Director of Educational and Counseling Services Marisa Crandall is currently trying to make the competitive, all-girls environment at Marlborough happier and healthier by improving the learning plans and extra time accommodations. By reaching out to students who have these accommodations, Crandall wants to help teachers better understand their students with these accommodations.

“A priority is getting all the learning plans and accommodation pieces settled for everybody in a more comprehensive way, so that teachers know not just that a girl has extra time, but knowing why and ways that they might offer to help her,” Crandall said.

Along with Head of School Priscilla Sands, Crandall said she hopes to bring in test-taking anxiety specialists starting in seventh grade to improve test taking skills and teach younger students coping skills before they enter the Upper School. Crandall works with the whole school’s mental health programs, but only advises for the Upper School.

In addition to improving learning accommodations, Crandall said she wants to make advisory a place where Marlborough students can develop coping skills to balance stress. Crandall will be working with the deans and division directors to support the growth of non-academic skills and creating a structured plan for informative mental health assemblies. Crandall also said she wants to work on peer-to-peer interactions to spread information about mental health.

“What I want to do moving forward is to give girls information about stress, anxiety, about mental health and those kinds of things because I think once people understand the processes that underlie anxiety or things like that then people can act on it in a way that makes the community more supportive,” Crandall said.