NMH Magazine, Spring 2017

NMH Magazine

17 spring

volume 19 • number 1

Northfield Mount Hermon

Student activist Keshawn Tyriq Bostic ’17 wants to start a conversation.

NMH Magazine SPRING 2017 Volume 19, Number 1 Editor Jennifer Sutton P’14 Design Lilly Pereira www.aldeia.design Contributors Sharon LaBella-Lindale P’17, ’20 Susan Pasternack Harry van Baaren P’16, ’18 Emily Harrison Weir Class Notes Editor Kris Halpin Class Notes Design HvB Imaging Print Production Pam Lierle P’17 Director of Communications Stephen Porter Head of School Peter B. Fayroian Chief Advancement Officer Allyson L. Goodwin ’83, P’12, ’14 Archivist Peter H. Weis ’78, P’13 Northfield Mount Hermon publishes NMH Magazine (USPS074-860) two times a year in fall and spring. Printed by Lane Press, Burlington, VT 05402 NMH Magazine Northfield Mount Hermon One Lamplighter Way Mount Hermon, MA 01354 413-498-3247 Fax 413-498-3021 nmhmagazine@nmhschool.org Class Notes nmhnotes@nmhschool.org Address Changes Northfield Mount Hermon Advancement Services Norton House One Lamplighter Way Mount Hermon, MA 01354 413-498-3300 addressupdates@nmhschool.org

NMH Magazine

17 spring

volume 19 • number 1

features

18 Stay Woke

Student activist Keshawn Tyriq Bostic ’17 found his voice at NMH, and he’s speaking up.

24 Inside Look

Campus life, through the eyes of student photographer Maggie Dunbar ’17.

28 Talking About Politics Is Hard

Like schools across the country, NMH wrestled with a bitter presidential election.

departments

3 Letters 5 Leading Lines 6 NMH Journal 12 Movers & Makers 14 In the Classroom 16 Past Present 36 Alumni Hall 38 Class Notes 88 Parting Words

<< DOUBLE DUTCH Jada Scotland ’19 celebrates an early spring during NMH’s Diversity Day in February.

PHOTO: SHARON LABELLA-LINDALE C O V E R PH O TO : J O A N N A C H ATTM A N

NMH Fund

Take a walk around campus. You are making a difference everywhere.

Gifts to the NMH Fund help supply our science labs and art studios, keep technology current, buy team uniforms, and bring fresh produce into the dining hall.

No other fund is this versatile. Or this necessary. Or this important. Please make your gift today.

Return the enclosed envelope, go to nmhschool.org/give, or call 1-866-NMH-GIVE (1-866-664-4483).

2 I NMH Magazine

Well. Grounded.

LETTERS

NMH Farm Products

lives worldwide in indelible ways.

Thank you!

William S. McKersie ’77 Weston, Connecticut CLIMATE CONTROVERSY

FAMILY TRADITION

NMH has been a fixture in my family since 1949, when my mother, Nancy Crosier, graduated from Northfield. The school’s values so deftly conveyed in D.L. Moody’s founding dictum of “the Head, the Heart, and the Hand” have resonated in all we have done as a family.

On Thanksgiving, I read the Fall 2016 issue of NMH Magazine, and from stem to stern, it portrayed vividly and with remarkable diversity why NMH is a school so essential to where we are now as a nation and a world. At each page, I was reminded of the incredible reach of this relatively small school in an uncommonly idyllic setting.

Poignantly, on the final two pages of the magazine, I came upon memorial statements for Deane Lanphear and Dick Unsworth, two leaders essential to NMH for so many decades. They were joined in their love for the school, even though they had a healthy diversity of ideas and priorities for NMH. Deane and Dick gave us clues for how leaders can find common ground — through shared values of dedication, justice, caring, and dignity.

I share my appreciation of all who have led and shaped NMH. Through your work, real impact has emanated from the school, touching

I am disappointed in NMH. For the past 46 years or so I have read NMH Magazine, sometimes lightly, sometimes with more profound interest.

I am increasingly disturbed by the fact that I do not recall ever seeing an article on a subject having public policy overtones that presents both sides of the issue.

Case in point: “Rob Werner ’79 Wants to Talk to You About Climate Change” (Fall 2016). The article is clearly based on the assumption that the world must and can do something about what is now being called “climate change” (having morphed from “global warming” for reasons I never understood). The article also seems to assume that no valid controversy exists.

I find it disappointing that NMH Magazine editors do not seem to recognize that controversy exists on at least four fronts: whether man can do something about climate change; whether man is the cause of climate change; whether climate change is a destructive phenomenon; and whether climate change actually exists as a new phenomenon.

I realize that readers have probably made up their minds on this issue. I am not affirming that they are wrong. I just beg that they show some tolerance of dissent — which most progressives talk about a lot but demonstrate little.

Do readers believe that any controversy exists, and if it is not legitimate, why?

Katy Harwood Delay ’65 La Quinta, California continued on next page

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spring 2017 I 3

LETTERS

Keep Calm and Carry On UNDERSTANDING AMERICA

The NMH bookstore can help outfit you and your family.

Visit the NEW and IMPROVED online store for great gift ideas.

nmhschoolstore.com

Northfield Mount Hermon Summer Session July 1 to August 5, 2017

Earn credits to advance in school.

Build skills and accelerate academic progress.

Sample boarding school life or come as a day student.

I read with interest Peter Fayroian’s remarks in the Fall 2016 issue (“Leading Lines”). I applaud the school’s VOTES project, but I took issue with two ideas you expressed.

First, I cringe every time I read about efforts to connect D.L. Moody’s understanding of social justice, founded in the Christian tradition, with today’s definition as viewed through the lens of liberal progressives. Any suggestion of alignment between the two would have Mr. Moody spinning like a top in his grave overlooking the desolate and abandoned Northfield campus.

I further did not appreciate the use of Moody’s 1890 quote regarding the virtue of China and India when compared to that of the United States, with the implication that similar conditions exist today. China, whose leadership over the past 65 years has expunged 70 million souls from this earth, and India, where voluntary gender-selective abortions have precluded generations of women from ever greeting the light of day, are far from sinless nations to be placed on a pedestal and emulated.

I’ve served overseas and fought for American ideals against foes that wanted nothing more than to destroy the way of life that makes possible the great freedoms you enjoy in running a cloistered New England prep school like NMH. Perhaps the school would

best serve the long-term interest of its students and alumni if more effort was focused on understanding America and how fragile are the freedoms we enjoy. Beyond the VOTES project, are civics classes a mandatory part of the curriculum? Is the student community brought together on Veterans Day to understand the past sacrifices made to preserve freedoms?

The greatest act of charity is to give people the opportunity for a successful future. Given that immigrants vote with their feet, and one of the biggest challenges the United States faces is illegal immigration, I’d suggest the nation is doing a good job at being charitable. Students need to hear less criticism of Americans for perceived shortfalls in charity and more about what they can do to understand and help preserve this great nation.

Thanks for all you do. Your influence on young people at this point in their lives changes the world.

