A Culture of Health and Well-Being: Looking Closer at Tartans Thrive and the Future of St. Margaret’s
The St. Margaret’s Commons will be the heart of the campus and foster community, nutrition, athletic performance and overall health and well-being. While still in the planning stages, the benefits of this future space are already coming into focus.
By Ryan Wood
When St. Margaret’s unveiled Tartans Thrive: Campaign for a Common Purpose in September, the goal was clear: Inspire support for the upcoming St. Margaret’s Commons and build a culture of health and well-being throughout the entire Tartan community in anticipation of the new space.
Across campus and throughout the community, Tartans have rallied around the efforts.
“We are moved by the tremendous support we have seen, and all the ways health and well-being have been demonstrated across our campus,” Head of School Dr. Jeneen Graham said. “The community commitment to this project has been exciting, and we look forward to continuing this momentum together.”
The 30,000-square-foot St. Margaret’s Commons will be the heart of the campus and serve all Tartans. There will be a kitchen preparing fresh, nutritious meals to all students throughout the day. A Great Hall will serve as an important community space. There is an expanded sports performance center for strength, conditioning, recovery and sports medicine. A student loft will serve as a gathering spot for students to unwind, relax, catch up on homework and just be with friends between commitments. Studios and other spaces will focus on athletic preparation, performance and recovery.
The launch of Tartans Thrive has brought with it momentum of support, with each gift putting the project closer and closer to reality. Though fundraising is ongoing, St. Margaret’s plans to break ground this summer.
Beyond the generosity of the St. Margaret’s community, though, the campaign has also brought Tartans together for initiatives and programs centered around health and wellness. This school year, St. Margaret’s has leaned into research around movement, health and community as essential elements of human thriving, and educators at St. Margaret’s have found creative ways to implement these elements into the school day.
“There have been so many examples of academic touchpoints and other programming that have stemmed from Tartans Thrive and the exciting future of St. Margaret’s,” Dr. Graham said. “As we look forward to this space, the work we are all doing to make the St. Margaret’s Commons a hub of health, well-being and, yes, thriving, is already underway.”
St. Margaret’s campus will be forever changed by the Commons when it is completed in 2026. Yet the benefits of the project are already coming into focus—whether through nutrition education, an increased interest in health and well-being, or the sustained success and innovation of Tartan athletics. As the school remains committed to developing the whole child, one thing is clear: The importance of a dedicated space nurturing the health and well-being of every Tartan is essential to that vision.
The Importance of Nutrition
A few days before the Scottie Snack Cart returned to the Lower School playground for its monthly appearance, grade 5 student leaders were hard at work preparing a sneak peek video for their peers.
Abby and Penelope stood in front of the camera, previewing what will be on the cart later in the week. More importantly, they were explaining why the selections of fruits and vegetables are so healthy. The video, organized by Lower School Director of Community Life Tupper Spring, is played at the Monday Chapel during the week the Scottie Snack Cart is rolled out, with the entire Lower School student body in attendance.
“Black grapes are as beautiful as they are healthy. This is a great opportunity to give them a try!” Penelope boasts. “Grapes are a great source of antioxidants, and generally the darker color of the fruit, the more benefits!”
The Scottie Snack Cart debuted in 2022, part of a larger effort by St. Margaret’s school leaders to increase health and wellness programs in the Lower School. The Parent Teacher Fellowship pledged its support through a PTF grant that funded five years of nutrition education and access to whole foods in the Lower School, and the Scottie Snack Cart was developed from that grant.
Over the last two school years, Lower School students have had the chance to try mandarins, grapes, dragon fruit, cucumbers, nectarines, carrots, Fuji apples, cantaloupe and more. Last year, grade 1 students picked strawberries during a field trip to The Ecology Center that were served on the cart that same week.
The Scottie Snack Cart is overseen by Lower School PFW teacher Adam Doty alongside parent volunteers. The cart was built by Upper School student Chase Springer as part of an Eagle Scout project.
