Cate School 2019 Summer Bulletin by Cate School

CATE Summer 2019

BULLETIN

CATE B U L L E T I N EDITOR

Mercedes Maskalik COPY EDITOR Jeff Barton GRAPHIC DESIGNER

Mya Cubero PHOTOGRAPHERS

Alicia Afshar, Kaori Funahashi, Mercedes Maskalik, Aimee Stanchina, and Millie Todd '20 HEADMASTER

Benjamin D. Williams IV ASSISTANT HEADMASTER FOR EXTERNAL AFFAIRS

Charlotte Brownlee '85 DIRECTOR OF MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS

Mercedes Maskalik MULTIMEDIA COORDINATOR

Aimee Stanchina ARCHIVIST

Judy Savage DIRECTOR OF ADVANCEMENT

Lindsay Newlove CATE FUND DIRECTOR

Katie Convoy DIRECTOR OF MAJOR GIFTS AND PLANNED GIVING

Chris Giles ALUMNI DIRECTOR

Andrew MacDonnell DIRECTOR OF SPECIAL EVENTS & GIFTS

Sarah Preston Correction: In the spring issue of the Bulletin, the caption in our 1969 faculty archives photo incorrectly reads Stanley Durant rather than Curtis Crawford and failed to recognize Sheldon Hickock in the middle row between Sanderson Smith and Paul Ruoff. Apologies for the error. MISSION STATEMENT

Through commitment, scholarship, companionship, and service, each member of the Cate community contributes to what our founder called “… the spirit of this place … all compounded of beauty and virtue, quiet study, vigorous play, and hard work.” FIND US ON SOCIAL MEDIA:

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The Cate Bulletin is published three times a year by Cate School and is distrubuted free of charge to alumni, parents, and friends of the School. Send correspondence and address changes to: communications@cate.org The Cate Bulletin is printed by V3 on Topkote paper.

Ella Hendriks '19 and Jojo Broussard '19 join the processional of graduates into the Commencement tent below the Nelson D. Jones '48 Stables.

In this

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INVOCATION

HEADMASTER’S ADDRESS

Joy Doyle In the Wake of Our Dreams

Benjamin D. Williams IV

FACULTY COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS

One Good Apple Patrick Collins

STUDENT COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS

The Big One Daphne McKeefry '19

2018-19 AWARDS

CUM LAUDE ADDRESS

BACCALAUREATE ADDRESSES

THE CLASS OF 2019

DEPARTING FACULTY & STAFF

CAMP CATE 2019

Shabana Basij-Rasikh Baker Fox '19, Elizabeth Li '19, and Writing for Your Life by Mattie Brickman '01 In a Commencement tradition, Headmaster Ben Williams gathers observations, teacher and advisor comments, and campus lore to craft a “literary snapshot” of each senior. We bid a fond farewell to seven members of the Cate faculty and staff.

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Reunion classes from '49 to '14 enjoy the splendor of the setting sun and the company of friends and classmates during the Headmaster’s Sunset Reception at the Class of 1985 House during Camp Cate.

In Every Issue 72

CLASS NOTES

IN MEMORIAM

FROM THE ARCHIVES

On the Cover: Our Commencement exercises were held for the first time on the lawn below the Nelson D. Jones '48 Stables. Maddie Erickson '19 listens to her senior citation. Photo by Aimee Stanchina

Invocation By Joy Doyle

shenanigans from the last three or four years. You spoke of necessary disorder, and urged us to embrace “benevolent mayhem.” You encouraged your classmates to channel moments of fitful laughter while making sure to bring joy to those around them. You reminded us all that a little bit of giving can go a long way. You asked us to put others first. You advised us to find our people. To find questions we all have in common. To seek out the stories of others, and not only to have respect, but to give acceptance. You encouraged all of us to tell others what we admire about them, and to do so as soon as possible. Good Morning, Cate. Seniors: Imagine. You used to scramble through big double doors on Tuesday mornings, squeezing into the last few rows of the Chapel, testing the tensile strength of creaking benches. Over the next two years, you ascended. You sat closer and closer to the front, caring a little less about the people in your pew, focusing your attention instead on the person at the podium. This year, you confidently marched to the front of the room on Thursday mornings. You addressed your community with eloquence, honesty, humor, and great vulnerability. Your Chapel Talks taught us about your Cate School Bucket Lists and silly

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Class of 2019, I’d like to take this opportunity to share my admiration for you. It has been an incredible joy to share this place with you for four years. You are an expressive and deep-feeling group of people that this school has been delighted to call its own. This Sunday morning, you ascended gracefully to the front of this space, facing your community one last time. Out from under parabolic arches and stained glass windows, we are grateful today to gather beneath this magical shelter, backdropped by green mountains and iconic red stables. Here, before loved ones and among friends, we recognize your journey. Let us give thanks, and celebrate.

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In the Wake of Our Dreams HEADMASTER’S COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS By Benjamin D. Williams IV

Whenever I come to an ending of any sort, I find myself thinking about the beginning. I know a school whose motto is “The end depends upon the beginning.” No doubt you

remember those first days you spent on the Mesa, the exhilaration and the nervousness, the happiness and the homesickness, the anticipation and the apprehension. Four years downstream of those moments, you likely dispense with most of them as just the usual sensations and jitters, but maybe you remember some with continuing clarity. Certain events and feelings stay with us, and often we don’t really know why. It comes to us in time, though, what it all means. Education of any sort is time released. We learn when we are ready for the lesson. Don’t worry; that isn’t a set-up for some pearl of wisdom I intend to bestow upon you. Most of what you need you already have. The key is knowing how to use it, when to call up the memory and see it in a new light, how to apply it in your new context. That need never diminishes, for no matter how old we are, there are still experiences to process and relevant conclusions to draw. I do that still, even regarding my own beginning at Cate. You weren’t born yet, a fact I’d rather not acknowledge but … there it is. It was Spring Family Weekend of 1998 and I was the Headmaster-elect, a curiosity to some but very much an afterthought to most. Amidst the usual docket of conferences, classes, games, and meals, there was great anticipation about the mainstage performance of Gypsy. In those days, there was just one show, and it was held on Friday night.

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So like everyone else on campus, Ginger and I headed to the theater early to get a seat. The front section was already full when we arrived, so we were in the first row of the rear section directly below the sound booth. Ginger sat down to my left and we watched as the building quickly filled to capacity and then beyond. By the time the show started, which was excellent in every way, all of the stairs in the upper section were filled with audience members. There were even folks standing along the walls, sitting in the aisles, and leaning by the doors. The fire marshal would have been very upset. There was, though, one open seat that, despite my efforts—and they were considerable—I could entice no one to take. It was the one right next to me (to my right). Had it not been for Ginger’s willingness to sit on my left, I might have been an island of one in that packed house. I’m not bitter, of course, or confused, or a little embarrassed Not really. I mean, it couldn’t be personal, right? Nobody even knew me yet. I wasn’t sure, frankly, what to think of this. So I asked the usual questions: What did I do? What can I do? Is it Ginger? I would love to tell you that this little problem passed when folks got to know me, but it didn’t. In fact, it hasn’t. More than two decades later I can usually rely on an open seat or two next to me. Just look at the one next to mine on this dais. It’s sort of handy, actually. I can put stuff there, stretch out. Lots to like. But it can be a little uncomfortable if I ask myself what it all means, not because I’m afraid of the answer … though I can imagine some uncomfortable ones. Mostly because I’m not sure that it’s responsible or appropriate to make it about me. That isn’t to suggest that I am not contributing to the dynamic somehow; rather it is to acknowledge that I can’t know another’s mind. And walking up to any one individual and asking him or her why they didn’t want to sit next to me isn’t likely to be a helpful exercise. Better, I think, to appreciate those who do sit

next to me (thank you, Ginge) than to worry about those who don’t. I trust they have their reasons. For the purposes of this moment—a graduation ceremony—such a confession may seem strangely … inconsequential. Frankly, you’d have reason to complain if the enduring message of this talk—or at least what you leave with—is that you should sit next to people (particularly us sensitive Heads of School) as often as you can. Thankfully, that’s not my point. It is rather that I think it possible that you and I have more in common than you might imagine. Something about our aspirations and, to borrow from Fitzgerald, that which floats in the wake of our dreams. You are, candidly, an ambitious bunch. You have been since the day you were born in all likelihood, but we noticed it immediately when you arrived on this Mesa. The scale of your dreams has been more than matched by the breadth of your endeavor and the intensity of your investment. You have done magnificently, setting standards of accomplishment and achievement in certain realms that may not be approached again for quite some time. And yet at times, despite your success, perhaps like Gatsby with his green light or me sitting alone in the theater, you have seemed confused, strangely unfulfilled, as though despite the hours and the thought and the commitment, it hasn’t been enough. Perhaps that is simply your collective nature. You are not satisfied, a virtue that drives achievement but does not always assure contentment. Perhaps that will change now that you all go your separate ways, or maybe you don’t want it to change. Some degree of restlessness can propel all kinds of industry, and that can take you to all manner of success, something it seems this class has always been destined to achieve. I read an essay by Joan Didion not long ago that included similar themes. Now 84 years old, Didion is a monumental

talent. “The ultimate standard for great writing,” one reviewer noted, “is not clarity or intelligence or entertainment. It’s the capacity to haunt: to get under the reader’s skin and stay there. To read Didion is to understand what writing, at its most exquisitely controlled, can do.” And Joan Didion also has much in common with you, or so I learned from an essay that she wrote for Vogue magazine in 1961, an essay she produced with little prior notice because the author who was supposed to write the piece never did. Didion was 27 years old, working as a copywriter for the magazine at the time. The daughter of an Army officer, she graduated from Berkeley in 1956 and earned the job at Vogue by winning an essay contest her senior year. She prepared the 1961 piece overnight to meet not a page requirement or a word limit but a character count. That, in and of itself, is an achievement, especially in the age of manual typewriters and carbon paper. But it’s what she did with those characters, the words she made, and the sentences they built, that rendered something that feels to me like truth. It begins ominously, “Once, in a dry season, I wrote in large letters across two pages of a notebook that innocence ends when one is stripped of the delusion that one likes oneself. Although now, some years later, I marvel that a mind on the outs with itself should have nonetheless made painstaking record of its every tremor, I recall with embarrassing clarity the flavor of those particular ashes. It was a matter of misplaced self-respect. I had not been elected to Phi Beta Kappa.” All of us know this moment. It was not Phi Beta Kappa in all likelihood that was agent to the end of our naïveté, but a peewee hockey coach perhaps, or a geometry teacher, the girl scout troop leader, our principal, some school or college admission office, a deceitful friend, or even a poor decision. Whatever the vehicle, the moment endures, even (ironically) for Joan Didion, a writer whose skill and inventiveness literally

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introduced the world to a new genre of expression. After noting, “This failure could scarcely have been more predictable or less ambiguous (I simply did not have the grades),” Didion continues rather hyperbolically, “The day that I did not make Phi Beta Kappa nevertheless marked the end of something, and innocence may well be the word for it. I lost the conviction that lights would always turn green for me, the pleasant certainty that those rather passive virtues which had won me approval as a child automatically guaranteed me not only Phi Beta Kappa keys but happiness, honour, and the love of a good man.” Portentous and gloomy though it may seem, this is not an essay about failure or hurt feelings; it’s about self-respect, how it is achieved, maintained, and understood. It’s about who we are and how we understand that identity, a narrative that at least for Didion is something other than an endless series of laudable achievements and accolades.

Rovenna Armi '19, Huy Le '19, Biba Duffy-Boscagli '19, and Elizabeth Li '19 share a moment with Ben Williams before the ceremony.

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Your own endeavors on our Mesa and even the expressions you have shared in your many remarkable Servons speeches, inquiry presentations, even assembly announcements suggest that you already possess much of the understanding that Joan Didion holds as essential in her essay. We have seen it and heard it. It has enriched this school year in marvelous ways, revealed you at your best even if you didn’t know or weren’t always aware what your best was. Said countless numbers of you from the podium this year, echoing our own William Shepard Biddle Class of 1918, this is my story. And in each story it seemed is a moment like the one Didion describes at the beginning of her essay, when each of you is confronted with the inevitable question, What do we do when things are not perfect? When we are struggling? When the achievement of our objectives is waylaid, re-routed, or postponed? When we can’t look back and say it all went according to plan or we were never disappointed (which makes us worry that the future is likely to be tainted by the same unpredictability)? I don’t believe a single one of you is cynical or your aspiration dimmed by experience. But I wonder if at times you have felt doubt creeping in where it hadn’t before. And you may wonder if that is something to be concerned about. Does it, as Didion suggests, portend a few red or yellow lights ahead? Or that you, too, will find the seat next to you is frequently unoccupied? T.S. Eliot famously observed that there is a demon of doubt in every faith. And endeavor of the sort and scale you are involved in depends in part on faith, on your belief in yourselves, your partners and friends, the various ventures of which you are and will be a part. You must believe to achieve, even where there seems reason to worry, when an unforeseen impediment arises, or your considerable effort does not immediately yield what you hoped. Your ambition gives you purpose, but your patience reveals your judgment and

your faith fires your resolve and fortifies your resilience. I share these musings because of the faith I have in you and perhaps because I worry, despite your conspicuous achievement, that you could have more in yourselves and in this seemingly turbulent world that you enter. Said one of your number to me not long ago, “I was so focused for so long on certain outcomes, some of which were and are beyond my control. I’m not sure what my new goal should be.” Not surprisingly, Joan Didion wrestles with the same phenomenon. Her essay continues, “The dismal fact is that self-respect has nothing to do with the approval of others, has nothing to do with reputation—which, as Rhett Butler told Scarlett O’Hara, is something that people with courage can do without.” And you, my friends, are courageous. We have seen it here, on athletic fields and in classrooms, in dormitories and meetings, in intimate settings and on the grandest of scales. You have been personal and powerful, vulnerable and human. You have not pretended to be more than you are, which would be difficult, frankly, because you have so few deficits. And you have not in our experience been anything less than what you might be. You must take hold of that truth and use it to fortify yourselves, not because you are unprepared or because the world is less than you might want it to be. But because it is more and so are you.

Good luck to you, Class of 2019. We will miss you around here.

One GOOD Apple FACULTY COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS By Patrick Collins

Farmer and writer Wendell Berry says that “It is possible … to be in one’s place, in such company … and with such pleasure, that one cannot think of another place one would prefer to be—or of another place at all. One does not miss or regret the past, or fear or long for the future. Being there is simply all, and it is enough.” I hope that this is such a place for each of you. Because I am going to just talk … no. Relax.

Families of graduates get a special welcome, particularly the Deardorffs and Nelsons, parents of my advisees Jack and Jake. Thank you all for giving your children so many things, and especially for giving them your trust and confidence and the freedom to become themselves. Thank you for sharing them with us. That is a rare and unselfish choice. I hope the

Class of 2019 will join me in applauding your parents for giving you this Cate life. Students. Faculty, staff, trustees. Birds and dogs of the Mesa. And you good people over there, each one of you so accomplished, so much loved, who bring us all here today: I intend to use this opportunity you have entrusted to me to tell you about—apples. That’s all I ask you to remember. Apples. Not even metaphorically: literally. Apples. OK? Thank you very much! I’ll see you at lunch. Seriously: Graduation is the season of symbols and metaphors, of speakers waxing poetic. Show up at graduation, and you will hear someone quoting poets, showing symbols and signs, and telling parables. Thus: The way a crow Shook down on me The dust of snow From a hemlock tree 9

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Has given my heart A change of mood And saved some part Of a day I had rued.

“Dust of Snow,” by Robert Frost, is the first poem I ever memorized. In third grade, I crushed the “memorize a poem you like” assignment by picking the shortest poem I could find. I never considered being asked what it might mean. I memorized it; what more do you want? How could the way in which a crow shook off some snow save my day, anyway? You’re asking me? I’m in third grade! I don’t even know what “rued” means! So darn you, Miss Zacker, and your insidious teaching methodology! That poem has lived in my head all my life. Reason One: it’s true. The oddest happenings can reframe how we experience everything. And two: I am no closer to figuring out how and why than I was the day I recited it. I memorized Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” entirely by listening to it at graduations.

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I — I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.

Since everyone apparently chooses the road less traveled by, it’s no lonely path anymore. Those two roads are now the 101 and the 405 (or the 95 and 495 for New Englanders like Frost), so I have updated the ending:

Koko Wing '19 and Caroline Son '19 make their way to the graduation stage.

Two roads diverged and I – I took the one Google Maps advised and that … saved me 20 minutes.

I half-learned other poems about travel by listening to graduation speeches, where journeying is often the theme of the day. “When you set out for Ithaka (that’s the home to which Odysseus sails, returning from Troy) … ask that your way be long, full of adventure, full of instruction …

On graduation day, nothing is just itself. Everything is an example of something else, some bigger concept or truth. Our hearts are open wide and if we can grasp one of those big ideas, we can apply it and our lives will be terrific. That’s one of the great individual and collective powers we possess: the ability to imagine the possibility of things being greater and more beautiful and pure than what we have and who we are. But I don’t think people think, learn, or live best that way. After all, the odyssey was not really “The Odyssey.” Amateur archaeologist Heinrich Schliemann took Homer’s poem, pulled out every bit that might have a factual basis, and by using that concrete information found Troy. “The Odyssey” was not created as a metaphor. It was one long trip home. It was not the myth of a journey. It was the very thing itself. It is said that “The longest journey begins with a single step.” Know what? The longest journey continues with a single step. And then another. Trust me on this because, as a JV basketball coach, I am something of an expert on travelling. Each graduate who crosses this stage will remember the literal, single steps taken each day on this Mesa. Walking on uneven bricks. The sandy path between Schoolhouse and High House. Grass playing fields. Tens of thousands of steps through Yosemite and the Kern. I’ll bet you remember the nonsense, accidents and incidents, surprises, jokes, discoveries, that time when … all those single steps on the trail.

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On another graduation day, my friend Becky Koulouris gave me a little book of Japanese prints by Hiroshige called 53 Stations of the Tokaido Road. The Tokaido Road will take you from Tokyo to Kyoto. It is broken into 53 stations a day apart, and that’s where things get interesting and real. Each print is markedly different because Hiroshige sees something utterly unique at every stage of the trip. At every step. Becky inscribed a poem in the book: “The Summer Mountain,” by Oshikochi. I still had far to go But in the mountain breeze I found it hard to leave The cool shade of green trees.

“ It is said that

We came upon a signpost with innumerable arrows nailed to it, stating place names and giving distances. Unfortunately, it was knocked over and broken, arrows pointing up to the heavens, or for that matter down to the center of the earth. What now? Either begin a new life on the spot as a shepherd, or take another step. What’s that? We plunged out of the mists to stare across an unbounded vista sweeping down to the ocean where a village was tucked beneath a big church, waves rolling behind it all and sunlight glinting off everything. It was glorious.

“The longest journey begins with a single step.” Know what? The longest journey continues with a single step. And then another.

Of all the maps we look at in Art History, my favorite is a map of the West after the fall of Rome. It’s a hot mess. There’s the Principality of Kiev; the territories of the Golden Horde and those of the Black Sheep. There are khanates, caliphates, kingdoms; places named for a tribe or religion or race. It’s an earnest attempt to impose order on a world that is really exploding into spectacular disorder. Making that map was like taking a picture of kindergarteners. “Everybody just stay still … ” You’ve got to love the effort, even though you know it’s futile. I once possessed the best map ever. It was created by my friend Frank Sykes—

“

So don’t just sit over there basking in glory, as though the stage is a destination. You’re getting a diploma— but you’re also getting the boot. People are checking their watches. You still have far to go. Do you think, “A good metaphor will guide me! Uh, would you repeat that thing about the two roads … ?” Consider a map. “Choose your destination and the main landmarks, and it will go beautifully.”

legendary Cate English teacher, British Lion international rugby champion, man of iron, an incredible wit with the vocabulary and voice of a God. My family planned a summer exploring England and Scotland by car, and Frank plotted a route for us through his native Yorkshire. He excitedly delivered a sheet full of wonderful words, a combination of eloquent poem and delicious recipe, saying where to turn at which landmark: “follow the stone wall; two roads will diverge; look for an old ruin … ” Let’s go!

Those instructions got us just far enough into the hills and dales to where we could not possibly backtrack. Nor could we see the right way forward. Is this the crossroads Frank meant? Hmmm … no mention of this fork in the road. There should be a village up ahead … no? Where did this mist come from? Is this a hill? Or a dale? A moor? Look—there’s no way a car can fit between the side of that stone building and, well, that stone wall … it’s a walkway, not a road! OK, I’ll try.”

“The Road Not Taken,” “The Odyssey,” “Huckleberry Finn,” “As I Lay Dying,” even “Journey to the Center of the Earth” and innumerable other life-is-a-journey books contributed nothing helpful to this experience. That wonderful map only served to get us lost. To this day, I cannot retrace our route or tell you where we were. But was this a disaster?

Having to pay attention to every single step rewarded us with one surprising thing after another. That farmer’s outfit. The funny way sheep walk when bunched together. The sweeping contours of the farmed land. Dogs who have jobs. Smells of dry grass and mown hay. Surface textures of rock dug from the fields, cut, and made into a house. Complicated, un-nameable colors. Many ways to fence livestock. Sounds of wind in the weeds. Tangy salt thrown in the air by distant waves. “It is possible … to be in one’s place, in such company … and with such pleasure, that one cannot think of another place one would prefer to be—or of another place at all.” Years later, in Wendell Berry’s “The Unforeseen Wilderness,” I read this bellringer of a description: 11

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“… Somewhere behind me that I will not go back to, I have lost my map. At first I am sorry, for on these trips I have always kept it with me. I brood over the thought of it, the map of this place rotting into it along with its leaves and fallen wood. The image takes hold of me, and I suddenly realize that it is the culmination … of what I have learned here … the gradual relinquishment of maps, the yielding of knowledge before the new facts and mysteries … The thought of … the map fallen and decaying like a leaf among the leaves, grows in my mind to the force of a cleansing vision. As though freed of a heavy weight, I am light and exultant here in the end and the beginning.”

Maps and metaphors, textbooks—even the whopper we read for Art History— tell you about where people have been before you, what has already been seen, and what others think it meant. Good to know, but past tense. I wish better for you. I wish you the unexpected. I wish you one lost step after another, taking in the dumbfounding, the particular, the strange, the beautiful, the very real, the literal, the actual. For example: apples. Someone is on the road from somewhere to somewhere else. Then: A scent of ripeness from over a wall. And come to leave the routine road And look for what had made me stall, There sure enough was an apple tree That had eased itself of its summer load, And of all but its trivial foliage free, Now breathed as light as a lady’s fan. For there had been an apple fall As complete as the apple had given man. The ground was one circle of solid red. May something go always unharvested! May much stay out of our stated plan, Apples or something forgotten and left, So smelling their sweetness would be no theft.