Colonel Alex Vohr ’84 USMC (Ret.) Jacksonville, Florida Editor’s note: Beyond the VOTES project, NMH offers a course titled Government and Civil Liberties and incorporates civics into many of its history and humanities classes. The entire NMH campus community is invited to participate in the school’s annual Veterans Day ceremony.

WHAT DO YOU THINK? NMH Magazine welcomes correspondence from readers.

Letters and emails may be edited for length, clarity, and grammar, and should pertain to magazine content. The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official policies or positions of Northfield Mount Hermon.

Reach us at NMH Magazine, One Lamplighter Way, Mount Hermon, MA 01354, or email us at nmhmagazine@nmhschool.org.

nmhschool.org/summer One Lamplighter Way, Mount Hermon, MA 01354 413-498-3290

summer_session@nmhschool.org

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LEADING LINES

From a World Away

International students are a crucial part of NMH.

by PETER B. FAYROIAN, Head of School

For two weeks in March, I traveled on behalf of NMH to Korea, China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. Upon my return, the question my colleagues asked about first was jetlag, but what I wanted to talk about — and still do — are the dozens of alumni and parents I met who, from thousands of miles away, hold this school close in their hearts.

They send their children to our campus, or their parents sent them in years past, entrusting us with one of the most important jobs in the world: caring for and shaping the heads, hearts, and hands of young people. We work unbelievably hard to do that job well, and to make these families feel strong and safe in their decision to join their educational goals and dreams with ours.

For nearly its entire history, NMH has benefited from the presence of students from Asian countries, East Asia in particular, beginning with those encouraged by Christian missionaries whom our founder Dwight L. Moody sent to the region. Mount Hermon’s first Japanese student, Kotai Masuda of Tokyo, graduated in 1885. A year later, three Chinese students arrived; one of them, Chan Loon Teung of Canton (Guangzhou), was invited to speak at the first Commencement in 1887. Our first Korean student, Hi Beung Pak, enrolled in 1898 and went on to Columbia University before returning to Seoul to practice medicine. The first Chinese girl to graduate from Northfield was Susan Chen, Class of 1922.

One Hong Kong family made Mount Hermon their educational home for more than two decades, starting in the summer of 1901, when Yew Lee boarded a ship in Hong Kong Harbor and two months later arrived at Mount Hermon, where he lived and studied until 1904. His four younger brothers followed him, graduating in 1918, 1922, 1923, and 1924.

So when we refer to NMH as an “international school,” we are not just talking about our current experience teaching and living with students from over 50 different countries. As far back as 1900, we were registering young people from 30 different countries, and welcoming about 150 international students every year for the first three decades of the 20th century. As a result, all of our graduates, whether they’re from East Asia or the East Coast, have benefited from a rich spectrum of cultures and perspectives.

A few years ago, I sat in the living room of Ford Cottage with a group of seniors, and I’ll never forget one student’s response when I asked about their most-valued NMH experiences. She was from Hong Kong, one of the most international cities in the world, and she described how she cherished the diversity of the student body. As she spoke further, it became clear to the rest of the students in the room — particularly the American students — that she wasn’t only talking about sharing her life with kids from New York City or Northfield, Massachusetts; she was talking about her Korean roommate, her Beijing classmate, her Singaporean teammate. Because of our commitment to international diversity, I believe NMH students, perhaps more so than students at other

P H O T O : R A C H A E L WA R I N G

schools, understand that the lumping together of “Asian” students makes as much sense as homogenizing students from Texas, Canada, Holland, and Italy.

Teaching this is one thing, but living it is another, and I’m so proud of NMH’s commitment to both a diverse domestic and international student body.

Now, back to the jetlag question. My standard response is that as the father of a 5-year-old and a 14-month-old, I don’t notice it makes much of a difference. The truth is, it’s a challenge, even for our generally invincible teenagers who regularly travel back and forth from one side of the world to the other. I don’t know how they manage it.

But I’ll do everything I can to help them keep managing it. Just as I visit alums and parents all around the United States to talk about the fabulous school we share, I’ll continue to visit places farther afield, where people have, for over a century, become an integral part of what makes an NMH education unique and so very worth the investment. [NMH]

spring 2017 I 5

NMH JOURNAL Shorter (left), now 69, found refuge from family trauma on NMH’s crosscountry and track teams (opposite page).

Born to Run Commencement speaker Frank Shorter’s race for Olympic gold started at NMH.

by EMILY HARRISON WEIR

If it hadn’t been for the 1963 NMH Pie Race, Frank Shorter ’65 might never have become an Olympic gold medalist. The champion marathoner, whose wins inspired ordinary Americans to take up running, returns to NMH this May to deliver the Commencement address.

But when Shorter arrived at NMH as a sophomore, winning the 1972 Olympic marathon was the farthest thing from his mind. He wanted to be a downhill ski racer.

6 I NMH Magazine

He already ran — about five miles a day — but only to stay in shape for skiing. “I didn’t think [running] was important in and of itself,” Shorter wrote in his memoir, My Marathon. “It was just something I did.” The first of his three years at NMH Shorter didn’t even try out for the cross-country team. When not studying or feeding the huge Hobart dishwasher at his dining hall workjob, Shorter skied and played baseball and JV football.

In the 1960s, NMH skiers trained by climbing the hills around campus, stamping out a slalom course in the snow, and blasting down it. Ski coach Dick Kellom and NMH senior Dave Rikert ’63 — that year’s Nordic combined junior national champion — became Shorter’s mentors, though he says they may not have known they were role models. “I just watched to see how they operated,” he recalls.

“They taught me to have focus, consistency, and confidence.”

They set academic and athletic goals, so Shorter did, too. “A seminal moment came when my English teacher, Mr. [Harold F.] Donnelly, said, ‘If you focused on academics, you could do really well.’” Shorter graduated from NMH with honors before heading to Yale.

His athletic life pivoted when he decided to compete in the Pie Race his sophomore year. “It was the first time I’d run any race,” he says. Shorter finished seventh, behind only Rikert and other members of the cross-country team, then the best in New England.

Shorter recalls thinking, “Hey, I’m pretty good; maybe I’ll go out for cross-country next year.”

So — although he had to give up skiing to do it — he and about 70 others did. In the try-out cross-country

run, Shorter finished fifth, just after those who were on the team at the time. By the end of that season, Shorter was fifth in New England, though still not the best runner on the team. “With running, the time’s the time, so you always know where you are,” he says.

Years before he started competing, Shorter ran for stress relief. He and his siblings suffered devastating physical and emotional abuse from their father, and he found literally running away from the trauma therapeutic.

NMH was a refuge. “From the moment I stepped on campus, I felt more at home than I ever had in [my boyhood home],” Shorter recalled in My Marathon. He loved the new feeling of achievement that competitive running brought. And he came to enjoy the social aspect, too, becoming best friends with some of his NMH teammates.

Senior year, Shorter captained the cross-country and track teams, and, as the 1965 yearbook noted, “He won every race of the season (including the Pie Race), and established a new course record on every course he ran.”