It has been a popular program in the Lower School, and the commitment to nutrition education has even attracted outside attention. Sam Kass, a former White House chef and senior policy advisor for nutrition, visited St. Margaret’s in September as part of the PTF Parent Up Speaker Series. He spoke highly of both Tartans Thrive and the Scottie Snack Cart, calling the latter a great example of how to introduce healthier foods and encourage healthier habits in children.
Lower School Principal Jennifer Blount has noticed that the Scottie Snack Cart has created a more positive culture of healthy eating when it’s out. It’s made fruits and vegetables cool, which she hopes carries over into the St. Margaret’s Commons.
“Children are inspired by one another,” Mrs. Blount said. “When you see your friends trying a healthy food it makes you want to try a healthy food. We’re excited because this is leading into the St. Margaret’s Commons where we will be able to provide fresh foods like this to our students every day.”
Sports Performance
In a given week, St. Margaret’s strength and conditioning coaches Michael Davis and Randy Park will see a sizeable percentage of Upper School and Middle School students. The weight room is one of the busier locations on campus each day.
St. Margaret’s personal fitness and wellness (PFW) curriculum includes three semesters in Middle School and three semesters in Upper School, with participation in a sport satisfying the requirement. That means that most students utilize the school’s strength-and-conditioning program many times while at St. Margaret’s, either through PFW or athletics.
PFW classes build the foundation of an active lifestyle.
There are up to four PFW classes visiting the weight room every day. While there, Middle School and Upper School students build foundational strength-and-conditioning skills in a safe and age-appropriate manner, under the watchful eye of Mr. Davis and Mr. Park.
Once school lets out, Upper School athletics makes its way over to the weight room. Offseason training for those not currently playing in a sport can be up to four times a week, while teams in season typically stop by the weight room once or twice a week. Sometimes those sessions take place inside the weight room, other times over at a temporary overflow weight room in the Ortega Village Center, and frequently it’s plyometrics and agility training on the walkway adjacent to Chalmers Field.
Mr. Davis, Mr. Park and the many athletic coaches use the space outside of the weight room daily for warmups, change-of-direction drills, jump rope, speed development drills and plyometrics. Part of the plans for the St. Margaret’s Commons includes a dedicated outdoor pavilion for dynamic training, with an artificial turf surface. Coupled with the plans for the Commons building to triple the present-day size of the weight room, Mr. Davis sees a bright future of community-building and performance-building in the new space.
“The Commons will definitely have a positive impact on the student-athlete experience at St. Margaret’s,” Mr. Davis said. “The addition of a new and larger facility will improve our training spaces, meeting areas and resources for our student-athletes. It will take sports performance at St. Margaret’s to a whole new level.”
Athletic Preparation
At the top levels of high school athletic competition, preparation is essential to peak performance.
For many athletic teams in St. Margaret’s Upper School, preparation takes many forms. Daily practices, strength and conditioning sessions, nutrition, recovery, injury prevention, data and film analysis are all factors that influence how well a student-athlete performs on gameday.
Those aspects of athletic performance have a lifelong impact, as the skills, knowledge and work ethic stemming from athletic training and competition fosters healthy habits that often sticks with a student-athlete long after their playing days end.
The St. Margaret’s Commons is designed with these essential elements of performance in mind. On the first floor, an expanded sports medicine space next to the expanded weight room will allow St. Margaret’s athletic trainer Dave Tomlinson more room and more resources to care for Tartan student-athletes who frequently come by for injury evaluations, treatment and rehabilitation exercises.
On the second floor will be three studios, all adjacent to one another, which will serve Tartans with an array of cardio, sports performance and recovery options. Students will have impactful technologies available for their training and preparation—whether it’s practicing long drives in a state-of-the-art golf simulator, improving cardio on a stationary bike, or using recovery tools like compression sleeves to bring their body closer to peak condition.