That’s Frost again. May much stay out of our stated plan. Not “May your plans be fulfilled.” There are apples right there on the other side of the wall along that road you have taken. They shouldn’t be there. But there they are. Right there. Metaphor masters, allusion addicts, and symbol seekers have a field day with this poem and its reference to a fall started by an

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apple. I refuse. It is just fine with me if the apples are, well, apples. Have you ever had a really good apple? Mr. Williams and Mr. Dorion and I share a love for good apples, so trust us: a good apple is wonderful enough without having to claim descent from a Garden of Eden. Maybe there is a Paradise with even better apples. I would not know. But what I do know is that in the nonmetaphorical, non-symbolic here and now, the things we cannot generalize, or expect, explain, deserve, or plan or find on a map—real, particular things that are so unexpected, surprising, or just plain strange that they are not an example of anything we think we know—these very real surprises can be the foundation of anything and are the foundation for everything. Charles Darwin was surprised to see the variety of the shapes of the beaks of the finches on the Galapagos Islands. Marcel Proust was surprised by the smell of a baked madeleine. Robert Frost, Martha Stewart, and Isaac Newton were surprised by … wait for it … apples. Graduates. I am going to miss you something fierce. Sure, I know where you plan to go to college, your accomplishments, hopes, and plans. I’ve even seen your GPA! Such things are profound, yet I don’t think of any of you in general terms. What hits me, wonderfully, are incidents as momentary, unexpected, and real as catching the scent of an apple, yet utterly defining. Jake passing on the art of pouring Martinelli’s to his chosen advisory successor, Will. Sydney breaking into that luminous smile after spotting yet another architrave. Georgia writing a pun as an answer for every item on a test. Jack cracking up when his Foundation Arts self-portrait appears on screen as senior English classes learn about Modernism in art. Opening a book Kate Bradley lent me about St. Francis, to find that it is the History Prize book she won, that she annotated it as she read it, and at the end included a note-to-self: “Thank whoever selected

this book!” My favorite surprise of the year and one of the all-time greats: Kaiser arriving last for Art History class and sitting down next to me with a full plate of breakfast … and then returning my stare as though I am absolutely insane to find anything remarkable about this. You can’t make this stuff up … any more than you can make up the way a crow shakes down the dust of snow from a hemlock tree, which somehow changes your heart and saves the day. I will bet—I know— that the truest, best, most powerful, and most lasting parts of your Cate lives are all based on such single steps and surprises. Has a journey taken shape yet? Hardly. How could it? But it will. My advice? Pay attention. Set aside the metaphors and lessons and laws and themes sometimes to watch your step and see what is really here and happening now. You have become brilliant experts at that here—the best I have ever seen—fulfilling yourselves as well as the founding purpose and magic of this place. Just pay attention. Finally, I want to reassure you that this world is as astonishing and as beautiful as it ever was. As full of wonder, as full of surprises and rewards. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise. As evidence, I give you: apples. Apples, literal apples, existing just as apples. And if you ever get a great one, as I hope you do, and you bite into it and in your surprise think, “heaven,” well—that’s one terrific apple. Thank you all for listening. And thank you, graduates, for more than I can say. I wish you more good things than anyone could imagine.

The Big One STUDENT COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS By Daphne McKeefry '19

Thank you, and a big congratulations to the Class of 2019. I’m going to share a thought simply because I haven’t been able to get it out of my mind these past few weeks, and because I’ll probably be saying it for the rest of my life looking back on my time here: This has been an exceptionally bizarre way to “do” high school. When we get out into the world and try to explain to those outside the Cate bubble about the MOD phone or the toast room, or riding in Yukons, or Gerald the Bat, they’re not going to get it. They’ll assume that work crew is an illegal enforcement of child labor, when many of us know it can be a great way to start the day and hang with T-Smith. They’ll assume that to live in a dorm with your teachers is both excruciating and uncomfortable, when many of us have yet to imagine a warmer home than that which we have found in our dorms here. Most of the friends we make after all this will probably misinterpret and disregard our high school stories because they are so niche and unusual. Yet in our strange predicament, what we missed out on from the “typical high school experience” pales in comparison to the entirely original experiences we have had.

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I’m incredibly lucky, in particular, to have lived and learned with friends who make good art. And I can say this because I’ve seen bad high school art. Lots of it. My old acquaintances from other schools are not shy about posting their god-awful renditions of Georgia O’Keeffe or their angsty, cliché poems all over social media to receive half-hearted praise from their friends. No, I’m surrounded by good art, and

We play with the medium of monotony. Perhaps this suggestion is sounding a bit too vague. So, this scenario might sound familiar: you’re stuck on campus on a Saturday night. You forgot to sign up for the off-campus activity, so now you have five-plus hours until in-dorm with a handful of friends and no plan. Rather than sulk back to our dorms or hit the sack early, ever since freshman

“ We can reclaim the lost

notion that the world bends towards joy, light, and livelihood. After we leave this Mesa, we are all going to go out into incredible, selfless, and worthwhile endeavors, I’m certain of it.

“

true creatives of every discipline: great writers and painters and photographers and sculptors and filmmakers, but also creative conversationalists, masterful storytellers, and comedians from every point on the introvert-extrovert spectrum. What I’ve noticed about the Class of 2019 is that this class has a diverse and revered range of creative pursuits, but this class also knows how to lead creative lifestyles. We have the capacity to turn everyday experiences into works of art.

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year it has been the inclination, nay, the instinct, of the Class of 2019 to go out and become night-time explorers of the Mesa. We hop between dorm common rooms, search the forgotten nooks of campus, and bring portable speakers along for impromptu dance parties. We might venture into someone’s room that we never dreamed (or nightmared) of entering. We gather friends to play Dungeons & Dragons or Minecraft in HH1, inviting those who stop in to join. We play Sardines and Manhunt around

campus, finding more ingenious hiding spots than one could imagine from the small encirclement of the night-time boundaries. Our class is exceptional at creating something remarkable where most high schoolers might see no potential for fun at all. I believe the greatest testament to our determination to unearth creative fun is our widely shared love for the game of four square. Each spring of my Cate career, without fail, as the days grow longer someone in the Class of 2019 paints a four square court on the walkway towards Bothin. My freshman year at Cate, when Ella Hendriks and Maddie Erickson first hatched the idea and set off sprinting out of '25 House, they were so moved by spontaneity itself that they didn’t even search for chalk to paint the lines but instead used a spray bottle of sunscreen to create the court. Given that the skies refused to rain in the years 2016 and 2017 on this Mesa, it suffices to say our four square court had a longer lifespan on the dry pavement than any of us had anticipated. But perhaps that is true of the spirit of four square in our players as much as the court itself, as it has blossomed into a school-wide happening and faithful springtime tradition ever since. I for one hadn’t even thought of the game since I last played it in the fourth grade, and never imagined I’d be playing it again in high school. That’s part of the beauty of 2019’s interest in four square, that we are so willing to tap into our frantic childhood energy and look a little ridiculous while doing so. Some evenings, a game of four square can draw such a crowd that the line itself creates a ruckus so great it can be heard from CHE and CHW. If someone had enjoyed too long a reign in the highest four square position of Queen, however, the content of our cheers could take a dark turn quite quickly. One evening, when Peter Firestone had been the Queen for a bit too long, a line of three dozen people was suddenly chanting, “Down with Peter! Down

with Peter!â&#x20AC;? with unbridled enthusiasm. Most remarkably, the goal of our four square game (more than lasting victory and supreme reign over the lesser four square players) has been to get every single passerby who wanders past the four square game to play with us. I cannot count the times I have happened upon a four square game and been waved into the line and found an otherwise calm night disrupted as I joined the great ruckus of cheers at every game point. Thus the joy, the spontaneity, and the creativity have been passed along and multiplied. Every person on this stage has stories like this. Stories concocted from a unique brew of boredom mixed in with some momentary ingenuity and the playful

spirits of the storytellers themselves. Chances are you are thinking of those stories right now. In writing this very daunting final homework assignment before I graduate, I realized I didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t want to write a story of my own character, my own changes, or my own growth in my time here. Instead, I wanted to write something to try to encapsulate the qualities that make the Class of 2019 unique. What has fueled our collective character, our changes, and our growth? In my view, it is our high expectations, our competitiveness, our collective emotional intelligence. But it is equally expressed in strangely entertaining events such as these. If I could lift up this hefty podium and turn it to face the stage full of incredible individuals on my left, I would. I have lived a very

fortunate life so far; that is clear to me today more than ever before. But I would undoubtedly say that of all the gifts I have received at Cate, this group of bright, hilarious, and crafty young people is by far my favorite. Continue that practice of making something, some game or joke or tradition, no matter how worthless or ridiculous, where others may notice no possibility at all. That opportunistic quality transcends all artistic mediums or difficult circumstances. Stay vigilant for your chances to play with the routine, because theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re everywhere. It should be noted, also, that Cate has been quite an ideal nesting ground to cultivate this shared quality. Being

That's what friends are for. Adlai Hester '19 makes short work of affixing a rose pin on Bailor Jalloh '19.

COMMENCEMENT 2019

stuck on the top of a beautiful mesa on S-Friday nights, and having a seven o’clock curfew each day, but also being surrounded by 300 ingenious teenagers in the same predicament gave this group a healthy dose of what I’m going to call a Phineas and Ferb complex. Don’t lose that impulse after you leave this place. Even twenty years down the road, no matter how tedious the work you find yourself in, or how much your future spouse and kids will make you want to tear your hair out, or how helpless you may feel in the frenzy of the rat race, you always have the opportunity to play with your surroundings. The people who can turn this ability to find the game into a practice are everywhere, and are often among the most compelling people you can find, no matter who they are or where they come from. Two weeks ago, I made a quick run to the Albertsons in Carp on a weekday evening. I got a bag of Tostitos Hint of Lime chips and a pack of gum and hurried to the express checkout, anxious to make the last bus back to Cate. The cashier, a gregarious older man, scanned my items and noted that my total was $4.99. I gave him a five-dollar bill, and he suddenly exclaimed, “Let’s play Count the change!” and pounded a drumroll into the register as a single penny fell out of the change counter, and made a hilariously extravagant show of handing me that penny. I walked out of the store laughing. What was so remarkable about the gentleman working the register at Albertsons was how even in one of the most mundane and tedious jobs, he was very much like this class: he was creative enough to find the game hiding in the monotony and relish it, stretch it, and pass the joy along to someone else. From this day forward, I would invite you to treat your own life like a work of art. Because if I’ve learned anything from my peers throughout my formal Cate education, it’s that the best painters can fearlessly play with their paints, that the

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best poets can make up new words, the best photographers and videographers can twist mundane objects and situations into a new image. But our class’s creativity doesn’t just live in the studio; it lives in our friendships, our Harkness tables, our dorm rooms, and our four square courts. Don’t forget about the ways you have chosen to keep the game going in your own lives. Don’t forget about What are the odds?, Tic tac toe, Sardines, Hangman, M.A.S.H., Witch or Pioneer Woman, riddles, Pointed questions/ Pointless questions, and Get down, Mr. President!—and all the other innumerable little ways you could continue to sneak your proclivity for creativity and joy into everyday life. It is in these ways that we can reclaim our agency and character as living beings in an increasingly mechanized world. We can reclaim the lost notion that the world bends towards joy, light, and livelihood. After we leave this Mesa, we are all going to go out into incredible, selfless, and worthwhile endeavors, I’m certain of it. With this education, each of us has more potential energy than ever before to do some profound good in the world. But if we go out onto our respective paths without some sense of how to keep the joy of life safe in our pockets as we go, we will quickly become disheartened and sick of the world. And I would hate to see any of our valiant missions become compromised because we were suddenly uninspired. Remember that opportunities to exercise your innate creativity will spring up in every dull conversation with a coworker and doctor’s waiting room and hour spent sitting in traffic. All I ask is that you never lose your ability to find the games, to find again and again the creativity that is forever around us and within us. To my friends up here on this stage: I have nothing but love and respect and high hopes for you all. Thank you, each and every one of you.

Calm, cool, and collected before graduation. Bottom row: Rivers Sheehan '19 and Raja Promige '19. Top row from left: Anthony DuPrau '19, Jeffrey Kim '19, and Kaiser Ke '19.

Abnner Olivares '19 receives the Morgan Gwynne Temby '69 Award, which is presented to a student who has shown deep concern for the welfare of others.

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2018/2019

Awards All awards are given to Faculty Recognitions members of the Class of Stephen Spittler '63 Cup 2019 unless otherwise noted Lauren Jared W. Burleigh Pattee Fellowship Award

Stanley D. Woodworth Language Cup

Jojo Broussard The Frank B. Light Cup

Peter Coors '21, Yuki Kobayashi '21

Commencement Awards

Zohara Zamor

Edwin Hartzell United States History Prize

Jeffrey Sumner Pallette '88 Award

Centennial Fellowship Award

Lina Infante '20, Oscar Vasquez '20

Sean Zhan

Anna Fortner

Santa Barbara Scholarship Cup

Circumspice Fellowship Award

The James Masker Global Studies Award

Jeffrey Kim

Joy Doyle

Ellis Cup

William New, Jr. '59 Servons Award

Carson Williams

Kevin Hartigan

Morgan Gwynne Temby '69 Award

Academic Awards

Abnner Olivares Dohrmann Pischel Class of 1914 Medal

Cloe Tarlton, Caroline Son The Miramar Award

Bailor Jalloh, Israel Sanchez Nelson D. Jones '48 Medal

Hunter King Santa Barbara School Medal

Maddie Denis Headmaster's Award

Kate Bradley William Shepard Biddle Class of 1918 Cup

Jennifer Soh

Gaby Edwards and David Harbison '72 Humanities Award

Elise Guerrand-HermĂ¨s '22 James C. Durham '02 Writing Prize

Elizabeth Li, Clare Meehan English Department Prize

Phoebe Hurwitz Chinese Prize

Yui Kosukegawa French Prize

Rivers Sheehan

Raja Promige History Department Prize

Kate Bradley, Jeffrey Kim Stanley M. Durrant Mathematics Prize

Cloris Cheng '21 Colin Day Mathematics Award

Kevin Tian Allan J. Gunther Mathematics Award

Sean Zhan Rensselaer Polytechnic Medal

Phil Xu '20 Biology Prize

Sarah Dike Chemistry Prize

Theodore Mack '20, Caroline Son Physics Prize

Japanese Prize

Alice Zhang

Hunter King, Abnner Olivares, Avalon Swanson

The Hans F. Summers Award

Jennifer Soh, Sean Zhan

Spanish Prize

Clare Meehan, Cloe Tarlton

2018/2019 AWARDS

Art Awards Joseph Knowles Foundation Arts Award

Extracurricular Awards

Fred Bradley '68 Prize

Betty Woodworth Librarian's Award

James R. Feld '81 Ceramics Award Tony Hooker '56 Sculpture Award

El Batidor Award

Cloe Tarlton Drama Award

Bailor Jalloh joins the Cate School Alumni Leadership Council as a Class Agent.

This year the Sportsmanship Award is shared by Peter Firestone, Maddie Erickson, Kate Tunnell, and Cullen Barber. The Human Development Award goes to the teaching assistant whose commitment and compassion is a daily example of what it means to lead through service to others. This year it is presented to Phoebe Hurwitz.

Kate Bradley and Kaiser Ke share the El Batidor Award.

Elizabeth Li and Clare Meehan are awarded the James C. Durham '02 Writing Prize.

Sean Zhan is awarded the Allan Gunther Award for excellence in mathematics. Hunter King receives the Technology Prize for leading the theaterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s tech crew, helping with assemblies, plays, Commencement proceedings, and alumni podcasts.

Mesan Award

Cloe Tarlton, Kate Tunnell, Alice Zhang

Marion Wolsey Cate Acting Prize

Liza Borghesani '20, Spencer Michaels '20

Israel Sanchez Robyn Collins

Yui Kosukegawa is awarded the Chinese Prize.

Natasha Weiss '20

Jinny Chung '22, Dawson Fuss '22 Elisabetta Duffy-Boscagli (2-Dimensional) Scott Holmes '20 (3-Dimensional)

Centennial Book Prize

Hunter King Franklin Ellis Vocal Prize

Kate Bradley, Abnner Olivares Peter Folger '25 Music Cup

Jeffrey Kim, Jennifer Soh

Kate Bradley, Kaiser Ke Public Service Award

Flora Troy Noah W. Hotchkiss Memorial Award

Jack Deardorff, Elle Smith Technology Prize

Hunter King Student Activities Award

Emily Calkins '20, Spencer Michaels '20

Jojo Broussard, Georgia Douglas, Celia Foster, Andreah Graf, Bella Hillyer, Luke Laurence

Digital Imaging Award

Human Development Award

Photography Prize

Ella Hendriks

Phoebe Hurwitz

Joseph Bradley '35 Art Prize

Athletic Awards

Elizabeth Li

Junior Book Prizes University of Pennsylvania

Outdoor Program Award

Daphne McKeefry Redington Cup Award

Mark Huerta '20

Will Deardorff '21, Anna Disorbo '22

Johns Hopkins University

Most Inspirational Athlete Award

Parker May '20 Dartmouth College

Maya Blattberg '20 Harvard University

Carlo Jacobson '20, Kimberly Rogers '20 Williams College

Hannah Biles '20 Brown University

Kenneth Liou '20

Drew Anastasio, Rivers Sheehan, Elle Smith Sportsmanship Award

Maddie Erickson, Cullen Barber, Peter Firestone, Kate Tunnell Beach SoulĂŠ Award

Jack Deardorff Peter Cate '37 Award

Sarah Polowczak

Wellesley College

Avery Ransom '20 21

2018/2019 AWARDS

Senior Varsity Sports Letter Awards

Football

Six Varsity Letters

Boys Basketball

Anthony DuPrau, Adlai Hester, Israel Sanchez, Kate Tunnell, Victor Vasquez Diaz Seven Varsity Letters

Ethan Cassulo Girls Basketball

Sarah Polowczak, Elle Smith Boys Soccer

Eight Varsity Letters

Maddie Erickson

Nine Varsity Letters

Sebastian Richardson Ten Varsity Letters

Bailor Jalloh Girls Soccer Girls Water Polo

Celia Foster, Ella Hendriks Anthony DuPrau, Peter Firestone, Adlai Hester Girls Lacrosse

Eleven Varsity Letters

Baseball

Maddie Erickson, Daphne McKeefry

Cullen Barber, Jack Deardorff

Jack Deardorff, McCarthy Willett

Twelve Varsity Letters

Boys Tennis

Sarah Polowczak

Brad Gordon, Charles Xie

Varsity Sports Captains Awards

Boys Track & Field

Girls Volleyball

Boys Volleyball

Girls Tennis

Drew Anastasio, Joshua Shields, Sean Zhan Cullen Barber, Sebastian Richardson, Carson Williams

Sydney Burton, Sarah Polowczak

Girls Swimming

Boys Cross Country

Lulu Blau, Sarah Dike, Celia Foster, Ella Hendriks

Abnner Olivares, Israel Sanchez, Josh Shields Girls Cross Country

Andreah Graf, Bella Hillyer Boys Water Polo

Cullen Barber, Sebastian Sak Squash

Kate Bradley, Maddie Denis, Stefan Suh

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Boys Lacrosse

Ethan Cassulo, Jake Nelson, Carson Williams

Katie Browne

Drew Anastasio, Jack Deardorff, Carson Williams

Drew Anastasio, Kate Bradley, Sarah Dike, Georgia Douglas, Bella Hillyer, Abnner Olivares, Josh Shields Maddie Erickson, Peter Firestone, Celia Foster, Ella Hendriks, Cal Sinclair, Elle Smith

Boys Swimming

Kaiser Ke, Victor Vasquez Diaz, Jason Zhao Girls Track & Field

Rovenna Armi, Rivers Sheehan, Elle Smith

The Physics Prize is presented to Alice Zhang.

Sarah Polowczak is awarded the Peter Cate '37 Athletic Award for being an outstanding athlete who personifies the best athletic virtues.

Rivers Sheehan, Elle Smith, and Drew Anastasio share the Most Inspirational Athlete Award.

Sebastian Richardson is honored for lettering in nine varsity letters.

The Marion Wolsey Cate Acting Prize is awarded to Cloe Tarlton.

Jennifer Soh and Jeffrey Kim share The Peter Folger '25 Music Trophy.

This yearâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s James Masker Global Studies Award is presented to Raja Promige.

Jake Nelson is honored for lettering in ten varsity sports.

Josh Shields receives recognition for lettering in seven varsity sports.

2018/2019 AWARDS

Prize Funds JOSEPH BRADLEY '35 ART PRIZE FUND

Established in 1987 by gifts in memory of Joseph Bradley, Class of 1935 and members of the faculty from 1944 to 1946, for an annual art prize and to purchase books of art for the McBean Library. Elizabeth Li is the recipient of this year's award. PETER CATE '37 AWARD FUND

Established in 1985 by a gift from Philip T. Cate, Jr. of the Class of 1937 for an annual prize for the best female athlete in the School. Sarah Polowczak is the recipient of this year’s award. ANTHONY S. HOOKER '56 SCULPTURE PRIZE FUND

Established in 1992 for an annual prize for students most proficient in sculpture, and to add to the library’s collection of books on the art form. Robyn Collins is the recipient of this year’s award. JOSEPH KNOWLES PRIZE FUND

Established in 1979 by a bequest from Joseph Knowles for an annual art prize for an outstanding student in the arts. Jinny Chung '22 and Dawson Fuss '22 are the recipients of this year’s award. JEFFREY SUMNER PALLETTE '88 AWARD FUND

Established in 1990 by gifts in memory of Jeffrey Sumner Pallette of the Class of 1988 for an annual prize for the classmate held in highest esteem by the members of the senior class. Sean Zhan is the recipient of this year's award. HANS F. SUMMERS AWARD FUND

Established in 1987 by a gift from an anonymous member of the faculty to support a prize for excellence in science. Jennifer Soh and Sean Zhan are the recipients of this year’s award.