The work ethic Shorter learned at NMH continued at Yale and then at law school, he says. Meanwhile, as he trained harder, Shorter moved up in national rankings.

“By 1970, I realized that I could do well on the world scene,” he says.

“But when I was at NMH, I certainly didn’t realize I’d ever get into the Olympics.”

Shorter ran his gold-medal marathon just days after a terrorist attack at the Munich Olympics in 1972. Four years later, he took the

silver medal in the marathon at the Montreal games, denied another gold by a runner suspected of doping.

Shorter’s Olympic performances and 24 national championship victories made him a household name. He was inducted into the U.S. Olympic Hall of Fame in 1984 and into the USA National Track and Field Hall of Fame in 1989.

Later, Shorter helped establish and then chaired the United States Anti-Doping Agency, and has spoken out against the use of performanceenhancing drugs by athletes.

Now 69, he no longer runs marathons, but Shorter still works out at least 90 minutes a day. “I’ve never gotten tired of running,” he says.

“I believe everyone is born with a love of a certain type of motion.

You just find yours. I love the feeling of moving across the ground when I run, even though I’m much slower now and have had a lot of orthopedic surgeries.”

Starting up the bell curve of academics and athletics at NMH prepared Shorter for coming down the far side later in life. “NMH provided the foundation on which I was able to build a lifetime career that evolved into a blend of academics, athletics, business, and social contribution,” he says.

Although Shorter hasn’t come back to NMH for reunions, the Pie Race — for which he set a course record as a student — has lured him back a few times.

When he returns to campus for Commencement, he says, running that cross-country course will be the first thing he’ll do after settling in.

P HOTOS: CO U R TESY O F FR AN K SH O R T E R AN D N MH AR C H IVE S

A New Owner for Northfield As of May 2, the former Northfield campus has a new occupant. The National Christian Foundation (NCF), which has owned the property since 2012, has donated the majority of the campus to Thomas Aquinas College, a small Roman Catholic liberal-arts institution in California.

The college, located in Ventura County, serves just under 400 students, and plans to eventually enroll the same number of students in Northfield.

In the four years since the NCF took ownership of the 500,000-squarefoot property, it has worked to find a long-term owner that could use the historic campus in a manner that honors the legacy of 19th-century evangelist and NMH founder Dwight L. Moody. For more than a decade following Northfield Mount Hermon’s 2005 consolidation from two campuses to one, the former Northfield campus has been vacant.

According to Anne Forsyth, director of college relations and assistant to the president at Thomas Aquinas, the college plans to admit 36 students to its new East Coast campus during its first year of operation in 2018, and then will increase enrollment over the subsequent three years to a maximum of 400. Forsyth said the college intends to preserve the buildings on campus as much as possible.

The NCF also announced that a small portion of the campus would be given to the Moody Center, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving the evangelical heritage of D.L. Moody. The center will restore the historic Homestead and the Auditorium, and will build a Moody museum that will be open to the public.

Although NMH has not owned the Northfield campus since 2009, it still uses the Auditorium for Sacred Concert each May.

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NMH JOURNAL

Courting Greatness Northfield Mount Hermon has a long tradition of opening doors to high-profile Division I college basketball programs, and this year is no exception.

All seven seniors on the boys’ varsity team will join Division I teams in the fall, an exodus that is both remarkable and nothing out of the ordinary — it has happened six times in the past 13 years. Prior sweeps occurred in 2005, 2007, 2010, 2011, and 2013.

“I’m so proud of these seven seniors,” says coach John Carroll ’89. “Student-athletes come to NMH because they have a dream of playing Division I college basketball one day, and these seven young men did everything, both on and off the court, to achieve that dream.”

NMH also continues its custom of helping players gain access to the Ivy League, with two seniors heading to Princeton and Brown. This year, 11 of Carroll’s former players dotted Ivy League rosters, a presence unmatched by any other high school in the world. The other Division I teams welcoming new NMH alumni this year include Bucknell, Davidson, North Carolina, Northeastern, and Quinnipiac.

Preparing his players for the quantum leap into highprofile collegiate programs has long been a part of Carroll’s court curriculum. During his 16 years at NMH, he has sent nearly 100 players to Division I rosters. And over the past two seasons, seven of his former players have been named captain of their D-I teams. Carroll says, “It wouldn’t surprise me to see any of this year’s seven seniors be named captain in the next few years, either.”

The exposure his players receive during their frequent appearances in the prestigious National Prep School basketball tournament doesn’t hurt their chances. This season marked NMH’s eighth consecutive trip to the tournament, and its fifth consecutive year earning a berth in the tournament’s final four. NMH bested Hargrave Military Academy in the semifinal beforefalling to nemesis Brewster Academy by a single point in the final.

In regular-season play, the team notched the most wins — 27 — in NMH basketball history.

Despite these accomplishments, Carroll has long prioritized academics and leadership on his team as much as athletic ability and potential. “We’re not looking for recruits who place basketball above everything else,” he says. “If they’re uncomfortable with that message, I tell them NMH is the wrong program for them.”

That’s been just fine with Ivy League-bound Jerome Desrosiers ’17. “Being challenged in the classroom and on the basketball court is exactly why I came to NMH,” he says. “I feel as though the classes I’ve taken have prepared me to be successful at Princeton.”

Desrosiers and his fellow seniors are leaving a distinct legacy for their younger teammates. “I see it as paying it forward,” says Carroll. “We had seven juniors on this year’s team who all want to play Division I ball as well, and after watching these seven seniors make it happen, they know firsthand what they have to do.” —Bob York

KIDS ON CAMPUS In January, the new Bolger Center for Early Childhood Education opened its doors to almost 40 children and their families, replacing the nursery school that operated for decades on the former Northfield campus. Having the children closer “reinforces that we’re a community,” says Sarah Warren, an NMH dean and religious studies teacher whose child is enrolled at the center.

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NMH JOURNAL

THE SHOT “RAINY DREAM” This print by Somin (Stephanie) Lee ’17 was part of NMH’s annual Student Art Show in the Gallery at the Rhodes Arts Center this spring. The show highlighted work created in NMH’s visual arts classes, including drawings, paintings, photographs, ceramics, wire sculpture, and 3-D architectural designs.

H EAVY HITTERS The girls’ varsity alpine team clinched their fifth straight Mount Institute Ski League Championship title. The boys’ team took second place in the league.

The girls’ varsity basketball team won the Eight Schools Tournament title for the second year in a row. Allie Lopes ’18 and Silke Milliman ’19 were selected to compete in

the New England Class A All-Star game.

The varsity swim team had 28 athletes qualify for New Englands, where Hannah Langer ’17, Yoon Jin Lim ’20, Issy Magbie ’17, and Rylie Hager ’17 broke the NMH school record in the 200-medley relay with a time of 1:54.08. The old mark of 1:55.36 was set in 2010.

Wrestling coach Zachary Bates was named the 2017 Prep School

PHOTOS: SHAR O N LA B ELL A- L IN D AL E , J IM B U R ST E IN

Coach of the Year by the Massachusetts chapter of the National Wrestling Hall of Fame.

