Crissy Cáceres Positions Brooklyn Friends School as Proud Educational Outlier

Most independent schools aim to align with prevailing norms in their sector. Brooklyn Friends School has chosen a different path under the leadership of Crissy Cáceres, who joined as head of school in 2019 as both the first person of color and first woman to hold the position in more than three decades.

“I’m excited to be the lighthouse in darkness for so many that are desperately looking to see if everything that they’ve believed in could possibly be just getting destroyed overnight,” Cáceres stated during a conversation about the school’s direction. “I’m excited to let them know, ‘No, no. No, you’re not alone. No, there are still those of us that are going to hold steady until you’re ready to be back in it with us and can.'”

Her statement reflects a broader positioning strategy. Rather than moderating the 158-year-old Quaker institution’s values-driven approach, Cáceres has amplified it. She describes wanting Brooklyn Friends School to become “proud outliers” in an independent school landscape she sees as struggling with integrity.

Integrity Challenge Facing Independent Schools

Crissy Cáceres sits on three boards addressing challenges in independent education: the National Association of Independent Schools Board, the New York State Association of Independent Schools Board, and the Friends Council on Education Board. From these vantage points, she has identified what she considers the most significant issue confronting these institutions.

“What I would say is the biggest challenge for independent schools is their ability to face themselves in the context of their missions,” Cáceres explained. “All missions speak about the need to provide access and respect the individual and engage citizenship and think about a values-led experience. Every single mission statement has that in some way. How it’s living differs.”

She pointed to schools removing diversity, equity and belonging from signage, shifting library book selections, or terminating staff in social justice roles. “If they’re doing that, as far as I’m concerned, they are in opposition to their mission statements,” Cáceres stated. “And so I hold a very firm ground on integrity.”

Her critique extends to financial pressures. When asked what schools should do if a donor threatens to withdraw millions over values commitments, her response was direct.

Integrity Over Financial Pressure

“At the end of the day, as a head of school, I only expect us to remind the governors of our school, the families, of who they’ve signed up to be in partnership with all along,” Cáceres told colleagues who posed the donor dilemma. “The fact is that our story doesn’t change with each change in the historical landscape of independent schools.”

Her position reflects understanding of current tensions as part of a longer pattern. “We’ve been through many iterations of history that are informed by what’s happening right now,” she observed about Brooklyn Friends School’s 158-year existence. “And that is the very designed for and intentional deconstruction of systems meant to be inclusive in favor of systems that are oppressive.”

Crissy Cáceres brings personal context to this analysis. “As a Black woman in the world, an Afro Latina woman, I’m like, ‘I’ve got your number. I know this story. It has been told many times over,'” she said. “So please don’t capture it in a way that makes it seem as though that water is now tastier than it was yesterday. It is still as rancid as you tried it to be 50 years ago.”

Outliers Becoming Norms

Brooklyn Friends School’s positioning as an outlier carries strategic intent. Cáceres articulated excitement about the school utilizing “the full power of the privilege that we have in this moment to be outliers proudly so.”

“Outliers get a bad rap,” she acknowledged. “I’ve always been a nerd and I’m like, ‘Yeah, I’m a rockstar nerd right here.’ I want us to be proud outliers and eventually become norms, norms of the independent school experience.”

Her vision encompasses schools that lead with values, consider humanity as their value proposition, and think intersectionally about their work—not just with other independent schools but with public and nonprofit sectors. “I want corporations to understand that there’s a school right here that could teach them a heck of a lot in how they run their boardrooms,” Cáceres said.

Brooklyn Friends School serves students from all five New York City boroughs, maintaining a 7:1 student-to-faculty ratio and offering the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme.

Living Quaker Values Through Contemporary Challenges

Brooklyn Friends School’s identity as a Quaker institution informs its outlier position. Testimonies summarized by the acronym SPICES—Simplicity, Peace, Integrity, Community, Equality, and Stewardship—guide decision-making at every level.

“Our commitment is to be wholly connected to the integrity that informs the living of our values in the context of a school that is incredibly rich in its academics,” Cáceres explained. “That is willing to ask the difficult questions, but more than ask them, pursue the possibility of gaining clarity around those questions.”

Distinguishing itself through action rather than passive observation remains central to the school’s approach. “We are not passive observers of points of difficulty and challenge in the world,” she stated. “That would actually go against the living of our mission. Our job is to identify, protect for the acknowledgement of that in the context of our work, utilize our independence to address it.”

Brooklyn Friends School serves more than 700 students from two years old through 12th grade across four learning communities: Early Childhood, Lower School, Middle School, and Upper School. Founded in 1867 by the Religious Society of Friends, it stands as one of New York City’s oldest continuously operating independent schools.

Risk of Being Less Humble

Crissy Cáceres identified humility as the school’s greatest challenge—not because Brooklyn Friends possesses too little, but because it has historically possessed too much. “I’m excited to be less humble,” she said. “I am super excited to be the loud Afro-Rican that I am as a leader and through osmosis, influenced in everybody in the school.”

Self-assessment acknowledges resource constraints. “We do not have all of the money in the world. Far from it, not even compared to our peer schools. We do not have the biggest campus. We do not have the biggest annual fund drive,” Cáceres observed. “But goodness gracious, if you could take our heart and connect it to design, put us in any room, put us in any room because we would be instinctively courageous.”