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Faculty Fellowships With the generous support of an anonymous donor, the School is pleased to offer two fellowships for exemplary teaching to members of the Cate faculty whose service this year has been particularly distinctive and impactful. The fellowships include $2,500 stipends which the recipients may use as they choose. The purpose of this program is to honor the exceptional teaching and commitment that has always distinguished the men and women who deliver the educational program here on the Mesa. The Centennial Fellowship

The Centennial Fellowship was conceived to honor thoughtful, purposeful, and innovative classroom teaching. Focused directly on pedagogy and practice, this award seeks to recognize an educator whose work this year has demonstrably advanced his or her own teaching skills, course design, and lesson planning and in so doing impacted productively the learning of his or her own students. This year, the Centennial Fellowship is awarded to Anna Fortner. The Circumspice Fellowship

The Circumspice Fellowship was designed to acknowledge the multiplicity of endeavors in which Cate faculty members are involved. This award recognizes excellence in teaching in the broadest application of that role, encompassing as we do at Cate, all that happens in the classroom, in the dormitories, on the stage or athletic fields, and in broad-based engagements with the community. This is an honor built on the actualization and exemplary achievement by a faculty member of the very same diverse commitments we ask our students to make. The Fellowship is awarded to Joy Doyle. The W. Burleigh Pattee Fellowship Award

The W. Burleigh Pattee Fellowship was established by friends of Mr. Pattee, to honor outstanding teaching at Cate. A student at Cate and the parent of an alumnus, Mr. Pattee served as a Cate trustee for 28 years. Known widely for his good sense and frugal lifestyle, Mr. Pattee was a stickler for value. At the Burlingame Country Club outside of San Francisco, where Mr. Pattee was a member, the caddy fees were, in Mr. Pattee’s mind, completely intolerable. To avoid the expense, Mr. Pattee built a small trailer that he could strap to his faithful Labrador retriever. The dog dutifully followed his master over the course, clubs in tow, requiring only a biscuit or two in the way of a tip. There were, however, things that Mr. Pattee was quite willing to pay for, and good teaching is at the top of the list. This particular fellowship comes with a $1,000 stipend. It is awarded to a faculty member who has invested fully and completely in the life of the school. A gentle dorm head to the underclass boys (who call her Mama Z), a skilled linguist, and one of our most conscientious and devoted public servants, this faculty member is perpetually busy improving the experience of another or actively advancing her own craft. It is an honor to bestow the fellowship on Zohara Zamor. 1. Anna Fortner is presented with the Centennial Fellowship by Headmaster Ben Williams. 2. Joy Doyle receives the Circumspice Fellowship. 3. Zohara Zamor, recipient of the W. Burleigh Pattee Fellowship, is all smiles after the ceremony.

The William New Jr. '59 Servons Award

The William New Jr. '59 Servons Award was conceived to honor the legendary service to Cate of its namesake. And since its inception, the award has been presented by Bill New himself: an inventor, philanthropist, trustee, and friend. But Bill succumbed to cancer in early 2018, and so we enter a new era for the honor he inspired.

The award is given to an individual whose service to Cate has been sustained, generous and remarkable. It has been awarded to alumni, parents of former students, trustees, faculty, members of the staff and this year to a new category of recipient. For nearly two decades our honoree has worked with this community, beginning as a contractor hired to advance particular projects but becoming a consultant, partner, and manager of virtually every notable plant-related project in the last dozen years. An innovator by nature and a highly skilled problem solver, he has pushed Cate relentlessly to be more thoughtful and responsible with everything from building materials, to water management and irrigation, to power generation, and a reduced carbon footprint. The micro-turbine that supports our pools by converting natural gas to electricity and recapturing the heat generated to warm the pools was his brainchild. The cistern that lies beneath our parking lot to store and reuse water was also his idea. The rising Booth Commons, which will collect all the condensate generated within the building and store it in a holding tank, will sustain and hydrate all of Kirby Quad because of our recipient’s inventiveness. Even the solar panels which sit atop Sprague Gym, the houses on the top of the Mesa, and will rest on the roof of Booth Commons were conceived by today’s honoree to press us closer to energy independence. Cate has throughout our century plus of existence relied on those who feel compelled by the possibilities of education, the hope and promise intrinsic to the exercise, and the inclination to play a part large or small. Our recipient this year has played a large part, fortifying the campus and the manner in which we operate to ensure the school’s viability in the centuries to come. It is a great privilege to bestow the school’s highest honor on Kevin Hartigan.

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Commencement Through the Lens

Zoe Hale and Flora Troy link arms as they join the procession.

Lulu Blau beams as she is recognized for her unique qualities and characteristics while receiving her diploma.

Sarah Dike and Kaiser Ke share a laugh on Commencement morning.

Ethan Cassulo, Sharlene Cordeiro, Lisa Pachikara, and Brad Gordon pose outside the Class of '85 House.

Abnner Olivares, Sebastian Richardson (back row), Emely Villatoro, and Victor Vasquez Diaz gather for a group photo before Commencement.

Abhishek Suresh and Robyn Collins process into the Commencement tent.

Jennifer Soh walks arm in arm with Celia Foster while celebrating the end of the Commencement ceremony.

Graduate Tessa Denison shares a touching moment with her father, Paul Denison '79.

Sydney Burton, Katherine Browne, and Phoebe Hurwitz pause for a fun photo before the ceremony.

10.

Kevin Tian, Charles Xie, and Sean Zhan display their graduation ties.

Photographer Robert Hanson â&#x20AC;&#x2122;98 captures the Milky Way high above the eucalyptus trees.

Cum Laude Address Shabana Basij-Rasikh

President and Co-Founder of SOLA

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Thank you, Mr. Williams, and hello to the Cate School community, the Class of 2019, and, of course, the Cum Laude initiates.

About Shabana Basij-Rasikh Introduction By Headmaster Ben Williams

I’m glad to be with you tonight. There’s so much that I want to say. But I thought I’d start by telling you something that maybe no one’s told you before. You—and I’m talking to each one of you, each student here in the Chapel—you’re who I wanted to be when I grew up. Now, when I say this, I don’t mean I wanted to be a student at Cate School, though now that I’ve visited twice and seen what the campus looks like, I probably would have been okay with that. And don’t get me started on those incredible Inquiry Day presentations I saw some of you give earlier, or we’ll be here all night. But that’s not what I mean. It’s not that I wanted to live where you live when I was growing up. It’s not that I wanted to have what you have. What I wanted was something much simpler than that … but also much harder to obtain. What I wanted, when I was growing up, was to be what you are. What I wanted was to be educated. Simple, right? Well, not if you’re a girl from Afghanistan. When I was growing up, what I wanted was illegal. And that’s because I grew up in Kabul during the time of the Taliban regime. When the Taliban came to power in 1996, one of the first things they did was to close all the girls’ schools. They made it against the law for girls to get an education. But even so, there were some girls who were fortunate enough to have parents who were willing to

During her time on the Mesa, Ms. Basij-Rasikh attended several student inquiry presentations and visited some classes.

Our guest tonight is Shabana BasijRasikh, the president and cofounder of SOLA (School of Leadership Afghanistan), Afghanistan’s first boarding school for girls and a leading advocate for girls’ education. Shabana was born in Kabul and was in grade school when the Taliban came to power in 1996. Under the Taliban regime, women were banned from attending school and forbidden from any public setting without a male chaperone. Rather than accept the Taliban’s rule as the end of her education, Shabana was among many ambitious girls who attended a secret network of schools that developed around the city. From 1996 until the fall of the Taliban in 2001, Shabana dressed as a boy and walked with her sister, who was clad in the traditional burka, to these secret schools. Girls’ schools reopened in 2001 and Shabana continued her education in Afghanistan before attending

high school in the U.S. through the State Department’s Youth Exchange Program. After high school, Shabana attended Middlebury College. In 2008, as a student at Middlebury, Shabana co-founded SOLA, with the mission of providing access to quality education for girls across her homeland. Cate alumna Farida Tahiry, class of 2018, was a SOLA student. While at Middlebury, Shabana was awarded a Davis Peace Prize, with which she built wells outside of Kabul; was selected as one of Glamour Magazine’s Top 10 College Women of 2010; and received the Vermont Campus Compact 2011 Madeleine Kunin Public Service Award for outstanding leadership and service to others. Shabana graduated from Middlebury College in 2011 with a degree in International Studies and Women & Gender Studies. Shabana continues to do the work that she started with SOLA more 29

CUM LAUDE ADDRESS

than a decade ago. She was named one of CNN International’s Leading Women of 2014 and one of National Geographic’s 2014 Emerging Explorers. Shabana is also a global ambassador for Girl Rising, a call to action seeking investment in girls’ education worldwide.

take the risk of sending their daughters to secret schools where they could still learn. I was one of those girls. I went to a series of secret schools in Kabul that were held in people’s homes, usually in their living rooms; there could be 20 or 30 or 50 other girls there too, and we’d all study together.

In 2018, Afghan President Ashraf Ghani and First Lady Rula Ghani awarded Shabana the Malalai Medal, one of Afghanistan’s highest national honors, for her work in promoting girls’ access to education. In 2019, she was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia list in the social entrepreneurship sector.

And we did that until 2001, when the Taliban regime fell, and girls’ schools reopened in Kabul. We could go back to school; we could study openly. And that’s what I did. I went to high school, I earned a diploma, I applied to college … and I never, for a single second, forgot how lucky I was to have a father and mother who risked what they did to ensure that I wouldn’t be a statistic. And this is what those statistics sound like: in Afghanistan today, nearly 3 million girls are out of school. In Afghanistan today, the illiteracy rate for teenage girls is 63%.

Shabana’s life work is a model of the generous scholarship we recognize with Cum Laude and our other celebrations for seniors over the next two weeks. It is an honor to welcome a guest whose life work embodies the spirit of Servons, and who, in a time of conflict, celebrates the possibilities of education, peace, and understanding.

At Cate, you’re encouraged to think globally. Earlier today, I heard Mr. Williams state that next year’s Inquiry question would be global in nature. You’re encouraged to take a broad worldview; you’re encouraged to ask tough questions. So, with that in mind, I’ll ask you this: What does it mean for the future of a country when almost two-thirds of its young women can’t read a book? What does it mean for the future of a country when nearly 3 million of its girls want to be educated—when nearly 3 million of its girls want to grow up to be just like all of you here tonight—but they don’t have the chance to? I asked myself these questions, when I was your age. I knew I had been fortunate. I knew I’d had opportunities that other girls didn’t have. I had become what I wanted to become: I

Seventeen members of the Class of 2019 were inducted into the Cate School chapter of the national Cum Laude Society: Top row (left to right): Flora Troy, Rivers Sheehan, Charles Xie, Sean Zhan, Esther Whang, Jojo Broussard, Jeffrey Kim, Jennifer Soh, Cloe Tarlton, Baker Fox, Alice Zhang, and Hunter King. Bottom row (left to right): Kate Bradley, Caroline Son, Raja Promige, Elizabeth Li, and Kate Tunnell. 30

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was educated. I was lucky. And I was in a position where I could make a difference. I was in college when I co-founded the School of Leadership, Afghanistan— SOLA, for short. I went to Middlebury College in Vermont, and in those early days, I was incredibly lucky to have an amazing team on the ground in Kabul while I worked on SOLA out of my dorm room, which I suppose makes SOLA sound a bit like a tech startup, doesn’t it? And just like a tech startup, SOLA is in business to change the world. We started small: when we began operating in 2008, we had a rented house in Kabul and exactly four students. That’s all. Today, we have nearly 80 girls at our Kabul campus, all of them living and studying together, and we’re looking to more than double our enrollment over the next four years. But we haven’t stopped there: some of our older students have already transitioned into lives overseas, outside of Afghanistan. We’ve had students attend schools in India, we’ve had them attend schools in the Middle East, we’ve even had them attend schools here in the U.S. In fact, some of you here tonight may have met one of these students. Her name is Farida Tahiry, and not only is she a proud SOLA alum—she’s also a proud Cate School alum. Farida’s story inspires me. The way she has persevered, the way she has pushed herself to become what she has become. She inspires me. If you’ve met her, my guess is that she inspires you, too. Let me tell you about another girl who inspires me. This girl, you haven’t met. And for security reasons, I can’t tell you her real name. So I’m going to call her Roya. Roya lives in Helmand province. That’s one of Afghanistan’s southern provinces, on the border with Pakistan. It also shares a border with Kandahar province, which, if you’ve studied Afghanistan or if you follow the news from my country,

you may be familiar with. It’s a beautiful part of Afghanistan: very rugged and very wild—and unfortunately, very violent. That’s where Roya lives. She’s 19 years old. And she came to us last fall, looking to be admitted to 6th grade. 19 years old. Looking to join our 6th grade class. I talked with her. And I asked her, straight out: “You’re 19 years old. Why would you want to enroll in 6th grade at SOLA?” Roya looked me in the eye. And all she said was this: “It doesn’t matter how old I am. The Taliban have closed girls’ schools in my district. I just want to be educated.” “I just want to be educated.” Have you ever met someone whose story breaks your heart—and rebuilds it at the same time? I remember what it’s like to be a girl living under the Taliban. I remember what it’s like to fight for a dream. I remember what it was like in SOLA’s early days, when we had to convince funders that we had a model that could succeed, and when we had to convince parents that their daughters would be safe with us. I remember—vividly— what it was like to have meetings with powerful officials in my country who told me that SOLA’s model was remarkable and visionary; and then they told me it was a terrible shame that I was wasting it on girls. I remember all these things. And then I remember Farida, and Roya, and nearly 80 girls asleep at SOLA’s campus in Kabul tonight. I remember the fathers and mothers I’ve met in my country’s rural provinces, fathers and mothers who risk their lives—and I mean that absolutely literally—to give their daughters a chance at an education, and a different life.

I remember my father and mother, who ran the same risk when I was a child. And I remember the looks on their faces all those years ago when I told them I was going to college in America—and the looks on their faces just a few months ago when I told them I was coming here, to Cate School, to talk to all of you tonight. Afghanistan has broken my heart too many times to count. But I want you to know that every time it has happened— every single time—it has taken those broken pieces and rebuilt them. It has rebuilt me. It’s made me a fighter. It’s given me something worth fighting for. I don’t know where you’ll find that in your own lives, or when, but you will, and when you do, you’ll know it. And when you know it, embrace it. Your fight is yours to fight, and you’ll rejoice in the challenge. The darkness in my country is real. I’ve seen it with my own eyes. I’ve never lived in a peaceful Afghanistan, not for a single day of my life. My country has been at war since before I was born. History has its own inertia, its own momentum; sometimes it can seem impossible to imagine setting a different course. But I believe in our girls. I believe in the lives they’ll lead, and the confidence they’ll have, and the courage they’ll possess. I believe in the change they’ll make. And I believe in Farida when she says she wants to be the President of Afghanistan—and she will be. SOLA is an acronym, but it’s more than that. As you may know, one of the major languages spoken in Afghanistan is Pashto, and in the Pashto language, the word “sola” means “peace.” It’s our mission, it’s our goal, it’s our future. On a peaceful night in California, here with you all, I wish you sola. Thank you so much.

Baccalaureate Welcome INTRODUCTION TO THE BACCALAUREATE CEREMONY By Headmaster Ben Williams

Welcome to our Baccalaureate ceremony in honor of the great Cate Class of 2019. Baccalaureate is an old ritual that came to this country from Britain. The term comes from the Latin “Bacca”—meaning “berry”—and “lauri”—referencing the laurels that were used to adorn those who earned their degrees. I confess that the laurels we will be granting tonight are of the figurative variety, but like those ceremonies of old, this one is a thanksgiving for lives dedicated to learning and wisdom. And surely you members of the Class of 2019 have so directed your lives. You have revealed yourselves, particularly in your senior year, to be skilled and dedicated academicians, talented artists and musicians, and consummate community citizens. Your leadership this year has been patient, public, demonstrative, and thoughtfully delivered. You are a cerebral group, truly, but your emotional intelligence is equally impressive and your imprimatur on the culture of the School this year has been remarkably productive. You have done well—often exceedingly so. But now it is time to go—to celebrate all that we have shared together, and to anticipate all that lies before us. I sense you are ready for that change, as you should be. Much more awaits you in the years ahead. Langston Hughes penned a great poem about our collective consciousness. “I’ve known rivers,” he wrote, “ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins. My soul has grown deep like the rivers.” Though you leave us shortly, I would have you consider Hughes’ verse. For perhaps in your departures we do not so much separate as absorb one another. Therein lies our depth and our connection. We, too, are ancient like the rivers that carve our landscape, provided we acknowledge all whom we carry with us. It is an honor to maintain that very association with all of you and to imagine the possibilities that lie ahead as we enter the succeeding chapters of our lives. Like the sunsets we have all enjoyed from the Parsonage lawn, those chapters will be tinged with color and character, both bright and subdued, and will speak to a beauty shaped by the powerful interplay of forces in the world. Surely you will contribute to that very interplay and color so many other lives, just as you have ours and one another’s! But before we get to those futures, we celebrate the present moment. And that begins, fittingly, with song. 32

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Cate Food By Elizabeth Li '19

There are few universal experiences at Cate. Day students never have study hours; not everyone went to Pyles; Kirby Quad is but an ancient legend to the freshmen. Yet there is one universal experience that everyone goes through— dining hall food. To me, the common experiences we share about the “d-hall” perfectly encapsulate the Cate experience.

Freshman year is like breakfast for dinner. Arriving at B for D, you are presented with French toast, pancakes, berries, bacon, bagels, waffles, and, last but not least, the omelette bar. Likewise, as a freshman, you seemingly have infinite options. Despite the eye-rolls of upperclassmen, through your eyes, the campus feels fresh. With so many sports to play, so much art to create, and so many activities to join, the challenge of freshman year is like deciding whether to get an omelette, a bagel, or waffles. As we begin to choose whether we want to become athletes, artists, academics, or all three, it’s the chaotic novelty of freshman year at Cate that keeps you coming back for more. Sophomore year is tacos for lunch. Let me break down the sophomore year taco for you. Your experiences as a freshman represent the Spanish rice and tortillas—a solid base upon which to build a unique experience. Your network of friends are the savory choice meats— always available for you, and a staple of an enjoyable Cate life. Your teams and clubs become the salsas picantes— keeping life interesting. Alas, just as you grow tired of the same lunch menu over and over again, you grow weary of the repetitive schedules that always feel a block too long. You smell junior year before you see it. A meaty smell like rotting basketballs wafts through campus like a noxious gas, and you hear yourself say, “Greek for lunch” before you know it. Much like trying to construct something mildly edible in the buffet line when it’s Greek for lunch, junior year is full of vain attempts to juggle your schoolwork, social life, and college prep in the hope that things will fall into place. Sometimes, these efforts fall flat, resulting in a disappointing lamb sandwich. However, on other days bright, golden-brown memories float above the

gloom, like the sticky sweet baklava at the end of the line. Sure, you might not like Greek for lunch, but you get to bond with everyone else in the line over the misery that three-word phrase evokes. Likewise, as you finish your junior year, you get to bond with your classmates more than ever before. In those glorious instants, you learn that everything that came before was worth it after all. As you line up for senior year, you’re both optimistic and jaded. Expecting a delicious beef burger, your excitement builds and builds until you reach the patties and your heart plummets. It’s turkey burgers. Whether your turkey burger is a breakup or a rejection from a dream college, you often feel stinging disappointment when senior year isn’t quite how you pictured it. The only thing to do is move on. Luckily, ahead lies a hidden gem: curly fries! Unexpected but welcome, curly fries are the friendships with faculty members and the personal bonds built with underclassmen that make both lunch and senior year worth sticking around for. Everyone complains about dining hall food at some point, but you can always find something good in the dining hall, whether it’s baklava or curly fries. Through all the stress, you learn to discover the delicious moments you wish would never end. While this year has been filled with change, from daily schedules to construction to rain on Commencement day, one thing remains constant: there will always be those perfect nuggets of Cate life that remind us to savor the beauty of our friends, families, faculty, and the spirit of this place. And while I didn’t realize it immediately, what I learned in the Raymond Commons is that even in the most trying times at Cate, there will always be something—personal or culinary—to appreciate.

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Change, Adapt, and Embrace By Baker Fox '19

Baccalaureate, an event I would, as an underclassman, appreciate only as a time to sign yearbooks while the seniors sat inside the chapel, is finally upon us, and with it the end of the year. Coming into this senior year there were a lot of new things to get used to. One notable example was this year’s new schedule, which led to my waiting in a 20-minute lunch line. Furthermore, as a kid with ADHD, it was extremely difficult to stop my body from getting jumpy and impatient halfway through the new 65-minute classes, at least in the beginning of the year. But as the year went on, the lunch line shortened, and so did my body’s resistance to getting jumpy during class. Although it admittedly took some time, I, and the kitchen staff, got used to the new way of things; we learned to adapt. Another big change in the campus itself was the loss of Kirby Quad, which had in its place a great heap of dirt, surrounded by construction vehicles of all varieties. For those of you who remember Kirby Quad, it wasn’t all that much to look at. In fact, the first time my dad visited Cate, during the drought that was 2016, he saw Kirby Quad and asked simply, “What … is that?” But despite Kirby Quad’s physical shortcomings, it was nonetheless an important part of campus, especially for a ceramics student like me. And so my trips to the ceramics barn with my classmates could no longer be sped up by blasting down the Kirby hill, gaining enough momentum to take us across the road.

But as the year progressed, we learned the new fastest ways to get to the ceramics barn, and learned to deal with a longer walk to the fields, until we didn’t notice it anymore. Once again, we got used to things; we adapted. I’ve sat in this chapel for nearly every Thursday talk this year, listening to my peers share their stories, thoughts, and hardships. All have been different, unique in their own ways, yet throughout them all there have been constants. Everybody has had a front row of their friends, people who have over the years helped them to grow and improve. Everybody has had some form of intro music as they walked in, from Pierce playing something on the piano, to Jeffrey actually playing Rock and Roll on his guitar. Everybody has stood in this very spot.

today, we still approach the idea of change with no shortage of trepidation. That’s human. No matter how much we see the necessity of growth and progress, it still hurts and scares us when something we love must end, and that’s hard. But we are more prepared than we think. Like the new schedule and the loss of Kirby Quad, change will happen, but we will always overcome it, until that which was different becomes just as much a part of our lives as anything else. If you’re a senior, then next year you’ll be in a new place, with new people, and new experiences. If you aren’t a senior then things will be changing as well, in other new and exciting ways.

But perhaps what has been the most interesting through line in every talk I’ve heard this year has been the idea of change. Overcoming the change of being a new student at Cate, preparing for the changes that we’ll undergo as college freshmen next year, even talking simply about how we have changed over our time here.

Embrace it.

Now, as the cynical person I am, I had my doubts about this year’s inquiry question, or rather this year’s prompt statement: change. And yet I have to admit that standing here and looking back at the year that is almost complete, I can’t deny the importance change has played in our lives.

But I hope you all look to the changing future for what it is—full of possibility— and endeavour to enjoy it.

As you enjoy this weekend with the amazing people around you, I hope you recognize that they too were new to you once. So say goodbyes if you need to, enjoy this time while it lasts, and as we all go off on our own separate paths, it’s ok to be sad; I know I will be.