Wrestler Yaraslau Slavikouski ’19 (195 lbs., right) took the No. 2 spot at the National Prep Tournament at Lehigh University. He was also a New England champion in his weight class, as was Jordan Rowlette ’17 (132 lbs., left) and Noah Burstein ’19 (126 lbs., center).

spring 2017 I 9

NMH JOURNAL

WHO• WHAT •WHY

The Art and Science of Pole Vaulting

If you’ve ever watched a pole-vault competition — a track and field event in which an athlete uses a long, flexible pole to clear a bar — you may have wondered how the athletes do it. (You may also have questioned their sanity.)

Heidi Leeds ’18, who won three competitions and almost broke the school record during her first season as a pole-vaulter last year, explains that body awareness, strength, and building muscle memory are keys to success. She says the power of the run before the vault, called the “approach,” and the timing of the “plant” — placing the tip of the pole in the vault box before takeoff — are crucial.

“The goal is to get vertical,” says Jim Bell, the pole vault coach for both NMH and the local Pioneer Valley Regional School, where he has been coaching since 1994. That may seem like a physical impossibility, but Integrative Math and Science Coordinator David Reeder, who also teaches physics, has a scientific explanation for how it’s done. You must “apply a force upward to your body that is greater than the gravitational force pulling you down,” Reeder says. The run leading up to the plant is important because changing horizontal force to vertical force is accomplished by converting kinetic energy — the energy from the run — to potential energy, which is stored in the pole as it bends, transferring energy into upward force and extra height. In other words, it flings the pole-vaulter up and over the bar.

Mind boggling? Leeds says that as a pole-vaulter, she finds it’s best not to overthink it. She recalls plateauing at a height of 8'6" and says once she stopped thinking about it so much, she reached 9'6", her best height to date.

A successful pole-vaulter is tall, slim, muscular, fast, and fearless, according to Bell. He says pole-vaulters tend to be edgier than most other athletes, and because it’s a risky sport, they learn to help each other. This was true at a practice on NMH’s track last spring, where more seasoned pole-vaulters gave newcomers advice on plant timing and increasing speed. Students from two different schools — Pioneer and NMH — cheered each other on and shared in each other’s disappointment when they didn’t clear the bar.

Despite Reeder’s explanation of the physics behind the pole vault, Bell prefers to see it as an art rather than a science. In fact, he penned a collection of poems that employ pole-vaulting imagery, called Landing Amazed. “I use pole-vaulting as a metaphor for overcoming obstacles,” Bell says. — Tara Jackson

Heidi Leeds ’18, mid-vault during a track meet last spring.

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PH O TO : G R E G L E E D S

NMH JOURNAL

FOR THE RECORD

READING LIST

“!For an educator, love means

The Lost Sketchbook of Edgar Degas Harriet Scott Chessman ’68 Outpost19 March 2017

availability, acceptance, patience, and respect. It is challenge balanced with affirmation, correction paired with compassion. It means seeing students as they are, yet having a vision for what they could become.”

CRAIG SANDFORD, NMH performing arts teacher, in a reflection on teaching that he delivered at a faculty meeting in March.

Feeding the Grid

Clothesline Religion: Poems Megan Buchanan ’91 Green Writers Press March 2017

Road to War John Lubetkin ’56 University of Oklahoma Press November 2016

LinkedIn for Personal Branding

The Field Photographs of Alain H. Liogier

Sandra Gustafson Long ’75 Strauss Consultants September 2016

Brandy Watts ’94 New York Botanical Garden Press March 2017

At Sword’s Point, Part 2 William MacKinnon ’56 The Arthur H. Clark Company, October 2016

Forever Friends Priscilla Hartwell Hansen ’47 Outskirts Press October 2016

If you’ve visited campus in the past six months, you’ve perhaps noticed a different kind of farm just beyond Northfield Mount Hermon’s iconic red barn and grazing pastures on the east side of campus.

A 10-acre “solar farm” was expected to begin operating at NMH this spring, generating two megawatts of electricity that would feed back into the local power grid.

The large array of photovoltaic panels, owned

by Borrego Solar of Lowell, Massachusetts, was installed last fall in the empty fields north of the Peller Family Field. The company leases the land from NMH — which, says Associate Head of School Charlie Tierney, is “one way we can help increase the production of green energy for the area power grid,” while also providing budget relief for the school.

This is the largest, but not the first, solar array at NMH. Solar panels owned and operated directly by the school generate power on the roof of Norton House, and near the farm and plant and property buildings.

Leasing the land to Borrego Solar is part of the school’s overall commitment — detailed in the latest campus master plan — to “leverage the productive landscape of the campus,” Tierney says.”

spring 2017 I 11

MOVERS & MAKERS

The Fearless Baker Award-winning pastry chef Emily Luchetti ’75 believes great desserts are an important part of life.

by LORI FERGUSON

After years of cooking on the savory side of restaurant kitchens, Emily Luchetti realized she was losing her passion. A veteran chef with extensive experience on both coasts, including a stint in Jeremiah Tower’s legendary San Francisco eatery Stars, Luchetti no longer felt connected to the kitchen or inspired by her work. So she did what any reasonable person does when seeking solace, comfort, or reward — she turned to dessert.

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Now, she can’t imagine doing anything else. “My palate is creatively more attuned to sweets,” Luchetti explains.

“You’re working with a smaller group of ingredients, which I find easier to wrap my head around, and dessert is inherently fun because it evokes such an emotional reaction and is consumed purely for pleasure.”

A quick scan of Luchetti’s résumé for the last two decades makes it evident that she made the right call. After eight years as the pastry chef at Stars and co-owner of the retail bakery StarBake, she enjoyed successful runs as executive pastry chef at San Francisco’s Farallon — where she won the James Beard Foundation’s outstanding pastry chef award — and at Waterbar. In 2014, she changed it up again, joining the Big Night Restaurant Group and taking over the dessert programs at Big Night’s four restaurants: The Cavalier, Marlowe, Park Tavern and Leo’s Oyster Bar. That same year, Luchetti founded dessertworthy, a movement dedicated to assisting people in making healthier, more informed choices about dessert.

“Desserts should be an occasional treat rather than a daily staple,” Luchetti argues — a message she promotes by working with chefs, food companies, schools, youth organizations, and nutrition advocacy groups, though she finds it best delivered one on one. “I try to work my message about smart dessert choices into conversations I’m having with people rather than lecturing them.

As much as I preach ‘Eat great desserts,’ the other part of my message is ‘Not every day.’ It’s all about balance.”

During her years on the “sweet side of the kitchen,” Luchetti has built a reputation on her simple, elegant, and wonderfully flavorful desserts. “I like straightforward, beautiful things,” she says. “I don’t like embellishments in my wardrobe, my home, or my desserts.”

Caramel, coffee, bittersweet chocolate, and blueberries are among the chef ’s

PH O TO : R O B E R T X . FO G A R TY

“!Food is there for joy. Julia Child

once observed that ‘a party without cake is just a meeting.’” favorite flavors, and whether she’s happy or sad, warm chocolate chip cookies are the answer. Asked to name her most prized indulgence, Luchetti pauses. “Just one?