Sneak peeks of what’s in store have already taken place to great excitement. At the PTF Tartan Family BBQ and Fun Zone in October, attendees had the opportunity to try a golf simulator similar to what will be installed in the Commons. Dozens of students, parents, and professional community members enjoyed the experience and gave positive feedback on its technological capabilities for golf and other sports. As part of the golf simulator purchase, a portable high-tech swing analyzer is already at St. Margaret’s and is being used by both golf teams.
Another aspect is film study, a way for sports like football, basketball, soccer, lacrosse and more to not only evaluate their latest games to better understand strategy, positioning and execution of plays, but also to scout the tendencies of their upcoming opponents.
Using the online platform Hudl, many athletic teams at St. Margaret’s rely on film to both prepare and reflect. Yet where those film sessions take place depends on the day—and often, the availability of space. The Tartan football team, for example, meets daily before every practice in the spring, summer and fall, installing schemes, analyzing film or just getting together to review important topics. Sometimes those meetings take place in the Upper School’s Tartan Center when it is available. Other times it takes place in a spacious math classroom that does its best to accommodate the large roster.
Film sessions for other sports often take place in academic classrooms, as well.
The St. Margaret’s Commons will bring all of those important sessions into one state-of-the-art Film Lab. Situated next to the performance studios on the second floor, the Film Lab will have theater-style seating large enough to fit more than 125 students. With the latest technological capabilities, it will be a place to break down film, conduct important meetings large and small, and even serve as a community space for events, meetings, presentations and more.
“All of our sports will benefit greatly from a facility space that is designed for team meetings and film sessions,” athletic director Dan O’Shea said. "Our student-athletes have very busy schedules and this new facility will help us better support them with more efficient film analysis sessions."
The Joy of Community
As plans for the St. Margaret’s Commons were still being formulated, school leaders had an idea—why don’t we ask the students what they want?
Through several sessions with Upper School students, school leaders listened as ideas were brainstormed for the student-centered spaces inside the St. Margaret’s Commons, specifically on the second floor. The students’ wish lists varied. Some desired areas designed for academic collaboration, while others wanted joyful spaces to interact with friends and take a break from academics.
The feedback spoke to a larger initiative that has been a priority of Dr. Graham’s since she became St. Margaret’s fifth Head of School last summer—nurturing and bringing together the Tartan community, through programs, events, and even facilities like the St. Margaret’s Commons.
In Gratitude of Tartans Thrive Supporters
St. Margaret’s is grateful for the generosity of the school community toward Tartans Thrive: Campaign for a Common Purpose. A list of supporters to this capital campaign can be found at the below link:
Plans are in place for the Great Hall to double as a community gathering area. The Film Lab is being designed with the capacity to bring entire grades together for class meetings. Ideas have touched on cross-divisional connections, bringing Tartans young and old together for learning in the kitchen or in other spaces.
Based on that student feedback, the planned Student Loft will be a popular spot in the Commons. The second-floor space will overlook the Great Hall and be a place for students who have an open block or just a little bit of time to unwind before the next school commitment.
Really, though, the community aspect means the entire Tartan community. School leaders envision the St. Margaret’s Commons as being a gathering place for years to come, with alumni, parents, legacy grandparents and more coming together to be together.
It is in these spaces that friendships form, work is enhanced, and a community looking out for one another continues to strengthen—and thrive.
“The response to Tartans Thrive has been a wonderful reminder of the St. Margaret’s community and its unwavering love, generosity and support for one another,” Dr. Graham said. “We know that health and wellness is an urgent priority for students and adults alike. We know that being a part of a vibrant community and having meaningful, long-lasting relationships is directly related to sustained happiness.
“This is what we envision the St. Margaret’s Commons being—a space for nutrition, health, wellness and athletic performance, yes, but also a place for the Tartan community to be together. It will be a transformational space, and we’re thrilled to see that transformation already underway.”
To learn more about supporting Tartans Thrive: Campaign for a Common Purpose, visit TartansThrive.org or reach out to Executive Director of Advancement Jonathan Tufo at jtufo@smes.org.