What I find interesting is how, despite the numerous changes we all undergo, the incalculable number of spinning pieces that brought us all into this chapel

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Writing Your Life By Mattie Brickman '01

Thank you, Mr. Williams, and to all of you—teachers, parents, and the great Class of 2019—for the opportunity to join you today. I’m truly honored to be here. The last time I spoke to this many people … I was here, at Cate, in the Hitchcock Theater, terrified out of my mind. It was my freshman year, and somehow I’d won the speech contest. So I had to speak in front of the entire school. The title of my speech was “I Love Camping.” It was an ironic title. So, in preparing for this speech, I asked myself, “Well, it’s been 18 years since I graduated, I’m nearly twice the person I used to be (at least numerically) … do I feel twice as equipped to give this speech?” “Okay,” I re-framed, “but I feel twice as confident … in general, right? Like, twice as wise? Grown up? Overall?” Well … So then I asked myself, “Well, do I at least like camping now?”

Uh … I mean, I love nature. I just don’t always feel the need to sleep on it. So, here I am, at Cate School, standing before you, yet again … still terrified (and still not a great camper). We’ve really come full circle, haven’t we? The thing is, I usually write things for other people to say—namely, actors. I’ve learned a lot about writing—both here at Cate, where I first felt empowered to share my voice, and in the 18 years since. I went through three pens writing this speech. I’m not sure what that says about me or the quality of the pens I use. But, somewhere around Draft 34, it occurred to me, that, when you get down to it, the act of writing is really problem-solving, troubleshooting—a series of decisions. Not unlike the act of, well, living. So I wondered: would the same things that help craft a great, fulfilling story … also help craft a great, fulfilling life? Well, let’s see, shall we?

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teacher there too. I’d never written a play. But I figured, what the heck. I’m living at home and heading to campus three days a week anyway—why not. Suddenly I was getting to write about political and social issues—not from a policy angle, but as stories. For people to perform. Onstage. All these disparate elements from my background—dance, writing, history, photography and visual art (things I’d loved as a kid and further explored at Cate)—clicked into place in a new cohesive form. Within months, I’d written my first two plays and was accepted into the Yale School of Drama’s MFA program in playwriting. (And, yes, Princeton sent my diploma. Along with a program that finally had my name in it.)

I PRESENT TO YOU: SEVEN LESSONS ON WRITING YOUR OWN LIFE.

Lesson 1: Write the story you want to see

That is, write the thing that you’ve craved, yourself, as an audience. As you’re typing away, make yourself laugh. Surprise yourself. Move yourself. Have fun with it. That kind of energy shines through in the storytelling and makes it great. Similarly, as you begin to forge your life and career, write the story you want for yourself. Note that I’m saying want, not should. The “shoulds” tend to creep in at this stage of life. Classes you “should” take, paths you “should” follow. Don’t let the “shoulds” limit you or distract you from what you actually want. Before I started my freshman year at Princeton, my dad told me to view college like “Disneyland of the mind.” “You’ve got the park to yourself for four years,” he said. “Go on as many rides as you can. And, if there’s a choice, prioritize a good teacher over subject matter.” 38

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Fast forward to my senior year. I was in Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School, majoring in public policy, planning to be a journalist. I had one more mandatory credit: a statistics course. Which unfortunately conflicted with a class I really wanted to take: Humor Writing, a small seminar you had to apply for, taught by visiting Time magazine columnist, Joel Stein. I figured I’d apply and I wouldn’t get in, and that would solve it. No such luck. I got in. I now had a decision to make. Did I take the math class or the writing class? Do I graduate from Princeton? Or not? I took the writing class. With Joel, I honed my voice and timing as a writer, and I realized how essential humor was to my tone. I didn’t graduate. I got to walk with my class, but my name wasn’t in the program, as my father was quick to point out. “Ride all the rides and go for the good teachers,” right, Dad? He just kept pointing to the program. I ended up taking that final statistics course the next fall at UCSB. My mother had heard there was a great playwriting

College is going to ask you to make a lot of decisions quickly. These decisions feel meaningful and consequential—and they can be. But this is also your time to find out what you really like. Keep checking in with yourself—“circumspice,” if you will—and make sure you’re being honest about what excites you. Because when you follow your instincts, you tap into your superpowers—the things that make you … you. The things nobody else can offer. And those will lead you in the right direction. I’m still writing plays. That teacher, Joel, continues to be a mentor. You can’t know it when you’re in the thick of the tough decisions or the uncertainty, but it will all make sense when you look back. Lesson 2: Stories are rarely linear

When I write, I often have a clear sense of the beginning of the story and the ending. The challenge—and the mystery—is figuring out how to get there, how to connect A to Z. Once I get to the end, it’s usually a little different than I initially imagined—but usually for the better. You might have a clear sense of what you want. Honor that, but also stay open and flexible as to how those goals manifest. Allow for some Escher-like

switchbacks. You never know where something might lead. Back to college. It’s the summer before my senior year. Pre-playwriting. I’m in full journalism mode, and I applied for an internship through Princeton. The school was selecting two students for the American Society of Magazine Editors’ summer program. I didn’t get it. I was dejected. I did some googling. I learned you could apply for the internship directly, too. I didn’t have to go through Princeton. So I applied again, myself. And I got it. That summer, I was one of 30-something students, living in an NYU dorm, all working at different magazines. From Newsweek to Real Simple. I was at Money magazine. It was my first time living in New York. It was awesome. As I veered off into playwriting the following year, one of my friends from that summer stayed the course as a journalist—working his way up as a writer and editor. He’d come up to New Haven to see my plays when I was at Yale, and over the past several years, we’d meet for lunch whenever he was in L.A. Cut to a few months ago. He was in L.A. again. He’d just started a new job at a tech company. And there was a project he thought might be a good match for me.

Cultivate those people in your life. Always show up. Be pleasantly relentless in your pursuits. And do great work. You never know where it might lead. Lesson 3: Give the problem to your character

This piece of advice comes from the late great Academy Award-winning screenwriter, Alvin Sargent, who was a close friend and who passed away just two weeks ago. He advised, if you’re having trouble with your story, give the problem to your character. Say, for example, you can’t decide whether you want your character, “Julie,” to be a doctor or a painter. Well, Alvin would say, make Julie decide. What does giving the problem to the character do? It puts the character into action. And action … is what reveals true character. If you’re at a crossroads or facing a difficult decision—say, you can’t decide whether you want a waffle or a Muffet’s tuffet—put yourself into action. A few ideas: 1. Pretend someone you know is having the same problem. Someone you really care about—whether it’s a friend, sibling, or grandparent. Ask yourself how you would advise that person? Sometimes stepping away from yourself can provide the perspective you need.

Now, if you had told me, that summer in New York, that we would be working together at a tech firm some day, I would have asked you, “Did I suddenly get good at math? Did I learn to code??” Who would have thought that a tech company would hire a playwright?

2. Engage the real cast of characters around you. Your community. Share your dilemma and get a range of feedback from people you trust. We don’t thrive by living in a vacuum. Learn by bouncing off of others.

Two thoughts on this.

You often hear people say “write what you know.” Which is another way of saying: come from an authentic place and find your voice. That’s step one. Step two is engaging that voice with a world beyond yourself. In other words, populate your story with people who are decidedly not you.

One: the world changed. And the world will continue to change. In this case, the epicenter of content moved into tech. And two: sometimes an unexpected leap can come from someone who knows you and what you’re capable of, even more clearly than you do.

Lesson 4: Go beyond yourself

I recently turned on NPR and heard this exchange: “We found a 40 percent decline in empathy.” “40 percent.” “Yep.” “Isn’t that a lot?” “It feels like a lot.” It sure did. I looked up the story. It was on the death of empathy—or at least the variety of empathy that encourages “walking in another person’s shoes.” The rise of empathy in the U.S. was a response to the atrocities of World War II; the idea was, if we could just understand one another, maybe we could prevent something like that from ever happening again. However, since the 1970s—and, particularly recently— empathy has grown more tribal; we’ve begun to empathize not with those who are different from us but with those who are the same. We only cheer for our own team. This has, not surprisingly, had the opposite effect; it’s polarized us. Here’s the antidote: surround yourself with people who are not like you. Whose backgrounds and opinions are different. Be thoughtful. Cast aside assumptions. Listen more than you speak. Remember that there can be truth in silence. Give yourself and others the room to really hear one another. Your story should be bigger than you. You know … #servons. Lesson 5: Caution is a thief

This is also from screenwriter Alvin Sargent. It was his motto. He emailed it to me last year, after I’d written him about a new play. Perhaps he sensed I was procrastinating. Perhaps he knew that procrastination was just another way I sometimes let fear get in the way of my work. Caution is a thief. It stops you before you can even start, robs you of what you have to offer. Fear isn’t productive; it’s restrictive. And perfectionism is just an excuse invented by the fear of failure. But you have to fail in order to be successful. So what do you do, when you’re facing a creative risk? It’s not about being 39

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Lesson 6: And then revise

I don’t have to tell you where this piece of advice came from. Okay, I will. It came from the legendary James Durham, whom I had the pleasure of studying with here at Cate my sophomore year. First drafts … are going to be terrible. They will. Every time. And it’s no less painful. Mr. Durham said it best. Writing is re-writing. To master anything requires constant training and refining. You don’t dunk the ball on the first day. And, even if you do, that’s not what makes you a great basketball player. It’s drilling every day to dunk it better and more consistently. Which brings me to my last (related) piece of advice … Lesson 7: Love the process

For a playwright, it’s not opening night every night. It’s revisions, rehearsals, submissions, rejections, heartbreaks, politics, starts and stops. You better love it. With anything you pursue, you gotta love the process. Because the process is what you’ll be spending 99% of your time on. So if you aren’t loving the process … figure out how to find the joy in it. How to make it work for you. Revisit what initially sparked you. That first want. And if it’s still not working for you … well, then head back to Lesson 6: “And then revise.” It’s never too late to go back to the drawing board, to do that gut check, and revise your course. That’s the greatest part: you get to choose your own destiny. I’m sure you’ve been asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” And I’m sure people will continue to ask 40

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“ What the next four years

– and beyond— will demand from you … is fortunately what Cate has prepared you for so well. Learning to learn, over and over, in new and unexpected ways.

“

fearless. It’s about feeling that fear—and using it as your guide, to lean in even further. Because if you’re scared of doing something, it’s probably something you really need to do. So be terrified … and do it anyway. That’s what courage is. (Heck, how do you think I’m doing this speech?)

you that, in various forms, as you head into this next chapter. It’s a misleading question though, because it suggests that there is an “end point” where you are … suddenly, what … “full grown”? “Growing up” is an evolving process. I’m still growing up. Everybody in this room is. And it should really be called “growing in” not “growing up.” Because it’s about “growing into ourselves”— discovering who we really are, becoming closer to that person, and honoring what we value in our choices. It’s like in The Wizard of Oz—or any superhero movie ever: the power has been in you all along. You just have to find it, and harness it. So, as I wrap up my second-ever speech on this magnitude, half a lifetime apart, I am reminded of one of my favorite lines from T.S. Eliot: “We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be

to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.”

The reason I don’t feel twice as equipped to give this speech … or twice as wise … or grown up … is because growing is learning, and learning is a dynamic, everexpanding process. The more you learn, the more you realize there IS to learn. What the next four years—and beyond—will demand from you … is fortunately what Cate has prepared you for so well. Learning to learn, over and over, in new and unexpected ways. That ability to adapt is the key that will unlock the world for you. Combine that with your gut as your guide … and you will find fulfillment, meaning, and joy. This is your most important story. Your finest work. And you get to write it. Make it good. Make it epic. Make it yours. Congratulations. And thank you.

About Mattie Brickman '01 Introduction By Headmaster Ben Williams

three years at Yale earning her MFA in playwriting. Mattie’s first produced play, which she developed as a graduate student (and which offered a somewhat dark comedic tone), was called The Imaginary Audience. Said one theatergoer of the show, “It was a theatrical turducken: funny wrapped in ‘whoa!’ wrapped in bittersweet.” Her subsequent produced plays include If Found Please Return to Charles Darwin, Bill Clinton Goes to the Bathroom, The Redundant Colon, Civil War, American Catnip, and Max Out Loud, a children’s musical adapted from books by Maira Kalman.

In the spring of 2001, Mattie Brickman was a senior at Cate, headed to Princeton for college and wherever else life would take her after that. It was the Awards Ceremony on the eve of Commencement and Gaby Edwards, the chair of the English Department, took her place at the podium. After confessing that English teachers secretly hope that some of their students will become professional writers, she began the citation for the Owen Writing Prize. “We have in every class students whose way with words is impressive, but there is one writer whose words have so delighted her classmates and teachers over the years that we simply had to limit how many contests she could win and how many of her pieces could fill the magazine. Wry wit, sweet nostalgia for the joys and sorrows of being a kid, and gentle derision of her own phobias and obsessions are her trademark. She tells a story with economy and hilarious understatement, and you don’t realize until you reread it just how perfectly wrought every sentence is.” Mattie herself may not remember that tribute, but it came to mind as I was reading the bio that I asked Mattie to

send me so that I could prepare this introduction, a bio that demonstrates the remarkable accuracy of Gaby’s assessment of Mattie’s language, her preferred topics, and her sense of humor. It begins, “Mattie’s playwriting career began when she didn’t graduate from Princeton.” I was hooked immediately. In fact, Mattie did graduate from Princeton, just as she did from Cate, with a host of remarkable accomplishments and honors. But she opted in her senior spring to take a class on humor writing taught by visiting professor Joel Stein, in lieu of a graduation requirement for her major— a “darn statistics class.” That, too, is ironic because Tim Smith, Mattie’s statistics teacher at Cate, was reputedly shaking his head after Mattie’s phenomenal performance on the AP and muttering something along the lines of “holy cow … and she doesn’t even consider herself a math person.” In truth, there is nothing that Mattie has not done exceptionally well, at Cate or elsewhere. She wrote her first two plays shortly after completing her undergraduate work, then spent

After finishing up at Yale, Mattie moved to New York City and began a host of projects beginning with the art.party. theater.company. Her work has been covered by such major publications as The New York Times, New York Magazine, The New York Daily News, NBC, and The Huffington Post. She has even worked more recently in the internet space preparing a web-series called Ro for the WIGS Channel. The series follows a woman who attempts to shed a complicated past at a speed dating event … until she runs into her probation officer. Again, vintage Mattie. Now living in Los Angeles, Mattie continues to produce what she calls “turducken-y” material for television, film, and stage. She does that, though, when she is not busy at Apple, where she is a writer and creative strategist for projects relating to the company’s TV service and its original programming. It is indeed a pleasure to welcome back to the Mesa on this particular occasion a communicator who manages to capture the breadth of human experience, and who can find in our many virtues and failings humor, insight, truth, and hope.

The Class of

2019

Every year, before Headmaster Ben Williams confers diplomas upon graduating seniors, he speaks of their individual character and achievements, noting the unique ways they’ve enriched life on the Mesa. These “literary snapshots,” composed of observations, along with excerpts from teacher and advisor reports, speak to the depth and breadth of the Cate community.

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ANDREW ANASTASIO Texas A&M University, Galveston

Drew is a soft-spoken powerhouse. He arrived on the Mesa from Katy, Texas with a highlight reel of his play on the football field and the kind of commitment and resolve that makes people great. That greatness came quickly on the gridiron. An All-CIF player in three of his four seasons, he proved to be a powerful runner and a punishing defender, a resolute captain, and a stalwart competitor. But Drew moved things forward just as impressively off the field. He has become an insightful scientist and a totally undaunted student. Drew’s English teacher and his math teacher described his scholarship as “brave,” both for the originality of his thinking and his inclination to tackle the tough stuff. Said his advisor last year, “In the larger game of life and learning, Drew will always be someone you want in your huddle.” We have certainly been honored to have him in ours.

ROVENNA ARMI School of the Art Institute of Chicago

Rovenna won national honors this year in the Scholastic Art Awards for a piece called “Acne.” Every teenager’s nightmare became, in Rovenna’s hands, an empathetic rendering and a wholly unvarnished expression of adolescence. Said one of her teachers, “Rovenna finds a way to communicate sincerely and effectively through any medium, be it the written word, a paint brush, a lump of clay, or a piece of charcoal.” And we have had the good fortune over the last four years to savor each of those expressions, to be connected in our own way to the artist, and to learn from her insight. But Rovenna’s wisdom transcends her art. It is equally present in her scholarship, her eloquence, and her inclination to see the world through a broad historically minded lens. It’s even in her athleticism and her contributions to our soccer and track programs, where we see the discipline that supports and propels Rovenna’s achievement.

CLASS OF 2019

CULLEN BARBER Purdue University

LULU BLAU Tulane University

Cullen never does less than his very best. In class he is relentlessly inquisitive and thoughtfully analytical. He doesn’t rush his problem-solving, preferring to follow the steps to the inevitable answer, but to do so in the right way. It’s the same if you meet him in the hallway or greet him in your home. He’ll look you in the eye, extend a hand, ever polite and appreciative. An Eagle Scout and so endearingly old school, Cullen was identified by one teacher as the occupant of the only dorm room on campus offering a steady stream of classic rock. He plays three varsity sports and has done so since his freshman year, backstopping our water polo and soccer teams with uncanny quickness, stamina, and mettle. He sings in the choir and this year is a section leader and a Head Student Librarian. Pick something generous to do or better yet identify a way to do things right and well, and more than likely you’ll be describing the Barber way.

Just the name tells you what you need to know about Lulu. She is a melody of resonant sounds, an endearing and unique mix of consonants and vowels, an expression of distinctness, a true Lulu. Said one faculty member, “It’s impossible to be unhappy when she is around.” But Lulu isn’t simply sunshine. She’s iron too, one of the foremost debaters in our community. Lulu herself admits, “From the time I could crawl, I have been stubborn.” And she claims teachers beginning in the first grade have suggested she study law. The vehicle for her conviction professionally remains to be determined, but we have discovered the character of it at Cate. We know she is compelled by the ocean and the means to care for that resource and by the young people in the world who do not have access to opportunity. Because she is so effervescent, it is tempting to wonder how great it is to be Lulu; but we know that it’s even better to be with Lulu.

KATE BRADLEY WITH HONORS

JULIEN (JOJO) BROUSSARD

Stanford University

WITH HIGH HONORS

A Cate faculty member confessed in a letter this fall, “Until we met her three years ago, we didn’t know a student like Kate existed in real life.” She has in powerful ways forced us to re-imagine scholarship at Cate. Her expressions, written and oral, flow from a well of eloquence far too deep for someone her age. Words form the basis of much that she does on campus— Servons Speeches, our newspaper that she serves as co-editor in chief, the student book club, even No Strings Attached, the acapella group she leads—yet Kate is about far more than saying or reporting or singing. Her unprecedented effort to support the Shan people in Thailand forged new ground for Cate service projects. Even her renderings on stage are epic, most recently as the hilarious and irresistible Tracy Turnblatt in Hairspray. Whatever the venture, and regardless of the difficulty, Kate just sees opportunity and the chance perpetually to do something helpful and hopeful.

Stanford University

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There is a character in Dr. Seuss’ “Horton Hears a Who” who refuses to be silent or to hide from the world. His name is JoJo. Perhaps it is coincidence, but our JoJo is equally demonstrative and distinctive. His razor-sharp mind has been carefully and conscientiously carving its way through our program. A lover of language, Jojo has found particular joy as a linguist, becoming especially adept in Spanish, preparing articles for our Spanish language magazine, and furthering his fluency off the Mesa. One teacher called Jojo a rock star, and not simply because of the ever changing hues of his hair. He has committed himself broadly here, serving as a resource and mentor for younger students, guiding our Gay Straight Alliance, contributing to our volleyball program and reminding us all of the importance of our voice and the manner in which we can use it for the benefit of all.

KATHERINE BROWNE

SYDNEY BURTON

University of St Andrews

Bowdoin College

Katie is really good at too many things. She put an exclamation point on that statement last year when she took a leave of absence in the winter to compete in the equestrian ring with a bunch of former and soon-to-be Olympians. Not only did she manage to keep up with her work on her own and enter the spring trimester in full stride, but Katie served notice to her fellow jumpers that there is a new talent in town. Even Olympic possibilities have not distracted Katie from her many endeavors at Cate. She led our powerful girls volleyball team as captain this year. She even caused everyone’s mouth to water with a few of her salad creations in the dining hall. Only Katie can make a healthy meal look that appetizing. She sings beautifully in Camerata and in her spare time, Katie has even managed to get some of her photographs published. The breadth of her considerable talent is nearly commensurate with its depth.

There are certain qualities that appear consistently in any discussion of Sydney: her warmth, her gregariousness, her enthusiasm and her focus. One teacher commented recently, “There is a lovely seriousness of purpose to Sydney that makes her a joy to teach.” And another suggested she is the embodiment of the advice given to Cinderella by her mother, “Be courageous and kind.” Sydney has been all that we have needed her to be at Cate and more. A gifted and compelling writer, she is our lead writing tutor this year, passing on her love of language to those who would love to be able to compose as Sydney does. Those watching her on the tennis court might hope to emulate her skills in that realm as well, for Sydney has been a significant contributor to our program. But Sydney’s greatest impact lies beyond what happens on the court or in the classroom and rests in an abiding connection to the fortunate folks with whom she shares the journey.

ETHAN CASSULO

KATHERINE CHENG

Santa Clara University

Case Western Reserve University

Ethan tells a great story about walking to his first day of school in Thailand, when he was a second grader and did not know the language or the way. Somewhat lost he spotted a boy wearing the same school uniform as him, and tailed him to his destination. Most of us would have panicked in that moment, but Ethan never panics. He is calm, forthright, analytical and steady. He solves problems carefully and thoughtfully and then he moves on. Said one of his coaches on the football team, where Ethan has been a standout performer, “Ethan loves full contact sports, yet his affect is more like a Buddhist monk than a linebacker.” That very reserve may be what gives Ethan his competitive power. He is able to maintain his composure and think practically, a skill we have seen him use as thoughtfully as a prefect this year and in the classroom as we have in competition. Being Ethan just works, wherever he is and whatever he’s doing.

Katie wants to know how the world works, or why sometimes it doesn’t seem to. We see that interest in our classrooms every day, in her calm solutionsbased approach to complex challenges. We see it in her commitment to and leadership of our Model U.N. program and in her performance in the sometimes heated exchanges between delegates. When others succumb to emotions and bias, Katie becomes tactical and diplomatic, helps forge alliances from conflict and understanding from disagreement. Never loud or boisterous, she relies on her generosity and her patience to ultimately hold sway. The same virtues define her work as a Teaching Assistant in our Human Development program, where her students appreciate that Katie cares deeply about their experience and perspective. One faculty member likened Katie to “a captain angling her ship through the chaos.” We’re all better off with her at the helm.