Homemade vanilla bean ice cream with toasted sliced almonds, chopped bittersweet chocolate chunks, and caramel sauce. This is my answer today,” she adds quickly.

“Tomorrow might be different.”

When it comes to desserts, Luchetti contends that beauty is only skin-deep. “My focus is on the creation of flavors and textures — plating is last.” After all, she says, if it doesn’t taste good, what’s the point? “When you’re eating one of my desserts, I want you to feel like every bite is worth it.” And happily, Luchetti is a sharer. She has authored six cookbooks on pastry, including A Passion for Desserts (2003), A Passion for Ice Cream (2006), and The Fearless Baker (2011). “Desserts taste so good that I want as many people as possible to enjoy them.” On television, she’s made pear charlotte with Martha Stewart and espresso chocolate-chip angel food cake on The Food Network; she’s also shared her recipes in the pages of Food & Wine, Bon Appetit, and O Magazine, among others.

Luchetti is a collaborator, too, eager to work with both up-and-coming and established chefs. She serves as a dean at the International Culinary Center in New York and California because she likes mentoring and teaching: “If I see someone young and eager to learn, I want to help.” She’s also chair of the board of the James Beard Foundation. “I love being a part of this professional community — chefs are fun, passionate about their work, and deeply committed to the creative process.”

“Fun” seems to be Luchetti’s main rule of thumb when it comes to cooking. “Food is there for joy,” she concludes. “Julia Child once observed that ‘a party without cake is just a meeting.’ I’m not saying that dessert is going to solve all the world’s ills, but when you put dessert on the table and it’s good, people linger and focus on those around them, and that’s a step in the right direction.” [NMH]

STANDING STRONG For Tony Sorci ’00, a member of the Bitter Water Clan of the Navajo nation, activism is a family tradition.

His grandmother, Roberta Blackgoat, was a renowned relocation resister who fought against the Peabody Western Coal Company’s establishment of two strip mines on the Big Mountain (then Black Mesa) Reservation in Arizona in the 1970s. She was also a towering figure in her grandson’s life. Sorci says, “To this day, when I encounter something that concerns me, I don’t ask ‘What would Jesus do?’ It’s ‘What would Grandma do?’”

That question came up again last June, when Sorci was participating in the Tribal Canoe Journey ceremony and the Traditional Circle of Youth and Elders in Washington state.

He learned about protests underway in North Dakota, where members of the Standing Rock Sioux nation had been protesting since April 2016, trying to stop construction of the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) and protect sacred sites from being destroyed, and the Missouri River, the reservation’s primary water source, from possible contamination through a pipeline leak.

Sorci wanted to help, so in the fall, he got in his car and drove west. Sorci knew people already camped at Standing Rock, and his plan for a two-week stay extended to four. He has made the 1,700-mile journey west twice since then.

Sorci’s activism came a decade after he graduated from Colorado College with a degree in cultural anthropology. First, he had happily returned to NMH, where both his parents were teachers, to coach football and lacrosse and work with Native American students. A year later, he became a professional lacrosse player, logging two seasons with the Buffalo Bandits before injuries steered him off the playing field and into coaching, first at St. Andrew’s, a boarding school in Middletown, Delaware, and then at Vermont Academy, where he also taught Native American literature. He is currently the head coach of the Vermont Voyageurs, a semipro indoor lacrosse team based in Essex Junction.

After taking up the mantle of protester last November, Sorci watched the National Guard issue eviction notices to demonstrators at Standing Rock, pelt them with water cannons in subfreezing weather, bulldoze sacred burial grounds, and hire DAPL workers to infiltrate the camp.

Sorci has paddled down the Cannonball River, trying to distract DAPL workers and force them to respond, which costs the company and the state money.

Sorci calls his efforts as a protester a responsibility.

“Many Native Americans have passion, but they don’t have the benefits of education that I’ve had, so I feel compelled to act. I’m trying to encourage global consciousness. We need to change the path we’re on, so we can sustain life on this planet.”

PH O TO : C O U R TE S Y O F TO N Y S O R C I

spring 2017 I 13

IN THE CLASSROOM

Hands in the Dirt

Students research improvements for the NMH Farm.

by TARA JACKSON

Scenes from the Science of Farming class: Two students check the progress of the logs they inoculated with mushroom spores; another scavenges the lab for parts to build a mushroom dehydrator; four others brainstorm ideas to ensure that the composting initiative they developed for on-campus faculty homes continues after they graduate.

The class, now in its second year, applies the scientific method to a broad range of agricultural topics, using the NMH farm as a laboratory. Drawing on students’ knowledge of biology and chemistry, the class also incorporates economics, ethics, and sustainability into class projects and discussions. Mary Hefner, chair of the science department, helped develop the class out of a desire, she says, to better “use a beautiful, unique resource — the farm.”

The idea was first proposed years ago by former farm manager Richard Odman as an immersive “study-away” semester: Students would all live together in North Farmhouse and spend their days on the farm. That proposal never came to fruition, but Hefner glimpsed the idea in practice when biology teachers would ask students to do two-week research projects on the farm each spring. Hefner says, “The kids loved their projects,” so she and Odman’s successor, former farm manager Liam Sullivan ’05, began batting around the idea of a semester-long class.

The result has students researching plant and soil science, gaining an understanding of food production systems, and literally rolling up their sleeves and getting their hands dirty as they learn. Emma Lindale ’17 has done her workjob on the farm for most of her time at NMH, but says that before taking the class with Hefner last spring, she hadn’t thought of the cows she milked and the crops she tended as science.

Junmo Kim ’17 says he signed up for the class because he was interested in studying an applied science. Indeed, one of the goals of the course, according to Hefner and Camilla Nivision, who taught the class last fall, is for students to identify improvements that can be put into immediate practice at the farm. The results of Kim’s final project, which compared three propagation methods for lavender plants, can be applied to the farm’s production of the crop, which is used to make soap and other cosmetics.

Another goal of the course is to show students how the challenges and opportunities of the class mirror those of the farm: Constant activity. Weather. Seasons.

Hefner says of her class: “We talked a lot about how at a farm, there isn’t one project. The cows need to be fed, and the beans need to be picked.” The students learn firsthand how multiple tasks are juggled in agriculture. “Every kid had a big project for which they were the principal investigator,” but they also were expected to help one another out. “Sometimes the whole class would

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Science teacher and department chair Mary Hefner (second from right) works with students in the greenhouse.

need to go pull weeds out of the beds so we could get the indigenousspecies flower garden project going,” Hefner says.

Nivision acknowledges that cold November and December weather makes it “really hard to be productive on the farm in New England,” so her class used that time to dig deeper into food systems and ethics, reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan, studying meat production, and watching King Corn, a documentary

“!Everyone has a project for which they’re the principal investigator, but they’re expected to help each other out.”

film that raises questions about how Americans eat and farm. Kim says the class changed his perspective on the food industry. “Every time I walk up to the dining hall food bars, I can’t help but think about the carbon footprint and the paths the food took to get to the metal trays.”

