My Mentor

Headmaster Eric Swain was one of the reasons why I moved to Incline Village.

It's rare in most professions, and especially so in education, for institutions to be proactive about their leadership transitions. When, during my first interview at Lake Tahoe School, I heard that I was going to be able to work with an experienced headmaster for a year, I felt pretty good about the direction in which the Lake Tahoe School wanted to go.

After meeting Eric, I felt even better. Eric is a man of unquestioned integrity. Raised in the West, he has a bit of the classic American hero about him: he talks little, shoots straight, and rides alone. But his passions for students, for academics, and for educational communities give him away for what he really is - an idealist and a romantic.

Throughout his career, Eric has been a relentless advocate for teachers, for financial aid, and for institutional sustainability. He has dedicated his professional and personal life to ensuring that students earn a first-rate liberal arts education, that they are held to the highest academic and ethical standards, and that they are good people. His admirers are legion: former students regularly write, call, and take him out to dinner when they are in town; his sons do the same.

Though an inspirational teacher and coach, Eric left the confines of the classroom to serve several schools as Headmaster. Regardless of where he has served, he has left a legacy of respect for the individual, honor, and fiscal responsibility. He preaches the values of self-discipline, honesty, and the ethos of hard work and practices those same; he is usually the first to arrive at school and the last to leave.

An apt example of his commitment to students and to community is the Bobcat Power Company. This is a group of students that Eric recruited to vacuum the halls, clean the classrooms, and wash the windows of Lake Tahoe School. For doing this work they are paid minimum wage.

But they don't get to keep their minimum wages; they send them to charities that support the victims of the Hurricanes. The students of the Bobcat Power Company have been working all year, and through personal sacrifice and doing what is right - picking up after themselves and others - the students are doing good for others.

Bobcat Power Company is all about self-reliance, and self-reliance is perhaps the biggest contribution that Eric has made to Lake Tahoe School. It wasn't too long ago that there was talk of the school shutting its doors for good, but Eric arrived and put an end to that talk.

Eric's legacy to Lake Tahoe School is that he has encouraged our educational community to become self-reliant enough to make the independent school that we treasure sustainable. It's a powerful lesson, one taught by a great teacher.

I'm nervous about taking over for Eric, for how does one go about following in the footsteps of a legend? I'm at the beginning of my career as Headmaster, and I'm going to make some of the same mistakes that he learned from long ago. But I'm going to do everything in my power to honor Eric's legacy by honoring students, teachers, families, and community.

I am going to surround our students with great teachers and encourage them to nurture creativity, compassion, and courage in their students. I'm going to keep in mind that high expectations lead to high achievement, that people want to earn their successes, and that honesty, integrity, and self- reliance are values that are imperative for educators both to cultivate and to model. Finally, I am going to do everything in my power to continue to ensure the sustainability of Lake Tahoe School.

For when I retire, I want my successor to say about me what I say about Eric: "It's an honor to follow in your footsteps, even if your shoes are going to be hard to fill."

--Steve McKibben
3/19/06