CLASS OF 2019

ROBYN COLLINS

SHARLENE CORDEIRO

Scripps College

Queen’s University

Robyn’s creativity and the diversity of its applications have distinguished her two years on our Mesa. So proficient did she prove as a beginning ceramicist that she went from beginner to intermediate to advanced in a single year, producing sculpture for shows after only a few months that are simply stunning. She has done the same with her language, finding her voice as a creative writer and merging it with a profound commitment to social justice. She has even done it in the outdoors, where this avid backpacker managed to build a shelter for her podmates on the Kern trip to escape an oncoming storm with nothing but a tarp, a few straps and anything she could scrounge from the wilderness. Just as compelling, Robyn’s easygoing and accessible nature causes us to gravitate to her and to spend time in her generous company. One faculty member called her a key “building block” for community and part of the foundation of ours.

Sharlene’s advisor likes to tell the story of dropping by her room on her first day at Cate and finding Sharlene at her desk in a brilliantly laid out room color coding and organizing her academic schedule. Sharlene is perpetually ready or doing what is necessary to become ready. Her work ethic is as compelling as her thoughtful nature, and she has become something of a standard setter for resolve. She has recovered from a heartbreaking ACL tear during her junior lacrosse season, making sure her physical therapy sessions did not interfere with the time she dedicates to tutoring local students in Carpinteria each afternoon. And she has been one of the heads of our tour guide program, serving as the ideal ambassador for those wanting to understand the quality and character of this community. “Tough and kind as they come,” wrote one faculty member of Sharlene, an unusual combination admittedly, but a perfect one.

JACK DEARDORFF

MADELEINE DENIS WITH HONORS

University of Southern California

Columbia University

It is hard to resist talking about what Jack has done in a Cate uniform. He is as strong and as versatile an athlete as we have seen, among the standout performers in football, soccer and baseball in each of his twelve seasons, the holder of all sorts of records, distinctions and awards. He is fast, loves competition as much as he enjoys contact, and inspires teammates as effectively as he daunts opponents. Thankfully, Jack’s diligence in the classroom mirrors his resolve on the field. The quantitative disciplines inspire him most conspicuously, but he is equally at home in the social sciences, a truly versatile student. He is one of our head tour guides and a brilliant spokesperson for our school. One faculty member equated Jack with Teddy Roosevelt’s “Man in the Arena,” the guy who no matter the challenge meets it head on with energy, resolve, plenty of good humor and all measure of skill.

Maddie insists that she cannot hit a golf ball. If that’s true, it’s the only thing we have noted in these last four years that she can’t do exceptionally well. Our student body president this year and a delightfully facile leader, Maddie has placed her distinctive imprimatur on our community. One faculty member noted that service comes as naturally to Maddie as breathing, a truth revealed in her generous guidance of our Student Senate. But her impact is just as profound in our classrooms where she has maintained a stratospheric level of performance in every area of academic endeavor, distinguishing herself not simply with the quality of her insight but the passion and conviction that propel and focus it. We see her on stage, too, whenever the curtain goes up on a play and on the squash court, vanquishing opponent after opponent. This as a young woman with no limits, and the very best of intentions. Quite a combo!

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TESSA DENISON

SARAH DIKE

University of Portland, School of Nursing

University of Minnesota, Twin Cities

“I imagine walking the graduation lawn,” Tessa said recently, “where I ran down the aisles just two feet tall.” In the spanning years Tessa has become a determined, disciplined, and inquisitive student. She has pressed steadily forward with her scholarship, testing herself particularly in the sciences, where her equanimity enables her full analytical power. Tessa imagines a career in nursing, but she manages unwittingly to make the fulfillment of her ambitions as challenging as possible. When she opted to get her Wilderness First Responder certification, she did it in the most unwelcoming of places: the Grand Canyon in the summer. When she was compelled like so many of our athletes to deal with injury, Tessa faced not one but two sequential ACL tears. And yet her resolve is unflinching and her spirit undimmed. Nearly 6,800 days she has spent on this Mesa, she recalls proudly, brightening each and every one.

A faculty member astutely observed recently, “Sarah enthusiastically lives to do the hard things well.” In fact, she gravitates to the complex, the problem solving when there are no easy solutions, the trail that is too long or too steep. And yet she goes, perseveres, makes her way. There is something wonderfully intrepid about Sarah and it infuses her every act with energy, optimism, and no apparent fear. Failure—or even the possibility of it—does not daunt Sarah. Maybe the prospect even seems a little enticing. “What can I make out of this?” she might wonder. A colleague imagined David Attenborough offering the narration on Sarah’s story, “With her Alaskan wolf hat on and her passport in her pocket, this smart, amiable, frontierswoman is the perfect blend of joy and determination.” We haven’t seen that hat, but we know those virtues, and we trust them to carry Sarah beyond the current frontiers with the courage of a true explorer.

GEORGIA DOUGLAS

ELISABETTA (BIBA) DUFFY-BOSCAGLI

University of Virginia

Oberlin College of Arts and Sciences

There is a little known, little seen document produced after each meeting of the Student Senate prophetically called “the minutes.” Georgia took them over this year, and suddenly “the minutes” are as eagerly awaited as a new season of Game of Thrones. We aren’t sure if the meetings themselves are all that entertaining, but the minutes include consistent talk of impeachment, jubilant irreverence, and clever commentary on poorly conceived legislation. Georgia’s Servons Speech was similarly compelling as is her every interaction on our campus. We respond not simply to Georgia’s honesty and her humor but to her comfort with each one of us and her ease with herself. She is at peace and unharried even as she tries to restrain her talkative hands and busy mind. “A challenger of assumptions and a bulwark against group-think,” Georgia is the student every community needs and the personality no community can forget.

Biba is Emerson’s poet— that artist destined to help us all see truth or reveal divinity. We’ve seen her do it with her own creations, with her language and her artwork, with her love of human expression and the humans who create it. But Biba’s genius is about more than what she creates, it’s about what matters to her and why. It was Biba who created and led the Cate Human Rights Club. She leads our Women’s Forum as well and Writing Dangerously, eager always to get to the heart of who we are, what we think, and why. Her scholarship carries that same priority, revealing a mind and a soul that are totally immersed in the search for understanding. It was Biba, too, who came up with the artwork for the senior t-shirts, including the sleepy sloth that is somehow a symbol of knowledge. Ask Biba how or why, for like in so many situations over these last four years, only she knows.

CLASS OF 2019

ANTHONY DUPRAU

MADELINE ERICKSON

Trinity College

New York University

Among the standout memories from this year’s CIF quarterfinal basketball game with Carp High was Anthony, a stalwart member of our Blue Crew, leading cheer after cheer, reveling in the contest and the opportunity to give our players some portion of his unfathomable reservoir of energy. Anthony is a community guy; genuine, earnest, determined, and unselfish. He loves a good debate and is intrigued by politics, where his many intellectual and oratorical gifts may well be on display in the future. He is the kind of teammate we all want, generous and wholly committed to the well-being of the group. Just watch him as a midfielder on the varsity lacrosse team and you can see the character of his investment, the completeness of it and its quality. “Anthony’s voice extends far and wide,” said one faculty member. Thankfully so does his impact.

We assumed when Maddie arrived on this campus that her impact here would be significant. A talented student, a budding artist, and a highly skilled athlete, she had the makings of a game-changer. And she has lived up to those high expectations. Every one of them. She became a Prefect this year, matured dramatically as an artist, and found that compelling confident voice in the classroom. Her lacrosse coaches confided that the team is “just a better unit” because of Maddie’s captaincy. But it may be that Maddie’s most enduring mark over these last four years has been left on a group of elementary and middle school girls in Carpinteria who, thanks to Maddie, call themselves the Carpinteria Flames. In sharing the sport she loves with youngsters in need not simply of lacrosse but of someone willing to invest in them, Maddie has given a generation of Carpinterians a sense of their potential and the certainty that someone believes in them.

PETER FIRESTONE

CELIA FOSTER

Lehigh University

Bucknell University

Peter is rarely demonstrative about his many academic or athletic pursuits. He relies on the work to speak for itself—the quality of the writing he produces, the intensity of his play in the pool, the character of his defending on the soccer field, or the reliability of his attack on the lacrosse field. One faculty member observed recently, “Peter’s defining characteristics are his honesty, integrity, and steadiness.” Those very qualities led to Peter’s appointment this year as a Prefect and the gentle imprimatur he leaves on every endeavor with which he is involved. He guides new families to Cate with the same spirit as he does a homesick student, with patience, care, and unflappable kindness. Whatever the need or the circumstance, Peter seems to provide the answer, in part because he seems to understand what is required, but also because he is willing to put in the time and the work; to be unselfish so that he might be helpful.

Celia loves a good challenge. Give her a tough problem to solve or a thesis to prove and she begins to glow with energy. Never daunted or fazed by the scale of the tasks before her, Celia jumps in with both feet and works her way steadily toward accomplishment. Sometimes, in fact, she pushes herself even beyond her own physical limits, causing her to deal with a few injuries over these last four years. But even they can’t keep her down for long, if at all. A literal force in the pool in water polo, Celia dominates with strength and speed. But she is far from a one-woman show. “I prefer working with a group,” she confided last year, “because working together we can solve an even greater problem.” Given her druthers, Celia would probably prefer to do her problem-solving in the wilderness. She loves the outdoors and seems most at home amidst the physical and philosophical challenges of mountains. Fitting, for climbing to great heights is Celia’s forte.

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BAKER FOX WITH HONORS

BRADLEY GORDON

Georgetown University

Washington University in St. Louis

Baker is unusually contemplative. In a world where everyone likes to express themselves in one way or another, Baker stands as something of a counter cultural counterpoint. He prefers to listen. This rare characteristic has propelled Baker to incredible heights at Cate. He is one of our Head Prefects this year, the glue that holds the prefect group together. He is a compelling scholar, known for equanimity, patience, and insight. When you listen like Baker does, knowledge and understanding are the dominant accruals. Baker has retained this very composure amidst great personal challenge. One of our most skilled soccer players, he tore his ACL in warm ups before the first game of his final season in a Cate uniform. And he has not been able to suit up since. Such crushing disappointment surely consumed Baker, but that is not the face he showed us. Instead he has always been the generous, inquisitive, thoughtful scholar and leader we’ve needed.

“What good are the novels of Wordsworth to one who works in the money markets?” asks a character in a well-known 80’s film. Had he posed the question to Brad, who has a deep interest in economics and entrepreneurship and started the Investment Club at Cate, he might have been surprised by the answer. For as compelled as Brad is by computational thinking and the prospects of venture capital, there is as much art in him as science. A brilliant photographer, he has earned national recognition for his work, and this year he served as the editor of our video yearbook. Brad’s analytical eye sees the profound in any setting it seems, leading faculty members in all disciplines to describe his work as “rich, descriptive, and beautiful.” The same artistry is present on the tennis court, where Brad is a very strong player and a disciplined competitor. Businessman he may become, but artist Brad will always be.

ANDREAH GRAF

ZOE HALE

University of Notre Dame

New York University

Andreah hasn’t met a challenge she didn’t want to overcome. She just has that kind of resolve and the growing confidence to see past the impediment to the opportunities that lay waiting for her. We see that very conviction in Andreah’s many choices, like choosing cross country as her fall sport and working so hard and well she became captain this year. Or asking to move ahead a grade at Cate because she felt ready for the higher expectations. Her many teachers are quick to acknowledge Andreah’s intellectual maturity, her commitment to her studies, her ever-present grit. The foundation for all were built throughout Andreah’s young life as she fought through a series of health challenges to emerge undaunted. Andreah understands better than most the work required simply to be free to pursue your dreams, and she is making sure she doesn’t let a moment go unvalued.

A good education should be in large part a journey of identity—to know ourselves for who we are, for what we love, and for where we want to go. Zoe came to Cate on that very path, filled with talents and interests but seemingly unsure of what mattered most to her or how she wanted to contribute to our community. She found herself first and foremost in her music, diving into her work on the cello and deriving purpose and selfawareness not simply from making beautiful sounds but from the discipline required to build such expertise. Her teachers note the same in the classroom, using phrases like “a growing confidence” or “an emerging voice.” An athlete when she arrived but hampered by injury, Zoe nevertheless maintained her competitive spirit, pushing herself in every other endeavor the way she had on the cross-country course, to arrive at this moment distinct, unique, and captivatingly melodic.

CLASS OF 2019

ELLA HENDRIKS

ADLAI HESTER

Chapman University

University of Colorado at Boulder

The focus of this year’s Welcome to Cate video, which Ella helped conceive and produce, is the moments that matter. Ella knows something about those because she delivers them with uncanny consistency and power. A natural story teller, she has moved from the written word to the digital arts, revealing in her projects an inclination to celebrate that which is special and remarkable in her subjects. The same appreciation is evident on the many teams she joins and ultimately leads, water polo and swimming in particular. Ella raises the level of everyone’s game, not simply through the power of her own play, but through the encouragement she offers and the example she sets. One faculty member noted, “Ella has a certain magnetism that makes her someone you want to be around.” In just that way, in endeavors and interactions large and small, Ella has contributed, just as her video confirms, so many of our best moments.

Watch Adlai on the soccer or lacrosse field and you can’t avoid his pace and speed. He covers ground with a remarkably quick stride and competes everywhere on the field. Yet encounter him off the pitch, and there is little of that unrestrained energy. His former velocity gives way to an endearing calm. Said one faculty member, “There is a stillness to Adlai that is reminiscent of those places we go to find peace.” In that quiet Adlai has found his scholarship, his inclination to follow his interests generously, and the energy that supports his inquiry. Like when he chases down an opposing player on the field, Adlai’s mind gains momentum the more he digs into a topic. That very nature has been critical to his leadership of the Young Men’s Forum and it has helped him introduce visiting families to the academic culture of this community. Said one colleague, “Adlai is like a poem and a prayer rolled into one.”

ANNABELLA HILLYER

PHOEBE HURWITZ

University of Washington

Tulane University

Bella is unstoppable when she allows her conviction to guide her. We all know what she cares most deeply about—like conservation, our oceans and beaches, or being responsible stewards of our resources—because she has made every effort to bring us along with her when she decides to act. And she’s very convincing. Just ask the Carpinteria Town Council who enacted a Styrofoam ban in town largely in response to Bella’s advocacy. Or better yet spend some time with the cross country team, which Bella leads and inspires with the strength of her commitment and her enduring discipline. Said one faculty member, in acknowledgement of all the aptitude Bella brings to any endeavor, “She is the go-to girl when working in groups.” Maybe that is evidence of Bella’s practicality. The problems she is working on aren’t solved easily or by the few. But more likely Bella enjoys people as much as her many causes, and works to support both.

A faculty member trying to capture the diversity of truths and traits that reveal Phoebe’s distinct and wonderfully engaging nature chose, “Beekeeper and scholar, lover of literature and Dachshunds, tenacious athlete and loyal friend.” Empathetic, brave, determined, and fiercely protective, Phoebe cares for her bee hives in the same way she cares for her friends. Full devotion and commitment seem to come naturally for her. And though she is not naturally outspoken, the things that matter to Phoebe compel her. In such commitments her voice—either in person or on the written page—finds peculiar resonance. We are drawn to her for that very reason, because she has a lightness to her and a purpose that we enjoy and admire. We have relied on Phoebe’s memorable presence these last four years, knowing how profoundly it enriches our classrooms, empowers our teams and invigorates our community.

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BAILOR JALLOH

KAISER KE WITH HONORS

Connecticut College

University of Pennsylvania

Bailor arrived at Cate from his home in Sierra Leone with remarkable levels of determination and hope. A phenomenal talent on the soccer field, he was quick to have impact on our pitch, beginning a career that will carry him to collegiate play and wherever he wants thereafter. But he has been just as impactful off the field, building confidence and skill as a student and pursuing his many interests in medicine, anatomy and physiology, economics, and the like. He loves the challenge of a difficult concept as much as he does a worthy opponent on the soccer field. And Bailor is not afraid of setback or failure. He knows too much of life to be concerned by such transient things. “Before me,” Bailor wrote two years ago, “my mother had given birth to four boys, but only half that number were still breathing when I arrived.” And arrived Bailor has, still in the early stages of a life he has built with courage and promise with a future as full of possibility and potential as he is.

Kaiser has a mantra, “You get from an experience as much as you put in,” which he lives up to in every moment, every generous gesture, every insightful analysis, every innovative idea, and every compelling interaction at Cate. It is difficult to say what Kaiser loves most, because he seems equally compelled by everything from his remarkable scholarly pursuits to his editorship of El Batidor to his captaincy of the swim team to his generous and conspicuous citizenship. Business is certainly on his top ten list—Kaiser helped start the Business Club at Cate and has brought in a number of interesting speakers—but he may be even more notable for the contributions he has made to his peers’ experience. Kaiser is a mentor of sorts to any who would learn to communicate thoughtfully, consider carefully, assess empathetically, or achieve graciously, and a model for how to do things right and well.

ALEX KIM

JEFFREY KIM WITH HIGHEST HONORS

Brown University

Columbia University

Teachers often remark on the quality of Alex’s calm. It makes him a thoughtful listener and a patient scholar. He is not stingy with his own observations, but he will usually wait to share them, knowing the context of the conversation and what he might see that others don’t. Language, in fact, its use and manner of expression, is one of Alex’s special talents. Faculty members characterize his fluency with the written word as “fantastic,” “clear,” “insightful,” and “original.” His facility extends beyond English to French, where Alex’s ability and inclination to share his affection for the language have made him a peer tutor and the two-year president of the French Club. He plays tennis for Cate as well and is actively involved in Public Service, endeavors which reveal Alex’s abiding interest in living a life connected to the pursuits and interests of others. In so doing, he has become a compelling humanist and potentially a profound scholar.

Jeffrey makes beautiful things. He built some spectacular watches a few years ago, with remarkable faces of his own design. He makes music consistently, either with his alto sax in our Jazz band or with his signature Fender electric guitar. Mild mannered Jeffrey has a clear penchant for hard core guitar riffs. Only Jeffrey could make entering the chapel to the sound of Van Halen or AC/DC seem somehow appropriate. His scholarship is no less artful or distinctive. Said one faculty member, “Jeffrey has his priorities ruler-straight.” He works hard but with a certain satisfaction at the opportunity to study something compelling. The last few minutes of class, a faculty member said, are always Jeffrey’s favorites, because you can see him distilling it all, soaking it in. In truth, Jeffrey is a rare artist, adept in every manner of expression and inquiry, warm in his engagements, and powerful in his potential and his purpose.

CLASS OF 2019

LUCA KIM Pomona College

HUNTER KING WITH HIGH HONORS Columbia University

Luca Kim is a New Year’s baby. It’s a distinguisher he says, because “I arrived when the year was fresh and bright.” And there is a resulting joy and originality to everything Luca has taken up since. A truly magnificent musician, Luca once said, “Most of my fellow musicians seem afraid when they get on stage. But I love to share my music and perform on stage. I feel very proud of all I put into each piece.” Virtuoso moments seem to come with regularity for Luca. He is a brilliant multilingual student with ability in every area of study but ambitions in linguistics, and a thoroughly committed public servant—the winner of a Metherall Grant for his work building music practice and performance facilities in Guatemala. He lists one of his dream jobs—after international lawyer—as “Pope,” which certainly says something about the quality of Luca’s faith and his desire to offer service to the world.

Hunter is everything we want our young people to be: remarkably able, wise beyond his years, infinitely curious, brilliantly facile, enduringly kind, unfailingly humble, and unapologetically principled. We have trusted him to lead at Cate since he essentially took over the tech crew in our theater in his sophomore year. He can manage a sound booth as adeptly as he can construct a set or program a light board. And though Hunter is not afraid to set a high standard for those with whom he works, he does so with an ever-present smile and an endearing twinkle in his eye. A superb mathematician and scientist, and one of our most advanced and creative programmers, Hunter has found himself in his senior year captivated by the broad and existential questions of the humanities. Frankly, we can’t imagine anyone better suited to the pursuit of such questions than Hunter. Said one faculty member, “He just has the soul for it.”

YUI KOSUKEGAWA

LUKE LAURENCE

Bryn Mawr College

University of Chicago

Yui lets her hands do most of her talking. A gifted graphic artist and painter, Yui spends long hours refining her craft, building in every piece the precision and keen attention to detail that distinguishes her vision. Even her facility with language is based on the calligraphy that is so intrinsic to Japanese and Chinese, two systems of expression in addition to English that Yui has mastered. And on the golf course, where Yui is a highly accomplished player, her hands lead the way, guiding the club in a smooth arcing stroke. We have been enchanted by Yui’s distinct approach to her many endeavors at Cate, to her oversight of the Japanese tutoring lab, her play on the basketball team, and to what one faculty member called, “Yui’s meticulous scholarship, global perspective, and compassionate heart.” With so many aptitudes, Yui seems poised for a host of meaningful expressions in the future, with her heart, her head, and her hands.

Luke has a brilliant mind that just won’t quit. It is busy in every direction at all times, giving him occasionally an endearing absentminded professor affect. When he graduated from middle school, his Headmaster gave Luke a comb, suggesting perhaps that Luke focus a bit on daily discipline in the years ahead. He has, thankfully. When Luke delivered his Servons Speech, he organized it masterfully around the concept of tables—the ones we sit around, the ones we produce with data, even the Mesa itself. His massive vocabulary, generated in part from voracious reading habits, colors Luke’s every communication, from a cogent written analysis to an impromptu stump speech when he ran for Student Body President. Scholarship in its many forms is what Luke’s eager mind was built for, and the momentum he is building surely destines him for impact in the world of powerful, meaningful, even paradigm changing thoughts.

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HUY LE

ELIZABETH LI WITH HONORS

Cornell University

University of California, Los Angeles

When Huy arrived on our Mesa, he was approximately half his current size, unusually reserved and shy, and seemingly eager to avoid too much notice or attention. Four years later, he is one of the heads of our Public Service Program, well known as much for his humor as his humility, in possession of a distinctive and powerful voice, and one of our most conspicuous academic performers. His teaching partner in Freshman Seminar said, “Huy knows how to drive the conversation and connect with the group. He intuitively knows when to talk, when to listen, and when to sacrifice time and energy for the class.” It is strangely fitting that Huy has gained traction as much as a teacher as in his capacity as a student. He certainly has the maturity to support his work as well as the empathy to know how to mentor well. Said one colleague, “Huy speaks up for those who have not yet found their voice.”