Although the Science of Farming class lasts one semester, “the farm is not a one-season event,” says Hefner.

“Depending on when they take the class, students could have a completely

P HOTO: GLEN N MIN SH ALL

different experience — harvesting or planting or soil tending.” Next year, the class will run in both the fall and spring, so interested students will have the opportunity to take it both semesters and “keep their own projects going,” Hefner says.

A project like the one Lindale did — researching the effect that plotting methods such as tilling, no tilling, and companion planting have on the soil — could be expanded over time, and put to better use on the

farm to increase productivity. Because she is a day student, Lindale was able to monitor her plots last summer, and ended up developing a larger no-till research trial that could begin this coming summer.

One of the goals of the class is to explore real-world agricultural problems and solutions, especially as the climate changes. Lindale’s project did just that.

“The class was eye-opening,” Lindale says. “It made me look at farming in a new light.”[NMH]

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PAST PRESENT

In her diary on Oct. 19, 1923, a 48-year-old New York City teacher named Jessie Wallace Hughan wrote, ‘Tracy [Mygatt] to dinner — had hair done — organized real War Resisters League ...”

Founding the War Resisters League may have been just one item on Hughan’s agenda that day, but it remains the oldest secular pacifist organization in the United States, still thriving more than 90 years after its founding. Hughan had graduated from the Northfield Seminary in 1894; earned a bachelor’s degree in political science from Barnard and a master’s and Ph.D. from Columbia; run repeatedly for political office; and earned a reputation in her hometown of New York City as a fierce anti-war advocate. The War Resisters League was only one of the organizations she launched and led as a political activist.

But before that, back when she was 13, Hughan was a precocious budding poet. In December 1889, she found her name in print for the first time, attached to the following verse published in The Staten Islander:

Fighting for Peace Jessie Wallace Hughan was a teacher, a wouldbe politician, and a fierce anti-war advocate.

by PETER WEIS ’78, P’13

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There’s a charming little Island in the midst of New York Bay Upon whose shores the wavelets and the baseball teams do play.

There great Teutonic breweries lift their graceful spires on high And the elm-trees lofty branches rise to pierce the summer sky ...

The poem became part of Hughan’s application to Northfield, likely the

PH O TO : C O U R TE S Y O F N M H A R C H I V E S

first example of an applicant submitting published work as part of her bid to attend the school. Jessie wished to follow her older sister Evelyn to Northfield, though poor health had forced Evelyn to leave the Seminary after a single semester. Perhaps worried that the same fate awaited Jessie, the school declined to admit her. A young Northfield alumna intervened and pleaded with the principal, Miss Hall, who relented and allowed Jessie to come.

It wouldn’t be long before Hughan would see her name in the newspaper with regularity. She joined the staff of The Hermonite, a biweekly campus paper that purported to “serve the interests” of both Northfield and Mount Hermon, but clearly did a better job of serving the interests of the boys’ school, since only one in nine pages was devoted to news of the Seminary.

Hughan and her co-editors successfully lobbied to triple the space allotted to Northfield news.

After graduating from Northfield, she returned to her native New York City, where she would spend nearly all of her life. As an undergraduate at Barnard, Hughan and three close friends established the first of her legacies, the Alpha Omicron Pi sorority.

Thriving today with over 100 active chapters, its mission is the same as it was 120 years ago: “Women enriched through lifelong friendship.”

The three strands of Hughan’s religious, intellectual, and political interests wove more tightly into a single braid as she pursued graduate degrees during

“She ran for political office on the Socialist ticket 18 times, and though she had little hope of winning, she used her attempts to draw attention to pacifism.” the first decade of the 20th century.

Her early religious upbringing in the Episcopal Church had been tempered by the evangelical atmosphere at Northfield, and, at her sister’s urging, she joined the Unitarian Church in the mid-1890s. Becoming a pacifist and later joining the Socialist Party in 1907 were, according to her biographer Scott Bennett, rooted in her lifelong religious faith: Following the dictates of Christ meant empathy for her neighbor and turning the other cheek. Hughan lived these virtues, and sought them as matters of public policy.

Meanwhile, after her doctoral dissertation was published in 1911 under the title “American Socialism of the Present Day,” she found that her political leanings kept her out of the upper echelon of the academy. Instead, she taught

in public secondary schools, with her patriotism questioned again and again.

She pressed forward with her views, running for political office on the Socialist ticket 18 times between 1914 and 1938. Generally, she sought election to the New York State Assembly, but she also ran for lieutenant governor (1920) and for the U.S. Senate (1926).

Though she had little hope of winning, she used these attempts to draw attention to pacifism.

At the outbreak of World War I, she founded the Anti-Enlistment League and advocated against U.S. entry in the war, but was eventually forced to cease that work and watch the U.S. government seize her organization’s materials.

The War Resisters League came next, established between the two world wars, with the goal of organizing and giving a voice to pacifists.

Hughan served as secretary of the War Resisters League through World War II, despite great opposition to the organization, and remained one of its active leaders until her death, at the age of 79, in 1955. Among her survivors was her sister, Evelyn Hughan, whom she had followed to Northfield and with whom she lived her entire adult life. [NMH]

spring 2017 I 17

STAY WOKE Student activist Keshawn Tyriq Bostic â&#x20AC;&#x2122;17 speaks up.

B Y TAR A J AC K S O N / P O R T RA I T S B Y J O A N N A C H ATTM A NN

* To stay awake, to keep informed in times of turmoil and conflict.

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*

spring 2017 I 19

Last fall, a few weeks after Keshawn Tyriq Bostic ’17 returned to Northfield Mount Hermon for his senior year, a police officer in Oklahoma shot and killed an unarmed black man named Terence Crutcher. When Bostic — a 17-year-old from Brooklyn, New York — found out, he taped a sign to his shirt that said, “What is my life worth?”

“I really didn’t know what to do,” he says. “At first, I was in shock. It hurt my heart, and I didn’t know how I was supposed to deal with that kind of grief. So I decided to write a sign. I don’t know where it came from, because I’d never done anything like that before ... put something in people’s faces like that.”

The next day, Bostic wore another sign that asked, “Am I next?”

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Bostic’s girlfriend, Krystal Ramirez ’17, also wore a sign that listed the names of 102 unarmed black people killed in 2015. In a mass email, she invited NMH students and teachers to participate in a “blackout” the following Friday — to wear black clothing to raise awareness about the deaths of Crutcher and Keith Lamont Scott of North Carolina, another black man killed by a police officer in September, and to protest brutality against people of color in the United States in general.

Bostic recalls that on the day of the “blackout,” there was a fire drill. He was one of the first students to leave Beveridge Hall. “I remember turning around and seeing all these people pouring out of Beveridge wearing black.

There were so many of them, and I stood there and started crying because it was incredible to see all these people standing by us at a time when it felt really difficult to be black.”

