asra recalls, “John Radway came to Geoff [Waynflete’s Head of School] and I in the spring . . . saying, ‘could we have a place in the school…outside of class where we honor the humanities and find ways to represent it? Because we don't have that space.’ And a lot of private schools do have actual humanities centers, where they'll host speakers [and] have events. John wanted to think about how we could, on a smaller scale, start something like that here.”

 

The great thing about the Humanities Center is that anyone can start events in the space, teachers and students alike. If you feel interested in giving a quick lesson on a topic you are passionate about, no worries about being experienced in public speaking, you can build your skills there! 

 

As a student who finds humanities such as linguistics and philosophy interesting, but hardly gets around to exploring them, I’m interested to see what the future holds for the Humanities Center, and understand how I too can utilize the area. This innovative space will provide students the opportunity to presume teaching roles that might not always be possible to fulfill in day-to-day life. Everyone will be able to learn from one another.

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So whether you have a heated topic that you want to debate, art to showcase, or a few words you’d like to share with the community, the Humanities Center is here for you to do so. Just make your way up to the third floor of Emery and look out for the new “Waynflete Humanities Center” sign in bright green and white, and make the space your own.