A faculty member suggested recently Liz’s unique nature is best captured in “Defying Gravity” from Wicked. The name is certainly apt, for there is a lightness of being to Liz that suggests gravity applies differently to her. And while there is little outwardly defiant about Liz, she has and will forge her own path, in keeping with one of the song’s lyrics in particular, “I’m through with playing by the rules of someone else’s game.” Part artist, part scholar, and deeply compassionate, Liz is as adept at rendering the human condition as she is at understanding and advancing it. At Cate she has led the RCCE club, which focuses on inclusion and understanding, and has masterfully shared in her Servons Speech and elsewhere the distinctive path that has helped her build her generous ideology. Sometimes the very best artists find a way to tell a story with how they live as much as with the works they produce. Liz is one of those.

DAPHNE MCKEEFRY

CLARE MEEHAN

University of Southern California

University of Virginia

For Daphne, living is a full contact sport. She likes to mix it up, to push back on a classmate in discussion, argue her way through a Mock Trial case, go straight down the hill on her mountain bike rather than try to traverse, or plow through a defender on the lacrosse field with a deftly lowered shoulder. We have seen her dressed as a moss covered garden gnome when representing the Environmental Club, as a Danger Twin when our community needed entertaining, and as a devoted teaching assistant when our underclassmen wanted guidance or a good mentor. In all venues, aside from her uncanny affability, we are compelled by Daphne’s clear-eyed logic and unselfish priorities. Her future, Daphne says, is in the fight to protect this planet and its climate and she seems off to a great start. Totally undaunted and unlikely to step back from a challenge, Daphne is full steam ahead, on her bike or off.

One of Clare’s responsibilities this year as co-leader of the Servons Speech program is to help her classmates craft and tell their stories. A gifted wordsmith and a deeply contemplative scholar, Clare is the perfect resource for those seeking to refine their respective voices. And all have come to rely on her maturity of perspective, the breadth of her interests, and the relative serenity of her communications. One faculty member called Clare a consistent “voice of reason” and another noted her “originality,” “enthusiasm,” and “dedication.” She is an explorer of sorts, as well, earning one of the highest levels of SCUBA certification, testing her ideas at Model U.N. Conferences, and studying everything from medicine to writing in the summers. Said one colleague, noting Clare’s diversity of skills and interests and her unending composure, “She’d probably be the best person to be stranded on a desert island with. Nothing ruffles Clare.” 53

CLASS OF 2019

LIAM MUNDY

JACOB NELSON

Carnegie Mellon University

University of Richmond

Liam is an Eagle Scout and an entrepreneur, a football player and one of our most captivating tenors, an urbanite and an outdoorsman, a guy’s guy and Tracy Turnblatt’s mother in Hairspray. Characteristics that might seem incongruent in others mesh seamlessly and endearingly in Liam. They fit with his insatiable curiosity, his wide-eyed intellectualism, his artful acting, and his old school values. Liam is everything scouting requires: trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent. He takes his responsibilities to the communities he inhabits very seriously, and he works hard to serve as best he can, an inclination that found him playing goalie for the JV Lacrosse team for a while. But Liam is just as likely to build a computer in his spare time or imagine a world full of personalized aircraft. The best of what has been and what might be—that’s Liam.

Jake is unmistakable, a gentle giant with a penchant for preppy clothes and bright colors that complement an endearingly sunny disposition. He is one of our most gracious tour guides and eager mentors. A senior Science Lab Tutor and the first ever Teaching Assistant in the Digital Arts Lab, Jake is the guy who is always asking how he can help. Such volunteerism flows both from Jake’s genuine and helpful nature and his affection for a good challenge. Problem solving of every sort compels Jake, and any dilemma is likely to fire him up. Said one frustrated student to the ever cheerful Jake about a particularly difficult chemistry problem, “It’s different for you. You actually like this stuff.” And everybody—whether they are a student artist with a design challenge or a member of the football, baseball, and basketball teams—wants Jake on their side. He just makes every collaborative endeavor better, richer, and more successful.

ABNNER OLIVARES

LISA PACHIKARA

Yale University

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

There is always a pause before Abnner answers a question. He is thinking about his answer, presumably, but his patience seems as much about respecting the question as providing a response, like he is somehow savoring the opportunity you have just given him to consider something new. Abnner’s tenure at Cate is filled with such generosity, with attention to his peers, and all manner of community and intellectual endeavor. He has gravitated to our most challenging areas of study, mastered three languages, become a Prefect and the Vice President of our Student Body and still manages to find time to create Action Cat Skateboards, compete on the track team, star in our musical, or mentor a freshman who needs a little care. Though the world around him is all hustle and bustle, Abnner is distinctly placid and contemplative, “like Buddha,” said one faculty member, “everywhere at once and peaceful always.”

In an attempt to capture Lisa’s uncanny focus, her patience, and her attention to detail, a faculty member earlier this year suggested Lisa is like a master blacksmith, conspicuously delivering when the heat—actual and figurative—is most intense. Such fortitude comes in part because Lisa seems to possess equal portions of humility and confidence, making her simultaneously able, understated, and totally undaunted. In trying times Lisa’s sense of humor is as conspicuous as her resolve, allowing her to see past an immediate challenge to the larger narrative. That is Lisa’s unique wisdom and the source of her special charisma. It isn’t an accident that folks come to her for tech help or that she is a dedicated tutor in Carpinteria. Her peers and her students know that time with Lisa is going to be well spent, that there will be laughter and insight, and that any needed answers will be within reach.

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SARAH POLOWCZAK WITH HONORS

RAJA PROMIGE WITH HONORS

Dartmouth College

University of Pennsylvania

It is easy to feel a little sorry for Sarah’s opposition on the tennis court, especially in doubles. If the serve comes to her forehand, the poor soul at the net stands no chance. Sarah apologizes always for the pace and proximity of the passing shot to her startled opponent, but thankfully for Cate she’ll hit the same winner again next time. There is too much power and purpose to Sarah to be restrained, and too much mental toughness for any opponent to expect anything but defeat. And yet in the community, where she serves as a prefect, or in the classroom or lab where her inquiry is thoughtful and focused, Sarah is generous, gracious, and empathetic. She learns with the same intensity and commitment that distinguishes her sport, but the motivation is different, driven by an earnest interest in discovery. She has been a model of preparation, investment, and execution in our community, and we sense she is just getting started.

“One cannot know Raja without knowing his art,” said a faculty member earlier this fall. “His work is both intense and graceful.” Raja has particular affection for highly detailed pen and ink drawings, which require every ounce of his meticulous energy and reveal the craftsmanship that is at the heart of this young man. He is a lover of challenge and inquiry, sometimes so exuberant that he admits to having to restrain himself a bit among his peers for fear they wouldn’t understand or think him odd. Raja is distinctive in all of the very best ways. He loves to write and think, share ideas and peer edit papers. He likes to work with elementary students in Carpinteria who haven’t yet found his facility with intellectual endeavor. And he enjoys an afternoon playing ultimate frisbee or volleyball. There are no constraints, it seems, to the endeavors that energize Raja, and likely no limits to what he might do with his joyful mind.

SEBASTIAN RICHARDSON

SEBASTIAN SAK

New York University

United States Air Force Academy

Sebastian rarely seems rattled. No doubt he experiences the full range of emotions we all do, but in him they manifest more often than not in patient inquisitiveness, serenity, and a little bit of wonder. His scholarship is distinguished by steady and generous application of thought, so that he never misses an opportunity to improve or grow in some way. He is perpetually curious and seemingly unworried by a setback or a complicated problem. He seems to know he will find his way through. In fact, we have relied on that very truth, not simply in the classroom but on the football field and the basketball and volleyball courts. A contributor to three varsity programs, Sebastian in the words of one coach, “gives his all and does so with grit and intention.” In volleyball in particular, as our setter, Sebastian is the guy that every play goes through, a weighty responsibility that he handles with his signature composure.

A faculty member suggested that Sebastian as a freshman was akin to a golden retriever puppy, full of energy, optimism, friendliness, and limbs that went in all directions. He remains as lovable as ever four years later and as kind, but he has grown and disciplined his mind and body in impressive ways. The game of water polo seemed to inspire much of Sebastian’s purpose. It appealed to his affection for physical challenge and he has become a truly great player headed for a Division I program. But his work in the pool had a host of byproducts outside of it as well. His scholarship has taken on greater complexity and focus. The bass that he plays so well in the orchestra has grown in resonance, the foundational sound upon which the rest of the musicians depend. And amongst all of this striving, Sebastian hasn’t lost any of his joie de vivre, his humor, or his gregariousness. It’s just that the puppy has become a very big dog! 55

CLASS OF 2019

ISRAEL SANCHEZ

MARGARET RIVERS SHEEHAN

Wheaton College, MA

WITH HIGHEST HONORS

Israel can smile his way through anything—a 14-mile day all uphill on the Kern, a particularly challenging lab report, even his Servons Speech. It’s not that Israel takes things lightly. He doesn’t. Just try to keep up with him on his daily workout and it becomes easy to appreciate the resolve and purpose in this young man. But Israel manages even in trying moments to keep his perspective, to appreciate each moment, and to savor them. That very spirit has allowed him to evolve dramatically as a student, to become a teacher, in fact, in the Freshman Seminar Program, and to find his unique voice. A member of the Hispanic and Latino Association and a regular supporter of our local Habitat for Humanity chapter, Israel finds ways to commit himself generously and personally to the important work of the community and its membership. That very nature has made him great here in ways our founder understood when he coined the phrase “spirit of this place.”

Harvard College

Rivers’ advisor put everything in context this fall with a single sentence: “Rivers is one of the most remarkable and impressive young women I have ever met.” The data at Cate more than support that assertion. Rivers has done everything well, often setting unprecedented standards of commitment or accomplishment. She is one of the strongest track athletes to wear the royal and white, holding the school record for the triple jump among others. She is as decorated a student as she is an athlete, last year winning the Centennial Prize for “modeling the intrepid spirit that leads to robust experience and discovery.” She is everything her symbolic name suggests, fluid and powerful, filled with richness and energy but happy to meander and spend her experience broadly, a giver of life building nourishment along a moving journey that will take her forever forward.

JOSHUA SHIELDS

CALLUM SINCLAIR

Gettysburg College

Tulane University

One of Josh’s crosscountry coaches said this fall, “No one works harder than Josh or complains less.” There is, it seems, a certain divinity to the way Josh approaches everything he does. He likes the work and what it requires of him, and his natural curiosity drives him to explore topics that he may discover in class but pursues relentlessly outside of it. It matters to him to do well, but it seems more important just to try, to learn something, even to miss the mark he’s shooting for. Because then he gets to try again, to train harder, to see what he is capable of. His community presence is on the same scale of his work ethic. A prefect in the freshman boys dorm, a brilliant dancer and choreographer, and a captivating personality, Josh manages to enrich every endeavor of which he is a part on our Mesa. Determined always to become his best, Josh has become one of our best, and a young man we all feel truly fortunate to know.

Not every great student or athlete begins life in Britain and then comes to California after a few years in Arkansas. Yet that has been Cal’s path, and it has helped him to forge a distinctive place in the community. Perhaps his Old World roots give him his remarkable facility with language or explain his affection for a good story. But Arkansas is where he learned to love football, barbecue and bible study. And when he came to Cate, he married those traditions and affections, and went about making himself ever better at the things he loves. Given his dedication, it is no surprise to see him outrunning opponents on the gridiron and even running over a few, or to hear him sing with the chorale. Coaches and teachers alike laud Cal for the initiative he takes and the commitment he makes. He has even taken to preparing his own barbecue, making an invitation to Cal’s grill the most coveted of opportunities.

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ELIANA SMITH

JENNIFER SOH WITH HIGH HONORS

Barnard College

Stanford University

Elle is a remarkably composed scholar. She loves a good discussion and has led a great many, both in academic discourse and as head of our Black Student Union. Her relative unflappability seems to speak both to her skills as a listener and to her deeply thoughtful nature. She considers ideas and expressions carefully and responds with articulate dexterity. She is similarly facile as our Head Tour Guide, where her graciousness, poise and insight tell an important story to any who visit this campus. And on the track or the basketball court she is almost uncatchable. Her long stride and disciplined play always place her ahead of would-be opponents, and she holds records in both individual and relay events. Perhaps her greatest accomplishment, though, is that Elle has managed to make the previously unprecedented reachable, thereby sending a powerful message to those who follow about what is possible.

Jennifer has proven to be unimaginably good at everything we ask her to do. As one faculty member noted, “She is superhuman … as good at wielding pipettes in a lab as she is at playing her violin in Carnegie Hall.” She has earned distinctions in every area of endeavor— math, science, art, scholarship in general, even citizenship. But the real genius of Jennifer emerges when she follows her own distinct path, shows her vivacious personality and sense of humor. We saw that clearly when she opened her orientation in '25 House as prefect this year with a hilarious primer on what to do when your roommate passes gas. Or when she abandoned a lifetime of classical violin for traditional Irish and bluegrass fiddling. Jennifer simply can’t be contained or resisted. A student with few equals, she shows the independence and originality required to do something uniquely impactful and beneficial in the world. We will all be watching closely to see what it is.

DAH-YEON “CAROLINE” SON WITH HONORS

STEFAN SUH

New York University

University of California, Merced

Caroline is a phenomenal academic talent, able in every area of endeavor and exceptional in most. Teachers use words like “powerhouse” and “prodigy” to describe her. As magical as Caroline has been academically, though, she is almost more remarkable in the day-to-day efforts she makes to build community. A prefect in Schoolhouse and admittedly a bit of a “mother hen,” Caroline infuses every gracious act, or kind gesture, or batch of cookies with energy and affection. Though not our most accomplished athlete, Caroline has made a career of captaining JV teams and bringing her young charges along. She plays hide and seek on senior lawn regularly, misspells her own name with endearing frequency, has a host of nicknames as a result, and can be counted on always to be earnest and caring. In her Servons Speech Caroline said that she struggles with change. How fitting that at Cate she would become our constant.

Stefan has called remarkable places home—the Netherlands, South Korea, and Switzerland to name just a few. But it was the time he spent in Pittsburgh as a young boy, just down the road from the Carnegie Science Center, that seemed to have the greatest impact on the young man he is today. There his mind was awakened to the possibilities of inquiry, a path he has traveled boldly at Cate and will surely continue in the future. Science faculty call Stefan “diligent and creative,” “highly engaged and productive,” and all laud his commitment and curiosity. As his academic pace has quickened, Stefan has also broadened his community interests and connections. He is a proctor in our science lab and the captain of our squash team. Last year he described himself as “an introvert becoming an extrovert,” an evolution that has allowed us to know better all the character and joy within him.

CLASS OF 2019

ABHISHEK SURESH

AVALON SWANSON

California Northstate University College of Health Sciences

Wellesley College

Often a person’s nature is revealed in the moments outside of commitments and responsibilities. Abhishek, at such times, is likely to be found in the biology lab counting fruit flies or in the physics lab programming robots. He comes by these avocations through a combination of profound personal interest and an inclination to do something worthwhile for the world. Said he last year, “In life, one must have the right balance between service and self-satisfaction. Science is a beautiful marriage of both.” Abhishek has lived by that mantra on the Mesa, revealing himself to be a deeply curious and engaged student with an affection for substantive co-curricular work. Model U.N. and Stream Team are a few of his favorites, as well as the robotics club he leads. Whatever he does, Abhishek’s posture remains generous, positive, and welcoming. That, too, is a form of service often as powerful as any type of science.

Immensely curious and unwilling to settle for easy answers, Avalon is an intellectual explorer of sorts. She likes to know things—why something happens or how something works. Her imagination is so rich that she is inclined to immerse herself in literature and the characters that inhabit the stories she reads: a fitting tendency given that Avalon herself is a memorable character. She is often exuberant, always inquisitive, happy to contribute to any worthwhile (or entertaining!) endeavor, and one of the best fist bumpers on campus. She tells wonderful stories about her 94-year-old grandmother who fled Lithuania on foot to escape the Soviet Union and miraculously made her way to Canada and then California. That explains perhaps Avalon’s own tendency to pick herself up after a setback and get right back in the game. For that very reason, and a host of others, Avalon seems likely to make everyone, including her grandma, quite proud.

CLOTINE TARLTON WITH HIGH HONORS

KAIHAO (KEVIN) TIAN

Bowdoin College

Dartmouth College

Cloe was selected as one of the Head Prefects this year by her peers no doubt because they saw in her the reason and compassion required to lead thoughtfully. She has more than lived up to those high expectations every minute since. That’s what Cloe does best, regardless of whether the challenge is a student community in need of order and guidance, a yearbook in need of editing, a Spanish language magazine that needs to be published, or an elite choir that needs greater harmony. She is an actor as well, quick to step into the character of another and strangely clairvoyant about the person she must become. Her scholarly work shows such insight and maturity, it prompted several teachers to muse on the possibility that she might someday sit on the Supreme Court or in the Oval Office. Her prescient peers certainly made us a fortunate community this year when they asked Cloe to lead.

Kevin’s remarkable scholarship earned him a spot here as a junior, a rare entry point at Cate, and he has more than lived up to expectations. He is an elegant problem solver in every discipline and a deeply insightful and creative student. Already he is seeking to publish in mechanical engineering journals his research and findings on several design projects. But Kevin introduced himself to the broad community not so much with his intellectual endeavor but with his art. He stepped on stage at a coffee house and belted out a love song that brought the crowd to their feet. Since then we have been entranced by his singing and songwriting, his self-directed independent art projects, his work on jazz piano, and his proficiency as a sound engineer in the recording studio. Understated by nature, his endeavor speaks volumes and like him it’s always on pitch and in key.

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FLORA TROY WITH HONORS

KATE TUNNELL WITH HONORS

Stanford University

Harvard College

Flora is about as genuine, as genuinely kind, as genuinely responsible, and as genuinely brilliant as they come. Aside from her notable scholarship, which was initially focused on math and science but has since broadened to involve all areas of intellectual pursuit, Flora occupies a leadership role in every endeavor designed to offer support to the community. She is a prefect in the freshman girls’ dorm and one of the Heads of our Public Service Program. When given the opportunity to meet with business leaders on our Board, Flora elected to speak to those who work in nonprofits. That’s partly why it was sort of shocking to see Flora in our Spring Musical so masterfully portray a vain, self-absorbed, quasi-villain. With nothing to draw upon but her imagination and her art, Flora constructed a masterful performance, revealing in its expression all the insight and perspective that have made her genuinely amazing on the Mesa.

Kate said not too long ago, “I have always been an inquisitive person and feel the only way I can really learn is when I’m challenged.” Her time on the Mesa has certainly revealed that intrepid nature, for Kate is all-in on every endeavor she joins. A brilliant class discussion contributor she is inclined to respond not to a teacher query but to an observation or assertion of a classmate. The dialogue in her capable hands always grows in richness and depth. Perhaps that is why the community has responded so well to her leadership as a Prefect this year, for she does not shy from challenge. Kate once acknowledged that the thing she likes best about painting is that it takes her places she never planned to go. That very courage has distinguished virtually everything Kate has done on the Mesa, and has colored all of her commitments with energy and adaptability. While the future is never set, with Kate it’s always bright.

VICTOR VASQUEZ DIAZ

EMELY VILLATORO

Trinity College

The University of Texas, Tyler

To watch Victor in the pool is to know Victor as a student and a citizen. A backstroker, a water polo player, and a member of our fastest relay teams, Victor moves always with purpose, energy and poise. And he has the uncanny gift of knowing where he is going without ever looking. That very intention brought Victor to Cate in the first place, and his great fortitude, commitment, and belief power him still. He is generous with his time, serving as a tour guide for the admission office, participating in our Los Niños trips to Mexicali, and giving his all in every academic area. Said one teacher, “Victor is uncomplaining about the difficult stuff and humble about his many successes.” And another gushed, “His written work conveys a depth of thought that would benefit any conversation or deliberation.” In such ways Victor has become the embodiment of his determination and in the midst of realizing his unlimited potential.

Emely came to Cate from her home in Houston, Texas, and she admitted early on the challenges of that transition, her absence from family rituals, the loss of the familiar, including Friday night indoor soccer games. So it wasn’t surprising when soccer proved to be her vehicle to make the Mesa home. Said her coach, “When Emely steps on the pitch, it’s like she enters another dimension.” Soccer, too, taught her the importance of commitment and resilience, and in that way Emely pressed forward at Cate, testing herself ever more ambitiously and building her scholarly momentum. She has also done her best to bring some of her own El Salvadoran culture here, becoming one of the Heads of the Hispanic/Latino Association and a resource for those trying to make a home here. One faculty member said of Emely, “She believes it is in her power to change things for the better.” This community is proof she is right. 59

CLASS OF 2019

ESTHER WHANG WITH HIGH HONORS

MCCARTHY WILLETT

The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science & Art

Pitzer College

Esther learns languages as a “hobby”: Chinese, Japanese, and Spanish to complement her native Korean and English, though she admits her other “hobby,” classical singing, is enticing her toward the study of additional romance languages. She is animated by all manner of things, and she is a delight to debate, though Esther does so with a lightness of being that makes even conflict feel amicable. One teacher called her, “Fantastic! A paragon of academic diligence and effort.” Yet her motivations also set Esther apart. She does everything because she loves people; loves their stories, their language, their art, and their engineering. In explaining her ambition to one day design prosthetic limbs, Esther talks about her own siblings, both of whom are artists. “Their voices are in their hands,” she says, “and what they can create with them. I want to make prostheses so no one who relies on their hands and limbs ever loses her voice.”

McCarthy is our second baseman on the diamond, a loose-limbed infielder who gets to balls we don’t expect him to reach and makes the plays we need him to make. And though he carries himself with an air of levity and casual comfort, there is never a question about his commitment or his resolve. He has worked hard in every area of endeavor at Cate to become the student and the athlete and the citizen that he is. Having looked up to the seniors who helped guide McCarthy as he made his way at Cate, McCarthy does the same now as a Teaching Assistant in the Human Development Program. He has also found himself compelled academically by personal areas of interest, including a great paper in U.S. History last year on the forces that lead to incarcerations in this country. Much like he does on the baseball field, McCarthy is a contributor in any context and the very best kind of teammate and partner.

CARSON WILLIAMS

KOKO WING

Middlebury College

University of California, San Diego

Carson is often the first to challenge himself and his teammates to overcome an opponent or obstacle, smacking those big hands together with an emphatic clap and a, “Let’s go!” And then he hits the field or the court and delivers on every unselfish promise. He has taken advantage of virtually every discretionary opportunity Cate offers—outdoor trips, public service trips, even the chance to play the principal and the gym teacher in this spring’s performance of Hairspray. If there is a collective effort underway, Carson will join and make it better. He just cares about what he is doing, about who he is doing it with, and about what they are doing it for. Movember is as much a case in point—and his near epic ability to grow facial hair—as the Kern trip, where he forded streams with pod members on his back. From Winnie the Pooh outfits, to his energetic prefectship, to Taylor Swift adaptations and a lumberjack song, Carson has carried and entertained us all this year.