A few days later, Bostic and Ramirez led a senior class meeting. Martha Neubert, NMH’s dean of diversity, equity, and social justice, recalls, “He stood up and told his story and it was incredibly powerful and moving. You could hear a pin drop. He talked about what it’s like for him as a young black man, living between the worlds of

NMH and Brooklyn, and how commonplace it is in his world to either be stopped [by police] or be suspect.”

Bostic says only, “I remember that being a very emotional meeting.”

As people across the U.S. reacted to the shooting deaths of Crutcher and Scott, and of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile and of five Dallas police officers before them — protesting, demanding justice, debating, figuring out how to talk to one another about how and why these tragedies happened — at NMH, Bostic’s voice rose persistently, urgently, to the surface.

In his final semester of high school, instead of coasting to graduation, Bostic continued to show up everywhere on campus with something to say. He hosted, with Neubert, a screening and discussion of 13th, the Oscar-nominated documentary about the U.S. prison system and how it reveals the nation’s history of racial inequality. He led a Diversity Day workshop about how hip-hop culture became pop culture.

And he stood before the entire student body in Memorial Chapel during a Monday Morning Meeting to talk about the violence he has witnessed in his life.

“He stood up and told his story and you could hear a pin drop. He talked about what it’s like for him as a young black man, living between the worlds of NMH and Brooklyn.”

“The first time I saw someone get shot in person, I was 7 and in a park. From then on it was not uncommon to hear random gunshots and hear about people dying that you’ve seen a few times,” he said. “Don’t get confused; this is not the world I want to live in, it is the world I do live in.”

FIVE YEARS AGO, Bostic almost didn’t make it to his NMH interview.

Driving onto campus, his parents missed the first entrance and entered by the farm instead. Bostic says, “I’m from New York. I don’t farm.” He and his dad were ready to turn the car around and go home, but his mom insisted that they stay for the interview and tour. “NMH was my top choice after

that,” Bostic says. “I really loved the campus and the people.”

Bostic had attended a single-sex, K–8 charter school in Brooklyn, where, he says, “Part of the creed we said every day was that we would enter, succeed in, and graduate from college.”

He was selected for Breakthrough New York, a college-prep program that helps high-potential, low-income students apply to and navigate four-year colleges, and the suggestion of boarding school came from a Breakthrough New York advisor when Bostic was in eighth grade. “My mom used to joke about sending me away when I was in the fourth grade. I thought it was a bad thing, like a threat. And then, four years later, I’m going off to boarding school,” Bostic says.

spring 2017 I 21

Kim Purvis, Bostic’s mother, says her son was independent and mature, ready to be away from home. But when Bostic arrived at NMH, he experienced culture shock. It was nothing like his home in Brooklyn. Different clothes, different music, different ways of talking. “People couldn’t even understand what I was saying,” Bostic says. He decided to change his speech and use less slang. He started wearing button-up shirts and bought a pair of boat shoes. He even decided to stop using his given name, Keshawn, and go by his middle name, Tyriq. “I felt so uncomfortable going by my first name in a place that was completely different to where I was from, and I felt that I had to act differently.”

One of the things that drew Bostic to NMH was the opportunity to help build the football team, so he mourned the program when it was cut after his freshman year. Instead, he played basketball, tried wrestling, threw the shot put and discus for the 2016 New England Championship track team, and during his sophomore year, he began tutoring at nearby Gill Elementary School. He says that if it weren’t for football getting cut, he never would have become a tutor.

“Now, I want to be a teacher, so I look at it as being something of a blessing.”

He continued tutoring during his junior year, this time working with firstgraders at Hillcrest Elementary. Their teacher, Krista Matrishon, remembers

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“From the time I was able to navigate this world without my mother right beside me, I have been afraid and people have been afraid of me.” how Bostic connected with four boys he tutored in math by telling them about the sports he played. The boys always wanted to talk with him about sports, and he used that as a way to motivate them to work on their math. “They looked up to him and were excited every week when he came,” Matrishon says. Bostic says, “It’s so cliché, but that moment when they finally get something [they were struggling with] and they feel good and you feel good that you helped them get it — I love that feeling so much.”

As a tutor, Bostic started to form the idea for a mentoring program to help other kids, namely, middle schoolers who struggle academically and socially but who don’t qualify for extra help in public schools. Bostic’s concern was that without extra support, they would flounder, and, not knowing how to ask for help, begin failing when they reached high school. He found “the space to make it real” in the form of a Rhodes Fellowship — a spot in NMH’s inaugural social entrepreneurship class. Drawing on his own experiences from his K–8 school and college-access program, Bostic developed We Rise, which he recently launched at the local Pioneer Valley Regional School in Northfield, during his second year as a Rhodes Fellow.

Grant Gonzalez, who teaches the class and coordinates global and leadership initiatives at NMH, says that as a fledgling entrepreneur, Bostic showed a strong desire to tackle a social issue and an understanding of real social needs. He developed resilience in the face of logistical hurdles in getting

P H O T O (L E FT) : S H A R O N L A B E L L A - L I N D A L E

the program started, such as persuading school officials to buy into the idea and coordinating the students’ schedules. Gonzalez also mentions something that happened in the entrepreneurship course that would become a theme for Bostic’s senior year: “He’s had an opportunity to tell his story and to listen to others tell theirs.”

THE DAY AFTER the 2016 election, Bostic sat down and wrote an essay that he titled “Open Letter to the United States of America.” As a young, black male in America, he wrote, “From the time I was able to navigate this world without my mother right beside me, I have been afraid and people have been afraid of me.” He stated his belief that the “racist, sexist, and xenophobic silent majority” had shown its true colors. He shared his worry that under the new presidential administration, inner-city youth will “live in a world full of hate and tension that they are not prepared to face.”

Looking back at that day, Bostic says, “There was just something hanging over me. I felt that someone had to do something, that it had to be articulated in a strong way.” After Ramirez helped him edit the letter, they placed copies of the letter in the windows of several classroom buildings and on the tables in Alumni Hall. They prepared for a backlash.

What Bostic didn’t expect was support. He arrived early for a meeting that night for students who were distressed about the election results, and as people streamed in, they hugged him and told him how brave he was. He says, “I don’t

Bostic says he has “tested out his voice” at NMH, in part by leading workshops during NMH’s Diversity Day (opposite page, far left).

normally get random hugs from people.”

A faculty member got a local newspaper to publish the letter.

Jeremiah Neal, a counselor in NMH’s O’Connor Health and Wellness Center and a faculty advisor to The Brothers, an affinity group for boys of color on campus, says of Bostic, “It’s impossible to ignore his presence. He is charismatic and has a raw vulnerability that incites passion in others. What he

shares of his pain is to connect with you on a deeper level.”

Neubert adds, “He’s always been interested in the big picture, and really keen on being able to articulate his convictions.”

Bostic no longer feels the same unsettling dichotomy of home and school cultures he first experienced when he arrived at NMH. He says, “I learned to navigate through different worlds and

I don’t really have to shift too much between the two now.” Gone are the boat shoes from freshman year, and Keshawn is back — Bostic has decided to go by his first name again.

