Lower School teacher Brad Stackhouse guides students through a card game in which a real-world conflict is presented, and students play cards that can increase the negative energy of the situation or de-escalate it.
One morning in the Dogwood Class, teacher Jules Collins posed a question to her students: If you had a superpower in our classroom, what would it be?
The answers came quickly. Students named flying, teleportation, and invisibility. Giggles ensued. There was a lull. Then the tone shifted. “Creativity,” one student offered. Others picked up the cue and listed empathy, peacemaking, curiosity, and helping people feel better when they are sad.
The conversation invited students not to imagine powers of fantasy, but to reflect on the strengths they already carried within themselves and the ways those strengths could support their community.
What began as a classroom exercise soon became a powerful example of the kind of learning Carolina Friends School seeks to cultivate every day.
As we celebrate our sixty-first year, our community continues to ask an essential question: How do we prepare students for a future we cannot yet fully imagine, while helping them grow into people who will shape the world with courage, compassion, and integrity?
At Carolina Friends, the answer begins with our mission. We seek to empower students to think critically, creatively, and independently while fostering both active exploration and quiet reflection. Inspired by Quaker values, our learning community encourages students to engage deeply with one another, wrestle thoughtfully with complex ideas, and discover the unique strengths they bring to the world.
In many ways, the Dogwood Class project became a vivid expression of that mission in action.
Jules’s teaching partner, Brad Stackhouse, took the students’ ideas home and, drawing on his background in game design, began imagining how their “superpowers” might come to life in a collaborative game. He created character cards and team-based challenges where players work together to solve problems, navigate emotions, and support one another.
The first version was imperfect. Then came another, and another. Students tested the game, refined the rules, suggested new ideas, and shaped the experience together. Through the process, the classroom became a laboratory for collaboration, imagination, and community-building.
As Brad reflected on the project, he described wanting to create something that helped students “work collaboratively, identify emotions, and find pathways from being dysregulated to regulated.”
What emerged was more than a game. It was a way for students to practice empathy, teamwork, self-awareness, and fairness while discovering how their individual strengths contribute to a larger community.
Brad noticed deeper growth unfolding as the project evolved. “They’re really interested in fairness and balance, and are starting to develop their values and what they believe in,” he observed. “That sense of ‘Oh, I’m not the only one…,’ the sense of community and group identity starts to be important.”
The experience also reinforced something essential for the adults involved: education at Carolina Friends is not simply about delivering information; it is about creating the conditions where truth, creativity, curiosity, and connection can emerge collectively. As Brad reflected, “It’s better if we do it together.”
Examples of student-made game cards that show attributes of characters. In the game, students take turns playing cards in their hand and watch as the group dynamic shifts in the unfolding scenario.
Moments like this unfold every day across Carolina Friends School. They happen in classrooms, on the playground, in Meeting for Worship, and through artistic expression, scientific exploration, athletic competition, and service to others. They happen because talented educators create spaces where students feel safe enough to ask questions, take risks, and grow into themselves.
In a rapidly changing world, students need more than academic preparation alone. They need empathy, resilience, creativity, and the ability to work collaboratively across differences. Through a conversation about superpowers, they discovered something deeper: that the strengths we bring to a community become most powerful when they are shared.
— Deb Feinberg, Director of Advancement