Said a faculty member this Fall, “To Koko, the pursuit of scholarship isn’t a companionless trudge, but rather a companionable journey.” And she is a truly inspiring partner. Just ask the Freshmen Koko guides as a Teaching Assistant or the folks she visits every Wednesday night under the auspices of our Public Service Program, or even her many classmates over the years whose descriptors of Koko include “helpful,” “kind,” and “gentle.” Teachers characterize her distinctive scholarship as being saturated with aspiration and joy. It is strangely fitting that her intellectual journey has led her to patient care and the prospect of a career in nursing. From our own experience, every endeavor of which Koko is a part is enriched by her presence and contribution. For those in need or in distress, we can imagine no more welcome salve nor more uplifting presence than Koko’s.

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CHARLES XIE WITH HONORS

XIAO (SEAN) ZHAN WITH HIGHEST HONORS

Georgetown University

Brown University

Charles plays the piano like a virtuoso and his solo performances are jaw-droppingly captivating. Twice he has entranced audiences at Carnegie Hall. But he seems as eager and inclined to be an accompanist, to adjust his sound to support the ensemble, to find a way to enrich the collective harmony. There is something about the unselfishness of that contribution and the prescience of it that distinguishes Charles. It’s like he knows how to make us all sound better. He does the same in the classroom, revealing an understated scholarship that is unusually powerful and totally insatiable. Charles is never content with partial truth. Much like in his art, he reaches for the roots of knowledge and understanding. He handles his prefectship in the same generous manner, and his place on the varsity tennis team, as an opportunity to grow in experience and to offer skill, dedication and service to the team.

Sean has been our intellectual leader, our even-handed senior role model, our inspiration and our gentle genius. Able to see solutions in the quantitative realm that elude most of us, Sean is our reigning scholar and one of the very best quantitative thinkers we have ever had the good fortune to teach. And he is inclined always to use that aptitude for the public good. A masterful drone pilot, Sean offered his services to the County last year to assist in the mapping of areas inundated by fire and mudslides. He is also involved in underwater robotics and math modeling, both endeavors with huge upside applications in the world. Sean is no less invested in his work as a prefect either or as a Math Lab proctor. Said one teacher of Sean’s particular skills and their likely impact, “Yes, Sean can fly, and we believe he has the inspiration and the enterprise to take others to the skies as well.”

ZHIXIN (ALICE) ZHANG WITH HIGHEST HONORS

JASON ZHAO WITH HIGH HONORS

University of California, Berkeley

Kenyon College

There are countless adjectives and descriptors that have been used to capture the incredible quality and character of Alice’s work. One teacher called her mathematical writing and problem solving “thoughtful and wishful.” Another mused after noting her curiosity, her humor, and her “inclination toward meaningful connections,” she might be “the most compelling person on campus.” As much artist as scientist and mathematician, Alice presents a wonderful panoply of qualities to be considered. And she has her own words for what she does and why. “I want to find my voice in the things I make,” she says. As the fortunate beneficiaries of her expressions, we see the generosity in her as well as the analytical nature; we see the human and the divine; and we recognize in her vision the ability to see what most do not. In the rendering of those moments, Alice’s voice becomes most powerful.

F. Scott Fitzgerald once referred to personality as “a series of successful gestures.” By such a measure, we see Jason in his piano performance of “Georgia on my Mind” for a friend’s birthday, in his inclination to stay after class to continue a discussion on a particularly exciting point, in his commitment to join our dance ensemble last winter, or his inclination to take up water polo in his junior year. Introspective, deeply thoughtful, and profoundly sincere, Jason brings an endearing innocence to his scholarship. His mind is as sharp as it is unencumbered, allowing him to think imaginatively about what might be. Jason’s only real challenge is his precision. A prodigious physics talent, he studies questions endlessly, looking always for greater clarity and understanding. And given the complexity of his own thinking, such solutions are elusive. But Jason’s quest is a compassionate one, and the answers he finds will be the ones we all most sorely need. 61

Faculty & Staff Anniversaries 5 years

Peter Bonning Matt Drew Kim McCormack Renee Mora Kara Ööpik '10

DEPARTING

Faculty & Staff

10 years

Carla García Mason Annalee Salcedo Cece Schwennsen Joshua Caditz 15 years

Charlotte Brownlee '85 Will Holmes Ben Soto Oscar Urízar 20 years

Linda Macías 25 years

Patricia Collins 30 years

Patrick Collins 35 years

Paul Denison '79 Carolyn Frary 40 years

Frank Griffin

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AMY VENDITTA

Amy is an old-school boarding school teacher with a modern approach. The product of boarding school herself, she understands the diversity of commitments and engagements that make up our days and nights on the Mesa. The assignments that she took on when she arrived at Cate speak to that very understanding: in addition to teaching four sections of math, Amy took on the role of dorm head in Bothin, became an advisor, coached the varsity girls basketball and lacrosse teams, and even offered classes for interested students and faculty in the fitness regimen called CrossFit. Her discipline is matched by an engaging open-mindedness and an eagerness to get to know those with whom she shares her life. On Outing Week trips, Amy is inclined to tell unending stories just to keep kids’ minds off the strain of carrying their packs over the Sierra. Accompanied everywhere by her two dogs, Lenny and Churro, Amy always has plenty of company. Those two, like the rest of us, recognize that there is little as invigorating as spending some time with Amy.

MARÍAJOSÉ PANADERO

MaríaJosé Panadero came to the Mesa nineteen years ago from Taft School in the Northeast, determined to build a more vibrant and robust Spanish program at Cate. She made it clear early on, with the quality and character of her instruction and her exacting standards, that she was not going to wait to have an impact. Just a few years after her arrival, the program itself had taken on a far higher level of expectation. She even augmented her work in the classroom by offering summer study in Spain and encouraging her students to immerse themselves fully in the Spanish language. At the same time she worked actively to be a part of her students’ lives, becoming a much sought-after advisor and mentor. She supported efforts to expand the presence of Spanish on campus, ultimately publishing with her students the Spanish-language magazine Ñ. She led the Mesan, the school yearbook, for much of her tenure at Cate, also expanding its scope, the quality of the writing, and the distinctiveness of each publication. It is one of MaríaJosé’s special strengths to give personality and purpose to any endeavor, something she has done generously on our Mesa.

JULIA MCCLENON

JAKE AND JESSICA BLOCK

Julia joined the faculty this year so that we might augment our offerings in Chinese. A brilliant linguist and a captivating teacher, Julia has worked with both our beginning and advanced Chinese language students with equal impact and success. Gracious, kind, insightful, and appropriately demanding, she has helped so many of our students build a love for the language and a facility with its use. We have been delighted to have her in the mix this year and trust she will continue to work with those who love language and culture as she does.

For ten years the Block family has guided the performing arts program at Cate. From the theater to the chapel to concerts near and far, the gentle and joyful imprimatur of Jake and Jessica has been visible and audible. Just watching Jessica conduct the choir is a lesson in immersion. Her expressive presence is as captivating for her singers as it is for those of us in the audience. It is impossible to watch and not be transfixed. Her performers respond to Jessica and follow her guidance in part because they know not only how much she knows but also how much she cares. Her own emotions follow the music of a performance, giving it special resonance. When Jessica arrived at Cate, our vocal ensembles included a small fraction of the school population. Now when there is a performance, it seems that half the student body is on the dais in song. Such growth in enrollment is a remarkable achievement, constructed with energy, charisma, and a profound belief in the lifted voice. But Jessica is about far more than music. In the theater she has mixed her repertoire to ensure that our productions both entertain and engage this community. Art is not simply an adornment. Jessica sees to that, pressing us with memorable shows like Ragtime and The Crucible, the latter performed in the round outdoors at the Class of ’81 Amphitheater. In such productions her partnership with Jake takes on special resonance. For as Jessica guides and inspires and supports her performers, Jake works with his devoted crew— building sets, designing the lighting, working the sound booth—and seeing to it that the art on stage is supported by thoughtful discipline off of it. It is no accident that our tech crew seems to have an unusually sophisticated grasp of the workings of the theater or that they are ever-present when needed. They have noted those same qualities in Jake and have made them their own. As we say goodbye today, it is with the understanding that Jake and Jessica will continue to lift other communities with their efforts, just as they have lifted ours.

KYLE JONES

Kyle is yet another New Jersey native (we have a host of them) who made his way West—in Kyle’s case, to join our athletic training department two years ago. A thoughtful caregiver with a relaxing southern drawl, Kyle is masterful at defusing a challenging situation so that he might discover the nature of an injury or help to build a course of treatment. Having spent the last two years living in Lido, he knows well the demands of boarding schools and he has risen to meet them each and every day, always with a wry smile and a pleasant word. We have relied on him to keep us functioning at the highest levels—in sport, in the backcountry, even in life on the Mesa—and he has more than answered the call. Though he leaves us for home in the East, we expect he’ll take a bit of the West back with him. And we’ll keep a little of him with us.

RANULFO MORA

Ranulfo joined the Grounds Department in 2001 and quickly made a name for himself not simply with the quality of his work—though he is an exceptional and hard-working groundskeeper—but with his prolific and generous sense of humor. He manages to keep every occasion light and he is as good at receiving some well-intended ribbing as he is at dishing it out. So much of success in every area of endeavor is about building a culture that contributes to productivity and satisfaction. Ranulfo has been that community building guy for us. And though we are sad to see him go, we are pleased to know that he is heading to retirement where he will have all the more time to savor the friendships he builds so easily and maintains so thoughtfully.

Camp CATE The sun definitely shone on the Mesa for Camp Cate 2019. Hundreds of alumni from the 4s and 9s—and some classes in between—returned to Cate to celebrate together. One of the highlights was the addition of a 50th birthday party for the Class of '87, an idea that came about two years ago at their reunion, creating a “cluster” reunion for schoolmates from the 1980s. Based on the fun had by all, it is likely that we will see that trend continue in the future.

On Friday, June 7, Cate alumni, parents of alumni, faculty, families, and friends arrived throughout the afternoon, greeted by the Camp Cate banner overhead and an enthusiastic welcoming committee at the intersection of Cate Mesa Road and Woodworth Lane. The weekend started with a visit to the archives as alumni gazed through editions of El Batidor and the Mesan for a trip down memory lane. That evening, as clouds cleared across the Pacific,

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guests gathered at Mesa House for the Camp Cate Kick-off Party. Ben Williams welcomed alumni and their families back to the Mesa as they enjoyed local tacos and beverages provided by Firestone Brewery. After the gathering, alumni made quick stops at their assigned dormitories before heading to the Wiegand Community Center for a late night of music, fire pits, and fun. An early Saturday call time did not deter alumni from toeing the start line for the 36th annual Mesa Race. After a description of the course, race director Tim Smith fired the gun, and more than 20 runners set the pace along the Day Walkway. The Class of 1994 took home the hardware with Amanda Salter '94 winning the race outright and Cody, son of Alex Mast '94, taking home first place in the male division. Longtime cross country coach Karl Weis was spotted on the course and earned a finish as well. Afterwards, both participants and spectators were treated to amazing coffee at Modern Languages Chair David

Wood’s Day Walkway Coffee Stand. David set up his espresso maker at 7:00 a.m. and served espresso until lunch started at noon! After alumni lingered over brunch in Raymond Commons and read local newspapers in the McIntosh Room, the campus tours departed from the Class of 1985 House Admission Building. Recent graduate Abnner Olivares '19 guided alumni and families on a walking tour of old and new buildings on campus. By midmorning, Camp Cate attendees shifted their attention to a special Headmaster’s Hour in the Johnson Library. Following updates from Admission, Advancement, and College Counseling directors, Ben Williams gave a “State of the School” address. With many new and exciting things happening on the Mesa, the discussion between alumni and the headmaster lasted until lunch time. While parents spent time playing tennis, catching up with former classmates and faculty, or shopping at the Blue Ewe (new school store), children of alumni

participated in Junior Camp Cate activities. Led by Riley Swain '20, Junior Camp Cate gave children ages 4-11 an opportunity to meet other alumni kids and have some fun! The program included arts and crafts, guided attempts on the climbing wall, and plenty of other games. A special thank you to our Junior Camp Cate counselors for making the weekend a special one for children of alumni. This year’s Saturday barbecue lunch was held on Commencement Lawn. The setting provided a perfect atmosphere for singer/songwriter Chris Ahlman '99 to play an hour-long set. Following lunch, more than 30 hikers joined Outdoors Program instructor Peter Bonning on the 6-mile round-trip hike to Bee Camp. The walkers were treated to a post-Thomas Fire landscape, one different from anything they may have seen as students on the Mesa. Saturday’s evening program started with a chance to remember and honor classmates and faculty no longer with us. Held in the Katharine Thayer Cate Memorial Chapel,

the annual Camp Cate Memorial Service paid homage to those recently passed, featuring piano performances by Flora Hamilton '17. Various alumni classmates gave emotional remarks on behalf of their classmates. Following the service, alumni gathered at the Class of 1985 House Admission Building for the Headmaster’s Sunset Reception. With a crisp, clear view of the Channel Islands, alumni across class years had the opportunity to connect and tour the new building. Awards were presented to the winners of the Mesa Race as well as those who traveled the farthest to attend the reunion festivities. Vanessa Janss '99 took home top prize; she traveled 8,182 miles from Victoria, Australia, for her 20th reunion! As the sun descended, guests made the short walk to Thayer Peck '53 Field and the Nelson D. Jones '48 Stables Courtyard for dinner and dessert. With lights across the beautiful red barns and small clouds hanging below the tops of the Santa Ynez Mountains, alumni enjoyed a picturesque setting for dinner with friends, old and

new. Memories flooded conversations from table to table while current student Will Anderson '20 played guitar and sang to provide an idyllic atmosphere. Will was joined by Nathan Clay '94, who was not going to leave the Reunion Dinner without getting on the microphone. Life Trustee Rick Baum '64 gave remarks, thanking alumni for making the trip back to the Mesa for their reunions. He gave special mention to Terry Sanders '49, who was on hand to celebrate his 70th Cate reunion! Once the Muffet’s Tuffets were gone, alumni headed towards the Fleischmann Gymnasium for the 4s vs. 9s dodgeball game and some late-night dancing. Three days, 350 people, the recollection of countless memories, and the making of many more—Camp Cate 2019 was, in the words of one alumnus, “an incredible event.” We hope you are feeling renewed, nostalgic, and eager to encourage your friends to attend their next reunion year. The dates are already set for June 5-7, 2020. So, 0s and 5s— get ready! We can’t wait to welcome you “home” next summer.

CAMP CATE 1

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From left: Cody Mast, Alex Mast '94, and Paul Denison '79 watch as Grace Mast scales the tower with ease.

Junior Camper West Barker learns new tricks from counselor Flora Troy '19.

The Fleischmann Gymnasium served as court for the late night 4s vs. 9s dodgeball game.

Ben Williams welcomes alumni back to the Mesa at the Camp Cate Kick-Off Party at Mesa House.

Bill Kennedy '74 views the 1974 edition of the Mesan yearbook in the Archives.

A beautiful bench built in honor of Caroline Montgomery '14 sits above the Emmett Horowitz Aquatic Center pool.

Alumni reach the ridges above the Mesa on the annual Bee Camp Hike led by Outdoors Program instructor Peter Bonning.

The McBean Library at night.

Longtime language teacher David Wood prepares his Day Walkway coffee station for early rising alumni and friends.

Photographer Robert Hanson â&#x20AC;&#x2122;98 captures the Milky Way high above the eucalyptus trees.

CAMP CATE

Cate Reunions

70TH REUNION: Terry Sanders '49

60TH REUNION: Front row from left: Barbara Newhall, Hope Hamilton, John Hamilton '59, Jake Butts '59, Judy Luce, and Thayer Bigelow '59. Middle row from left: Judd Hanna '59, Cynthia Norwood, Jon Newhall '59, and Gim Hollister '59. Back row from left: Steve Norwood '59, John Luce '59, Richard Wheelock '59, John Caldwell '59, Karen Sketch, Bo Davis '59, and Terry Sanders '49.

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55TH REUNION: Front row from left: Suzanne Janney, Oliver Janney '64, and Rick Baum '64. Middle row from left: Cindy Dyer, Steve Dyer '64, George Paloheimo '64, and Rita Paloheimo. Back row from left: Charlie McCormick '64, Homer Alexander '64, and John Kuney '64.

50TH REUNION: Front row from left: Guy Loughridge '69 and Larry Cooke '69. Middle row from left: Barbara Smith and Lawrence Webster '69. Back row from left: Barbara Seward de L'Arbre, Charlie de L'Arbre '69, Daniel Simons '69, and Sanderson Smith.

45TH REUNION: Front row from left: Arden Kwong '76, Wade Morse '74, Ginger Morse, Jeffrey Crane '74, Alden Marin '74, Dave Forbes '74, and Lisa de los Reyes. Second row from left: Jonathan Upham '73, Bill Kennedy '74, Jim Wright '74, Jim Sayre '74, Fred Powell '74, and Rose Sekulovich. Third row from left: John Lee '74, Chimene Lee, David Wallenstein '74, Chaz McEwan '74, Juan Miller '74, Joan Miller, and Mark Whiting '74. Back row from left: Michael Crandell '74, John Perkins '72, Randy Louis '74, Greg Kubicek '74, Alec McAndrew '72, Teri Behm, John Clawson '74, Bruce Toms '74, and Chris Nadai '74. 35TH REUNION: Front row from left: Paul Gifford '84, Andrew Pearson '84, Leila Chism '84, Jay Melican '84, and Charlotte Brownlee '85. Back row from left: Peter Bryant '83, Whit Leibow '84, Shelley Tantau '84, and Matthew Morphy '84.

40TH REUNION: Front row from left: Steve Boehm '79, Jim Olmstead '79, Tim Hosbein '79, Rob Waller '79, Bobby Schwarzenbach '79, and Adam Rhodes '79. Back row from left: Emery Rhodes '79, Rob Dunton '79, Ving Simpson '79, Dave Hosbein '79, Paul Denison '79, Andy Bogardus '79, and Eric Slater '79.

50TH BIRTHDAY: Front row from left: Colin Drake '87, Hilary Bauer Wendel '87, Farina Talbert '87, Mike Morris '87, Stephen Spaulding '87, and Kevin Dick. Second row from left: Karen Meeder Wintringham '87, Heidi Thorson '87, Dylan Davidson '87, Shana Lynch Arthurs '87, and Jane Shepherd Dick '87. Third row from left: Arthur Conner '87, Kirk Watanabe '87, David Jones '87, Heather Jackson '87, and Bruce Croker '87. Back row from left: David Arthurs, Henri Bristol, Lindy van der Reis Yurich '87, Wendy Meyer Trimble '87, and Daniel Emmett '87.

CAMP CATE

30TH REUNION: Front row from left: Lauren Craig Albrecht '89, Jessica

25TH REUNION: Front row from left: Voloe Scott and Andrea Browne

Stewart Kaludis '89, Valarie Janklow Gardner '89, Brooke Lambert '89, Alisa Ahlstone Lewis'89, and Geoffrey McDonald '89. Middle row from left: Rachel Mayorga '89, Shafia Zaloom '89, Holley Shepard '89, Allison Pomerantz Schiller '89, Taylor Clyne '89, and Pat McCoy '89. Back row from left: Robert Johnson '89, Roz Emmett Nieman '89, Tam Beseda, Jessica Blue Howells '89, Sacha Howells '89, Clare Salstrom Keck '89, Alison Metherell Valentine '89, and Rob Sebree '89.

Nicholas '94. Second row from left: Becca Roberson Turett '94, Sabrina Schlumberger Scott '94, and Allison Mast. Third row from left: Carl Langfeldt, Amanda Salter '94, Kaja Lewinn '94, Matthew Horowitz-Syrkin '94, and Alex Mast '94. Third row from left: Beth Green Monda '94, Alexander Yarovoy, Eugene Park '94, Tom Ogden '94, Sloan Larsen '94, and Laura Larsen. Back row from left: Todd Katzberg, Marie-Claire Overgaag Barnaba '94, Kelly Nord Katzberg '94, Ashley Hill Walmsley '94, Alex Bloomingdale '94, Nathan Clay '94, Georgia Owen Clay '99, and David Cass '94.

20TH REUNION: Front row from left: Chris Ahlman '99, Shanon Barnard Engel '99, Stephanie O'Mary-Berwald '99, Paul Grumet '99, and Max Barton '99. Second row from left: Sachi Price Perkins '99, Vanessa Janss '99, Angela Nostrand '99, Meredith Jenks '99, Clara Lee-Zimmerman '99, and Collin Zimmerman. Third row from left: Morgan Emmett '99, Jennifer Tanaka, Georgia Owen Clay '99, Isaac Flanagan '99, Lindsay Anderson Archer '99, Sara Blask '99, Kristen HarrisNwanyanwu, and Kelechi Nwanyanwu '99. Fourth row from left: Paty Arias, Cyrus Tanaka '99, Adam Horowitz '99, Nathan Clay '94, Matt Archer, Lindsey Fell, and Adam Fell '99. Back row from left: Peter Given '99, Justin McBaine '99, Erin Horowitz, Neal Perlmutter '99, Andrew Hoover '99, Seth Korman, and Meredith Lynn '99.

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15TH REUNION: Front row from left: Anita Rai '04, Mark Semegen '04, Tyler Mellos '04, Ben Farber '04, and Katie Rocklin Donnelly '04. Second row from left: Matthew Barrett, Daniel Philpot, Emily Grossman '04, JR Callery '04, Justin Shane, Hayley Bridges '04, and Allison Sparkuhl '04. Back row from left: Michael de L'Arbre '04, Rusty Barker '04, Dylan Marder '04, Calista Nabors, and Giuliana Garcia '04.

10TH REUNION: Front row from left: Michael McMahon '09, Guadalupe Ortega '09, Cascade Zak '09, and Raisa Bruner '09. Second row from left: Michael Yoon '09, Taylor Casey '09, Weston Wiener '09, Aliena Klaus Squire '09, and Sara Hetyonk Duron '09. Third row from left: Andrew Lin '09, Vladimir Vilsaint '09, Vanessa Vilsaint '09, and David Duron. Fourth row from left: Charlotte Livermore Healow '09, Maddie Firestone Giebink '09, Albert Lee '09, Kristina Park '09, and Nick Brown '09. Back row from left: Danny Healow, Tim Giebink, Max Sabel '09, Marlowe Griffin Lyddon '09, Louisa Dick '09, and Blake Reichert.

