An article in the up-scale design magazine "Departures" begins, " One blustery morning in New Hampshire, during an otherwise idyllic parents' weekend at Proctor Academy nearly twenty years ago, a then 17-year-old Christopher Spitzmiller told his mother he wanted to to be a potter. 'She pulled the car over to the side of the road,' says Spitzmiller, 'turned to me, and just said, 'No.'" The article goes on to declare Chris's highly glazed vase lamps to have acquired "cult status" within the design industry.

The article goes on to say, "Decorator--and fellow Proctor Academy alumn--Eugenie Niven discovered Spitzmiller's work while flipping through an Architectural Digest." The reader comes away with an appreciation for the arts at Proctor, but I'm going to transition quickly to home decor in boys' dorm rooms, because that's where I spent time today as Eric Viandier scored vacant rooms on their environmental compliance as part of the "Green Dorm Challenge."

We are not looking for--or finding--any fancy lamps in Rulon-Miller and Carr House. Eric's looking to see that heating elements are exposed, that lights and appliances are off and that there is evidence of recycling efforts in each room.

Dorms are competing in an incentive-based initiative for cash prizes, so there are no demerit-type penalties for leaving a window open (which might be a good thing, if the heat's off.)

Eric observes that student compliance with environmentally-friendly protocols has increased dramatically over two years. Another surprise is that only about two out of seventeen dorm rooms inspected had locked doors--a huge change from fifteen years ago, when we invested tens of thousands of dollars to install locks.

Once upon a time, I attended an admission conference at which the director of admission of a neighboring school spoke about her strategy to entice families: show them a "demo" dorm room that is artificially prettied up, neat, with college banners on the walls! "This is what a dorm room could look like!" was the concept.

Funny...that school experienced a lot of "attrition," as enrolled students discovered that it wasn't like the school they thought they had chosen. Here are James and Travis in one of the Carr House triples.

Henry and Charlie in Eco-dorm tonight:

These guys are catching the Ali G Show before the start of study hall.