The Conroy Distinguished Visitor regaled students with tales of his military service from the depths of the seas to the upper echelons of the U.S. government.
September 14, 2023
For Chinese student Sebastian Brigham ’24, language learning doesn’t end when he leaves Zhaohong “Jenny” Li’s classroom.
BY JACQUELINE PRIMO LEMMON
Sebastian Brigham ’24 had studied Chinese before joining the St. Paul’s School community as a new Fourth Former in 2021, but he says it was his first term with SPS Chinese Teacher Zhaohong “Jenny” Li that unlocked a genuine passion for the language. For Li, seeing that spark of excitement in Brigham and other students is one of the things that’s most rewarding about teaching at SPS, where she currently serves as head of the Languages Department in addition to teaching, advising … and once tried her hand coaching lacrosse. Student and teacher alike say that living and learning in the fully residential SPS environment plays a special role in the academic experience — one that doesn’t end when they walk out of Li’s classroom in Schoolhouse.
“I see Mrs. Li all over campus and feel that she really does care about me as a student and as a person,” says Brigham, now a Sixth Former enrolled in Li’s Chinese Seminar class. “And with SPS being fully residential, we have the opportunity to have office hours at 7 or 8 p.m. in the library, even as a class. That’s an opportunity that I have never had before. The teachers like Mrs. Li are really willing to accommodate your schedule because they really want you to learn.”
Li says that immersive environment is exactly what she signed up for when she joined the SPS community from the McDonough School in Owings Mills, Maryland, in 2016. “At SPS, my relationships with each student develop a lot, and because of this environment, their life is a part of my life, too. I see them go to rowing from 3:30–5 p.m. and then run to the dining hall, and then go do homework. I understand more about their life.”
I came into Chinese last year and Mrs. Li saw something in me; she took that and ran with it. Her pushing me has made me more excited about the language and it’s sort of taken off.”
— Sebastian Brigham '24
In spring 2022, Li signed up to coach girls JV lacrosse in part to develop that better understanding of the student experience at SPS, noting that in China, where she began her career teaching molecular biology at Beijing’s Tsinghua University, students aren’t exposed to sports. “Before I came to SPS, administrators told me I was a great Chinese teacher. But my dream is to be a great all-around teacher,” she explains. “To me, that means not only teaching, but advising and coaching as well.”
That also means teaching in a way that’s tailored to students’ learning styles and needs. “At St. Paul’s School, we don’t teach in a cookie-cutter way,” she continues. “I feel like I have a teaching plan for every single one of my students, and because learning Chinese is very different and very difficult, the best way to teach them is the moment they want to learn.”
Brigham says Li pushes every student to be the best they can be at Chinese, and in his case, the results have been tangible. At the end of his Fourth Form year, he participated in the National Chinese Language Speech Contest, and, coached by Li, earned second place at the intermediate mid-level. This spring, at the end of Fifth Form, he was awarded the Dickey Prize in Chinese as the School’s outstanding scholar in the subject. “I came into Chinese last year and Mrs. Li saw something in me; she took that and ran with it,” he says. “Her pushing me has made me more excited about the language and it’s sort of taken off.”
“At St. Paul’s School, we don’t teach in a cookie-cutter way,” says Chinese Teacher Zhaohong “Jenny” Li. Watch the video to see what she means.
Down the road, Brigham says he sees himself putting his language skills to the test in China, and continuing to study Chinese in college. For now, the language has enriched his friendships with SPS classmates from China, a number of whom have stayed with his family during shorter School breaks when international travel wasn’t practical.
“I became friends with some of them just by sitting down with them at dinner and speaking Chinese,” he recalls, smiling as he remembers that his comprehension wasn’t maybe quite as good when he was a Fourth Former as it is now. Back then, his ni hao in the Upper might have been the prelude to a short exchange. Today, it’s the opener to a conversation that can continue into an evening study session with his classmates, peer tutoring for other Chinese students or just about anything else.
