A Closer Look at Boarding

SENIOR SPOTLIGHT

AIDAN SILVERMAN ‘21

By: Alex Barron

Aidan Silverman ’21was known by peers and teachers as one of the hardest working students at Boys’ Latin. His books would invariably contain twice as many notes as anyone else’s. His one-page responses often turned into two or three. For the entirety of his journey from kindergarten through twelfth grade, he could count on his friends for good- natured ribbing: “How much did you write this time?” they would ask him, or “How long did you spend studying for this quiz?”

But Aidan would laugh off such comments with a self-effacing grin. He knew that for every assignment, he wanted to go the extra mile. “I started to like being known as the kid who got good grades,” he reflected after graduating from BL in June, “I’m happy with the way I worked and with my work ethic. I ended up embracing that try-hard mentality.”

Starting around his junior year, Aidan recalls that other students, especially freshmen and sophomores, would approach him for tutoring. He was proud that his strong academic track record led others to seek him out, and was happy to drop everything for a peer in need. Most often, they solicited his guidance for science and math classes. (Although he earned strong grades in every academic subject, Aidan perhaps excelled most in math: he won the Boyd F. Winkelblech Award for Excellence in Math at the end of his senior year.)

As he progressed through high school, Aidan began to see his potential for leadership in several areas. He was selected to attend Senior Retreat as a junior, an honor reserved for only a handful of students, and returned twice the following year as a student leader. “Getting to know the seniors and the faculty on that first retreat was just incredible,” he says, “I knew it was an experience I wanted my classmates to have, too.” By his senior year, Aidan, along with Ian McAslan ’21, also stepped into a leadership role as the copresident of the One Love Club, an organization dedicated to raising awareness about healthy relationships. “It’s important that this club has a presence at BL,” says Aidan, “Relationship violence is an issue that affects everyone, men and women.”

Aidan was a leader on the soccer team last fall as well, in a season that was vastly truncated due to the pandemic. In his second season on varsity, he started every game. He was also a member of the varsity lacrosse team for two seasons.

Ms. Megan Kenney, director of counseling, worked closely with Aidan in her capacity as faculty sponsor of the One Love Club. She attests to his strength as a leader. “Aidan is a creative thinker and problem solver when it comes to running meetings,” she said, “Even during a difficult time Aidan tried to get creative and make the meetings fun, interactive, and educational all at the same time.” She added that he was “kind, compassionate, and supportive” in his role as a senior retreat leader.

After thirteen years on Lake Avenue, Aidan has left BL a better place. This fall, Aidan matriculated to the University of Virginia, and we have no doubt that he’ll bring his academic diligence and steady leadership to the UVA community.

FACULTY SPOTLIGHT EIYANA FAVERS

By: Alex Barron

CALDECOTT PANELIST MS. FAVERS BRINGS EXPERIENCE TO THE LOWER SCHOOL LIBRARY

Every year, a select group of thirteen to sixteen children’s librarians gather to determine the book that will receive the Caldecott Award. The renowned award, first given in 1938, recognizes the “most distinguished American picture book for children.” An appointment to the selection committee is perhaps the highest honor that can be achieved by a children’s librarian. This year’s panel is composed of just sixteen representatives nationwide and will include Boys’ Latin’s own lower school librarian, Eiyana Favers.

Ms. Favers is excited and grateful for the opportunity – “It’s going to be a lot of fun,” she says, with trademark humility – but knows that the honor was the result of hard work behind the scenes. She completed the prestigious Bill Morris Seminar, sponsored by the Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) which teaches librarians how to best evaluate books for their collections. She also participated actively in Capital Choices, a group of librarians and other educators who work together to create lists of outstanding titles for children and teens.

Librarians like Ms. Favers take great care in considering potential recipients of the Caldecott Award. She reads piles of books, of course. Her committee is tasked with choosing from the pool of books that will be published in 2022, but some advanced copies have already started to trickle in several months early. Preliminary meetings began in July.

“One of the things about the Caldecott Book is that a lot of times educators have the expectation that the award will go to the most loved book. The best story. That isn’t always the case,” she says, “We aren’t looking at popularity; we’re looking at content.”

Prior to Ms. Favers’ arrival at BL last fall, she worked for twenty-two years in Baltimore’s Enoch Pratt Library System, as an Early Literacy Outreach Specialist. In that role, she visited city schools, Head Start programs, and other community organizations, where she introduced children to books in order to instill a love and appreciation for reading.

“I like the challenge of being able to find books and stories that [children] will like based on their age range,” she says, “I can usually steer them towards something I like, that’s appropriate for their age.” Now that she has found a home at BL, Ms. Favers says she looks forward to developing relationships with the boys, and watching their progress as they journey through the lower school and upward.

“Working with children every day I get to see them. I get to learn what their likes and dislikes are,” she says, “I get to support them.”

According to upper school librarian Claire Ricci, Ms. Favers has already been a valuable asset to the team. “Young boys are especially able to sense when someone is genuine and our youngest Lakers are spot-on in connecting to Ms. Favers,” she says, “[She] more than meets their needs, modeling reading as a means of accessing information, expanding world view, developing empathy and as a pleasurable escape.”