5TH REUNION: Front row from left: Kaitlyn Dayka '14, Bryant Perez '14, Maddy Barney '14, and Ben Swain '14. Second row from left: Sophia Soriano '14, Sydney Luca-Lion '14, Erika Noble '14, Shirin Vetry '14, Sally Shin '14, Sarah Martin '14, and Jasmine Paz '14. Third row from left: Nick Burns '14, Cydney Pierce '14, Lacy Douglas '14, and Monica Wang '14. Fourth row from left: Mady Burger '14, Ellen Lempres '14, Zach Ell '14, Tamsyn Walker '14, Chloe King '14, and Jenny Lundt '14. Back row from left: Jack Hoover '14, Nik Pajouh '14, and Andrew Robbins '14.

memoriam There is a character in Leif Enger’s novel Peace Like a River whose name is Jeremiah Land. He is an

understated fellow, unassuming and kind, but rarely demonstrative. He is the father of the boy the book is ostensibly about, but in truth nothing happens in Peace Like a River without Jeremiah Land, beginning with the opening pages. For Jeremiah Land’s son is born with lungs that do not function properly. Gasping for air after birth, the boy seems doomed. In fact, the doctors give up on him, conceding the fight. But not Jeremiah Land, who picks up his son after the physicians have ceased their interventions, cradles him in his arms, and says in a voice that is quiet but unmistakably laden with hope and authority, “Rueben Land, in the name of the living God I am telling you to breathe.” And so he does.

Nelson D. Jones '48

August 6, 1930— May 23, 2019

By Benjamin D. Williams IV

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That is the Nelson Jones I know, the gentle man whose capacity for good and loving contribution can literally compel us—regardless of our deficits—to do what we must, to live, to breathe, to care, and to serve. With so few archetypes these days to remind us of how best to be, Nelson stands out even though he would never have wanted to be so conspicuous. Like Jeremiah Land, he was instead perpetually at work behind the scenes, making everything possible for so many of us who relished his company and aspired to his dignity.

I was thinking those very thoughts recently in my kitchen, when I glanced up at the shadowbox on our wall containing an eight-inch section of the original wood floor of our home on the Cate School campus. The shadowbox was a gift from Nelson Jones and bears the inscription: Cate School Mesa House Kitchen Wing Rehabilitation For Ben and Ginger Williams 2003 A.D. Nelson oversaw the remodel, much as he oversaw most of the important work at Cate, and he memorialized the event. It’s as though he wanted to be sure there was an accurate record of all that transpired, not for him but for history. Because history mattered to Nelson Jones. It was his way of showing respect and honoring those who came before us. Said a fellow trustee, “Nelson knew schools are collaborations of individuals, and he and I, like all the rest of us trustees around our table, would do our best to honor history’s lessons and work to ensure that the School thrives into the future. We were part of something larger, and a temporary part at that.” But there was an even more powerful conviction that inspired Nelson’s commitment to our school. He once described coming to Cate in the fall of 1944 by saying, “It was the best thing that ever happened to me. Eighteen boys,” he said of his classmates, “who were like brothers to each other.” In some ways, I think

everything Nelson did at Cate since that first moment was at least partially for those boys, and ultimately for the memory of them and the men they became. Our shadowbox is a story of similar intention. That remodel wasn’t simply done for our school. It was for us, for Ginger and for me. A typical Nelson Jones gesture, filled with love but shrouded thoughtfully in ritual and remembrance. Personal. Generous. And overflowing with affection and meaning. It is why the name Nelson Dorrington Jones '48 makes us think first and foremost—in any age—of a gentleman. His trusteeship at Cate flowed from that very reservoir of gracious decorum. Said one of Nelson’s colleagues on the Board, Monique Parsons '84, who referred to Nelson as “Mr. Jones” even when she became Board Chair (until he invited her to please use his first name), “I rarely saw Nelson make a public challenge. The Nelson I saw made his points in more subtle ways: through his dryly delivered anecdotes about the early days of the school; through the people and places on the Mesa that earned his resources and time; and through letters delivered the old fashioned way, through the U.S. Mail. Nelson and I exchanged several letters over the years, and I treasure them, as he was a beautiful writer and he took time to direct my attention to the ideas—and the people—he thought merited my close attention.” Though I did not know it until Nelson told me the story, my own family’s connection to Nelson Jones goes back nearly half a century and it began when Nelson was leading the Board at Cate. He went east in the late 1970’s to speak with heads of school who had taken their institutions co-ed. Cate was considering such a move and the ever-disciplined Nelson recognized the need to do his research. On one of his visits to Massachusetts, he met with my father, who had brought girls into his historically all-male school. Some years later, Cate would do the same. 83

IN MEMORIAM

With each generous gesture, like connecting me to the Class of 1948 at my very first Camp Cate, complete with the distinctive class hat, or inviting me as he often did to dine with the “old boys” as they called themselves, Nelson was seeing to it that I understood the community of students and alumni I was presuming to lead.

friends knew, the one who was eager to laugh and relax, let down his guard a bit, even respond to the nickname “Nellie.” I remember sitting with Nelson, Ernie Bryant '49, Jim Crutcher '48, and Bill Taverner '46 at dinner one evening at Birnam Wood, the club where Nelson stayed when he came to town for Board meetings. As the meal progressed and the memories surfaced, Ernie and Bill in particular took great sport in ribbing Nelson for various misadventures over the years, for his well-cultivated reserve, and for so consistently being, well, Nelson. He had run the work program at Cate so clearly Nelson was well schooled in dealing with his rambunctious peers. This was no different, albeit nearly 70 years later. There was nothing but amusement in Nelson’s eyes as he listened, recognizing in the accounts the ever-vigorous memory of youth.

It was in those more casual settings, too, that I got to see the Nelson that his good

But the takeaway for me of such evenings is not the stories—the

I have long felt, since learning of that interaction from Nelson shortly after my appointment, that there was some destiny at work. My father is the reason I chose education as my life’s work and Nelson was the one standing by my side when I assumed the same role my father had. It was only right that my dad and Nelson would know each other, and that Nelson would in many respects take over for my father as I went about the business of trying to lead Nelson’s school.

understanding that Nelson wasn’t always apparently the best of students, the fact that he was initially terrified of Mr. Cate (a man he would ultimately call a great friend)—but Nelson’s eagerness to laugh and listen. He made little effort to defend himself, only occasionally correcting the speaker on a factual error, of which there were several. He was transported—you could see it in those moments—back through a life he had relished, to moments that he could recall with crystal clarity. It was like seeing him as a schoolboy and finding him all the more compelling and remarkable. I liked, too, his many stories about Mr. Cate. I sensed, in fact, that Nelson gave such service to Cate School because of Mr. Cate, because of the high esteem in which he held the King (as Mr. Cate was called), and because he seemed to know that Mr. Cate needed him to care for his school. And so he did. For his lifetime.

Nicholas Van Cott Niven, Cate Class of 1959, died on April 18, 2019 at Dominican Hospital in Santa Cruz, California.

Nick Niven '59

June 1, 1941—April 18, 2019

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Nick was born in Los Angeles in 1941, the middle of three children of Robert Niven, Cate Class of 1928, and Barbara Haskins Niven. Nick’s older brother Robert Niven was a member of the Cate Class of 1955. Nick’s uncle Van Cott Niven graduated from Cate in 1929. His sons (and Nick’s cousins) Laurence Niven (the science fiction writer) and Michael Niven graduated in 1956 and 1958, respectively. Four of Nick’s nephews, sons of his brother Robert and his cousin Michael, also attended Cate: Douglas Niven, Class of 1981; Bradford Niven, Class of 1982; Michael Niven, Class of 1986; and Brett Niven, Class of 1990. Nick was also related to Alison Speer, Class of 1987, whose

And yet each moment when I imagined I had Nelson fully figured out, he’d surprise me again. Like when I heard him sing Hawaiian music at his 80th birthday party, his voice though battered by time still true and resonant. Or when he would befriend a student and begin a correspondence that would last long after the student had left the School. Mr. Cate said once that the chapel on our campus was funded by an alumnus who was the beneficiary of Mrs. Cate’s outreach and care. “She saved my life,” said the boy who ultimately donated the building in her honor. I wonder how many Cate students could say the same of Nelson Jones. That’s the thing about education, particularly at the high school level. It finds young people in need not simply of models—people whom they might emulate—but of people who might invest in them, help them understand that they are each distinct, worthy, and capable of whatever they set their mind to. Nelson, perhaps more than most,

mother was once married to Michael Niven of the Class of 1958. Despite his extensive Cate family tree and his father’s position as both secretary of the Union Oil Company and treasurer of the Cate School board, Nick was an unassuming student at Cate who rarely, if ever, mentioned his background. He was popular with his classmates, excelled in his classes, and displayed a keen interest in sports, science, literature, conversation, and the outdoors. The walls of his dorm room were covered with pictures of sports cars, and he tracked the careers of Juan Manuel Fangio and other international race drivers with the same intensity he bestowed on his favorite baseball and football teams. After graduating from Cate, Nick attended Yale as an English major and earned his medical degree at the University of California, San Francisco. He then served in the United States

recognized that need and answered it with his generous friendship and unselfish attention. Even when his health and his vitality were impacted, Nelson continued to reach out to do what he might, knowing how much it mattered. Just a few days before he passed, a young man from the Cate Class of 2017 stopped by campus. His first question to me was, “How is Mr. Nelson Jones?” It is hard not to feel like something more than a life has ended with Nelson’s passing. He just seemed to be more than simply a man. He was a force, a spirit, a keeper and a conscience. Like Jeremiah Land, Nelson was full of belief, and it gave us life. What, we might ask, are we to do now? Ironically, Peace Like a River ends with Jeremiah Land again performing the miraculous, though it costs him his life to do so. But it is a sacrifice he gladly makes. Says Rueben Land of his inexplicably powerful lungs, a gift

Navy in San Diego and practiced there before moving to Santa Cruz on the Monterey Peninsula in 1975, where he worked as a well-respected gastroenterologist until his retirement in 2014. Some gastroenterologists are procedure-oriented, to which recipients of the colonoscopies and endoscopies they administer can testify. But Nick was more interested in talking to his patients, and he cared for a large number of men and women with HIV infection and Hepatitis C, even when those were untreatable disorders. Nick was also a Dominican Hospital expert on substance abuse, a problem he was personally familiar with, although he was clean and sober during his later years. Nick married Rebecca Allen in San Antonio, Texas, in 1965. They had two children: Van, of the Cate Class of 1990, and Sarah, who graduated from Midland in 1997. Nick and Becky divorced in 1986, and in 1992 he married Corrine Pate, an intensive care nurse at

he presumes from his father, “They had been touched. That was the point. Goodness, I miss my Dad.” We know how he feels. Perhaps our own respiration owes something to Nelson, for at least on Cate Mesa the air we breathe seems in its own way to be a gift from him. He said in his Baccalaureate Address at Cate’s centennial, “The School always operated under a spare philosophy. We certainly had everything that was needed for a fine education but never had a great overabundance of anything. … I wouldn’t want to see us begin to wallow in the trough of great plenty.” And so he gave us simple things—the fundamentals: a place to love, a history to admire, and a future to imagine. Oxygen for our dreams. Rest well, my friend. We will think of you with our every breath, comforted by the knowledge that your soul still resides on our Mesa, “A shining light in a troubled world.”

Dominican Hospital. Their daughter Camille graduated from Santa Cruz High School in 2015. All three of Nick’s children and his five grandchildren live in the Santa Cruz area, as does his sister, Janet Swords. A service for Nick was held at Point 16 in Big Sur on June 1, 2019 where he also celebrated his 50th birthday 28 years earlier. Colleagues, friends, and family recalled his warmth, his humor, and his compassion at a site overlooking the Pacific Ocean that he lived close to for most of his life. In fact, the view was very much like that he would have seen from his beloved Cate School. Written by John Luce '59

IN MEMORIAM

Dayton O. Hyde '43 March 25, 1925— December 22, 2018 Dayton Ogden Hyde died peacefully on December 22, 2018 surrounded by relatives on the family’s Yamsi Ranch in Chiloquin, Oregon. A rancher, photographer, essayist, and conservationist, Dayton also found success as an accomplished and award-winning author of twelve books, including Sandy, Yamsi, and Don Coyote—named by the American Library Association as one of the best books of the 1980s.

The quintessential cattle rancher/cowboy, Dayton began his Western adventures at the age of 13, when he left Michigan and joined his uncle on his Oregon cattle ranch. “Though I had no spare clothes or any money or had ever been more than sixty miles away from home, and was yet to ride a horse, that day I became a cowboy,” Dayton wrote in The Pastures of Beyond. His zeal for life and love of the outdoors were deepened during his career on the Cate Mesa. Mr.

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Cate helped guide Dayton’s passion for wildlife and forestry with visits to the Santa Barbara Natural History Museum and introductions to local experts such as Almanac for Moderns author Donald Peattie. Before Dayton graduated from Cate in 1943, Mr. Cate described him as “the nicest boy in the world.”

of Land Management to relinquish 1,000 unadoptable wild mustangs desperately in need of greater range of their natural surroundings. As a result, the 11,000acre Black Hills Wild Horse Sanctuary is Dayton’s largest conservation project, and his actions have preserved a history and educated a nation.

Dayton made an indelible mark in the history of an almost forgotten species by establishing The Institute of Range and the American Mustang (IRAM), a nonprofit organization whose mission is to give freedom and a better quality of life to America’s wild horses. He also served as president of Operation Stronghold, an organization that seeks to benefit both wildlife and private landowners.

Dayton embarked upon a life of true adventure, drawing upon those principles and beliefs Curtis Wolsey Cate held in the highest esteem when he established the Miramar School in 1910. Dayton’s time on the Mesa, combined with his insight and courage, gave him the tools to contribute in such a remarkable and intuitive way to our society. He appeared on several television shows, including “The Dick Cavett Show,” “Good Morning America,” and “National Geographic Today.” People magazine described him as “an amazing American.”

Dayton’s life was interrupted during World War II, when he served with Patton’s Third Army and swam ashore at Normandy on D-Day. While stationed in France after the allied victory in Europe, he staged seven rodeos in the Roman amphitheater at Arles, “to help keep up the morale of his fellow soldiers,” Mr. Cate wrote in a 1946 letter. Later in life, long established as a bonafide cowboy and rancher, Dayton displayed forthright courage and conviction when convincing the Bureau

He leaves behind his children, Dayton, John, and Taylor Hyde, and numerous nieces, nephews, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. Including his parents, Hyde was preceded in death by a brother, Frederick William “Ted” Hyde III ’35; a sister, Elizabeth “Liza” Barton Meyer; his spouse, Gerda Virginia Isenberg Hyde; a daughter, Marsha Gerda Hyde Tschosick; and a greatuncle, Dayton Ogden “Buck” Williams.

Charles de Guigné '57 April 23, 1939—August 9, 2017 Charles de Guigné passed away peacefully at his home in Monterey, California, on August 9, 2017. Born April 23, 1939 in San Francisco, Charles was the son of business executive Christian de Guigné III and Eleanor Christenson de Guigné. He joined Cate as a new 11th grader with the Class of 1957. Also known as Chal while at Cate, he served as captain of the tennis team and as a prefect. After graduating from Columbia University with a BA degree in 1973, Charles worked as an executive sales representative with Stauffer Chemical Company. In 1976, he moved to France to assume management of the de Guigné family wine business at Château Sénéjac in the Le Pian-Médoc region of Bordeaux. During nearly a quarter-century in France, Mr. de Guigné completely renovated the aging wine production facilities at Sénéjac, replacing them with state-of-the-art equipment that enabled him to produce very high-quality Cabernet Sauvignon and Sémillon Blanc. In 1999, he sold Château Sénéjac and the family winery to Lorraine Cordier, owner of the renowned Château Talbot winery, and retired to his California residence in Pebble Beach. In addition to successfully managing the family winery, Mr. de Guigné was an ardent outdoorsman. He loved sports— playing tennis and golf; skiing in the Swiss Alps; climbing Mt. Kilimanjaro and Aconcagua and the Pyrenees; and trekking in the lower Atlas Mountains and the great sand dunes of Tunisia. He was also a member of the Cypress Point Club. Mr. de Guigné was also an enormously kind individual who cared deeply about the welfare of both people and animals. He contributed generously to many charitable and philanthropic organizations, including The Salvation Army, The Monterey SPCA, The Community Hospital Foundation, The Animal Rescue Project, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Mr. de Guigné is survived by his older brother, Christian de Guigné IV; his first cousins Axel de Tristan, Geraldine Forrester, Ronna Hoffman, and Eleanor Graff; and his very special and close friend of 13 years, Diane B. Wilsey.

IN MEMORIAM

Mark Herron '50 December 29, 1931— August 30, 2018

Mark Leo Herron died on August 30, 2018 after a battle with bone cancer. The Santa Monica native, nicknamed “Sporty” during his time on the Mesa for his soccer prowess, served as a prefect and monitor in Lido and spent two years on the El Bat as a staff photographer. After graduating from Cate, Mark attended the University of Hawaii. When he got home one summer after a sailing trip, he was drafted into the army, where he served for two years in France and Germany as a cook. In 1956, after his return home from military service, Mark was married to his wife, Meredith, and went on to attend the University of Southern California, where he majored in geography. When he graduated, he went to work for his father-in-law as a cartographer. Mark and Meredith had three children—the late Cynthia, who died at 46; Mike; and Rick (and his wife, Julie). The couple moved to Malibu in January of 1969. Mark was active in the community, serving as president of the Malibu Little League from 1972 to 1974, and as president of the Malibu Lions Club in 1982 and 1983. He had his own business—Heron Maps—and worked from home. He is survived by his wife, three children, four grandkids—Casey, Jessica, Nick, and Miles—and one great-granddaughter, Emma.

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Ben Boyden '97 August 19, 1978— November 14, 2018

Benjamin Cary Boyden, beloved member of the Class of 1997, passed away on November 14, 2018 in Los Angeles. He was 40. Ben grew up in Davis, California before coming to Cate as a sophomore in 1994, where he earned respect and admiration across campus as a scholar, an athlete, and a pillar of the community. He starred on the soccer field, joining the varsity team as a sophomore and serving as team captain during his senior year. In the classroom, he thrived in Cate’s culture of inquiry and critical thinking, and he brought a skeptical, searching intellect to each of his courses. His passions spanned the liberal arts spectrum, from advanced mathematics to upper-level English seminars. And Ben proudly embodied the spirit of Servons, serving as a prefect in Long House and traveling to Tijuana to help build a school with other Cate seniors during a week-long public service trip.

Ben’s affinity for Cate was deep, particularly because of the friendships he made on the Mesa and sustained for the rest of his life. Ben loved his friends in the Class of 1997, as well as other classes in that era, and they loved him back. Much of Ben’s college and post-college life was centered upon relationships formed at Cate. He lived with his Cate friends, traveled with his Cate friends, and enjoyed sports (especially soccer), music, and literature with his Cate friends. The people he met on the Mesa were truly a focal point of Ben’s life. After Cate, Ben attended Amherst College with Ross Flournoy '97. He spent most of his time after college working as a strategy consultant at Monitor Group (later Monitor Deloitte), a job that took him to far-flung locations around the world. But he always returned to California, where he lived in the Bay Area and in Los Angeles, almost always in the company of his friends from Cate. Ben leaves behind his loving parents, Cary and Suzanne Boyden; his sister Katy, and her husband Christopher, and their children Blakely and Bo; and his brother Nathaniel, and his wife Anne and their children Lilah and Violet. Ben was a loving son, brother, and especially uncle to his young nieces and nephews, whom he provided with many books and endless affection. Donations in Ben’s honor may be made to the Ben Boyden Memorial Scholarship Fund at Cate School. Written by David Amerikaner '97, Ross Flournoy '97, and Ariel Morris '97

From the

archives From the first Commencement in 1914 at the bottom of the Cate hill to the most recent ceremony in front of the Nelson D. Jones '48 Stables, Cateâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s capstone ceremony has evolved through the years. Held in the Fleischmann Gymnasium in 1950, Commencement that year not only celebrated the thirteen graduates, but also the retirement of Curtis Wolsey Cate with a crowd of 550. Almost 900 people attended the 2019 Commencement; while weather forced a change in location, the growing scale of the audience has also necessitated some alterations. One constant has always been the personal reflections on the graduates and wise insights from senior speakers on the meaning of the Cate experience.

1950 1973

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OFFICERS OF THE BOARD Monique F. Parsons '84 Chair Glencoe, IL J. Wyatt Gruber '93 President San Francisco, CA Henry F. Burroughs '68 Vice President Jackson, WY Eric C. Taylor '80 Vice President Los Angeles, CA Greg H. Kubicek '74 Treasurer, Life Trustee Vancouver, WA Benjamin D. Williams IV Secretary/Headmaster Carpinteria, CA LIFE TRUSTEES Richard D. Baum '64 Kenwood, CA Dan A. Emmett '99 Santa Monica, CA Nelson D. Jones '48 San Marino, CA TRUSTEES Calgary Avansino '93 San Francisco, CA Jessica Bowlin Pacific Palisades, CA Mimi Brown '92 Hong Kong Rosalind Emmett Nieman '89 Pacific Palisades, CA Kate Firestone Solvang, CA Stephen J. Giusto '80 Laguna Beach, CA

Peter Given '99 Alumni Council President Redwood City, CA Sheila Marmon Heuer '90 Sherman Oaks, CA Adam Horowitz '99 Newport Beach, CA David Horowitz Irvine, CA

FACULTY ADVISORY TRUSTEES John Swain Carpinteria, CA Faculty/Art Stephanie Yeung Carpinteria, CA Faculty/English

Frank A. Huerta '85 Santa Barbara, CA

EX-OFFICIO STAFF Charlotte Brownlee '85 Assistant Headmaster for External Affairs

Palmer Jackson Jr. '82 Santa Barbara, CA

Jay Dorion Assistant Headmaster

Ellis Jones '72 Los Angeles, CA

Hallie Greene Director of Strategic Initiatives

Jenny Jones Santa Monica, CA Chris Maloney '80 Rancho Santa Fe, CA Sebastian Man '76 Hong Kong Casey McCann '97 Santa Barbara, CA

Erin Hansen Director of Student Life Lisa Holmes Director of Studies Pete Mack Assistant Headmaster for Students

Leone Price '02 Santa Monica

Mercedes Maskalik Director of Marketing & Communications

Edward Simpson '86 Los Angeles, CA

Lindsay Newlove Director of Advancement

Marianne Sprague Santa Barbara, CA

Sandi Pierce Assistant Headmaster for Finance and Operations

Lisa B. Stanson '92 Newport Beach, CA David Tunnell San Francisco, CA Traci Young-Hillyer CPO President Pacific Palisades, CA

Bryan Rodriguez Dean of Students Lisa Spengler Director of Admission & Enrollment

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