“Since NMH is such a safe space, I have been able to test out my voice, and even my appearance — mostly trying new things with my hair that my mom wasn’t always the biggest fan of,” says Bostic. Purvis observes that her son “has come into his own. NMH allowed him to be himself, to speak out, do the things he wants to do.”

One of those things was curating a Black History Month celebration.

Bostic says, “We talk a lot about the civil rights movement of the past, struggling for equality now, and how hard it is to be black in America. I wanted to tell a different narrative for Black History Month: a celebration of culture and achievements — not just of civil rights activists — a celebration of people, period.” The line-up included movie and TV show screenings (Friday, Dear White People, “The Boondocks,” and “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air”) and a book display in the library featuring works by Malcolm X, Jay Z, Assata Shakur, Zora Neale Hurston, James Baldwin, and Toni Morrison. Bostic hoped it was “enough to kick-start something, light a fire under somebody for next year.”

Ramirez, who has known Bostic since their first year at NMH, says that he has always been confident and outspoken, but has in the past year reached a broader audience outside their social group. “I definitely think he has sparked some important conversations on this campus. What if he had never worn a sign on his chest? Would we still be in the same place? What he’s doing,” Ramirez says, “is really important for the future of NMH and the students.” [NMH]

spring 2017 I 23

INSIDE LOOK What happens when a student turns her camera on her peers?

At NMH, we take lots of photographs of students. Those images are often evocative and striking, intended to tell the story of the school for alumni, parents, and prospective students and their families.

But when you ask an NMH senior to carry her camera around with her for a few days, you get something different: a spontaneous glimpse of everyday life on campus, a sketch of a moment that is at once fleeting and enduring.

Maggie Dunbar ’17 — who’s made her name at NMH as a dancer, visual artist, and serious student — floated under the radar the way no professional photographer could.

Her images are casual, low-stakes; nobody’s posing for the grown-ups.

At first, Dunbar took pictures of her friends. Then she started asking other people if she could photograph them. It was a little awkward. “People had a hard time being candid when they knew they were being photographed,” she says. “But the better I got at asking, the more realistic they became.”

P HOTOS BY MA G G IE D U N B AR ’17

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Clockwise from lower left: Chuck Hannah ’18 and his roommate relax in their dorm room in Shea; Anna Martin ’18 helps a customer at the dorm store in Mackinnon; Marcus Lin ’17 takes a study break with a friend in the library; Aissatou Thiam ’19 prepares for a dance performance of Alice in Wonderland; Chloe Castro-Santos ’17 (right) congratulates Elyse Kassa ’18 after the performance; college counselor Sarah Kenyon runs an advising session in her office; Annika Voorheis ’20 and Ella Bathory-Peeler ’20 perform in Alice.

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INSIDE LOOK

“

People had a hard time being candid when they knew they were being photographed. But the better I got at asking, the more realistic they became.”

Clockwise from lower left: Kellan Grady ’17 warms up on the basketball court with his teammates; Emmet Flynn ’17 during lunch in Alumni Hall; Sekou Bolden ’18 in Shea; Checking out the costume shop in the Rhodes Arts Center; Rylie Hager ’17 eats dinner with her “little” during NMH’s weekly Big Brother Big Sister gathering; Ashlyn Koh ’17 and Celia Oleshansky ’17 during a visit to Magic Wings Butterfly Conservatory in Deerfield; (below) photographer Maggie Dunbar ’17.

Maggie Dunbar ’17 is from Rhode Island. She loves breakfast, sailing, and speaking French (she hopes to live in France someday). She plans to take a gap year after she graduates this month.

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Talking About Politics Is Hard How NMH wrestled with a bitter presidential election

B Y J E N N I F E R S U T T O N / I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y D AV I D P O H L

spring 2017 I 29

O

n Nov. 9, the day after Donald Trump was elected president of the United States, a group of students clustered around a table in Alumni Hall, watching Hillary Clinton’s concession speech on a few laptop computers. It was around 11:30 AM; typically a loud and busy time in the dining hall, yet the cavernous room was strangely hushed and still. Some students were crying and hugging each other, “as if someone had died,” says Abby Mihaly ’17 of Vermont.

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A couple hundred yards away in Blake Hall, Drake Hunt ’20, who’s from Atlanta, says he was waiting for his freshman humanities class to start when another student walked in, happily chanting, “Trump! Trump! Trump!”

Hunt got up and left the room. “I was so mad, but I didn’t want to yell or get in trouble for cursing her out,” he says. “I knew she was a Trump supporter, and that’s cool, but she should have respected that others were going through a tough time.”

Emotions were so raw on Nov. 9 that a scheduled faculty meeting was abruptly called off so teachers could check in with students who were struggling to come to terms with the

PH O TO : R A C H A E L WA R I N G

Students watch Hillary Clinton’s concession speech on Nov. 9, 2016, in Alumni Hall.

“ election news. For many on campus, the day was one of shock, sadness, fear, anger, and anxiety. Even those who were pleased with the results felt disconcerted: How could they celebrate Trump’s victory without being labeled racist, misogynist, bigoted, or simply unsympathetic?

Head of School Peter Fayroian was traveling that day, but he emailed students and staff to offer perspective, saying that although “there are some among us who believe an important message about the need for change has been sent to Washington … for many, the result not only was surprising, it was deeply and personally painful … particularly for people of color,

women, and for those of the Muslim faith who felt marginalized and disrespected by the language that characterized this election year.”

The turmoil on campus on Nov. 9 and in the days that followed were hardly unique to NMH. Similar scenes played out at schools across the country. At some schools, classes were canceled or given over to political discussions; support groups were hastily formed; protests were staged.

College presidents and high school heads and principals sent out messages much like Fayroian’s.

Amherst College President Biddy Martin lamented the campaign’s “virulent forms of racism, misogyny,

How do you agree and disagree with people in a fashion that’s productive and constructive?

We struggled with that all fall.” homophobia, and other ills … celebrated by some as though the expression of our worst impulses were the definition of human freedom.” John Palfrey, head of Phillips Academy Andover, said at a Nov. 9 all-school meeting, “I will give a very wide berth to the conversations we need to have about politics and difference. But intolerance of one another is something that we must resist.”

Many conservatives decried these reactions by school administrators as little more than political partisanship,

spring 2017 I 31

and wondered openly if the same level of angst would have been displayed if another candidate had become the 45th president. In a conversation several months after the election, Bob McKeon ’17, a postgraduate from Texas, observed that “if Hillary Clinton had won, people at NMH wouldn’t have reacted like they did. If she had gotten started on her agenda as we’ve seen Trump do, we wouldn’t be talking about it the same way.”

But school officials responsible for the health and well-being of young people — especially at boarding schools like NMH that operate in loco parentis — viewed their reactions as not only warranted but necessary, especially given the rise in hate speech and crimes that preceded and followed the election. In the 10 days after Nov. 8, the Southern Poverty Law Center documented close to 900 “reports of harassment and intimidation,” many of them occurring in schools.

Fayroian offered assurance to students during an all-school meeting in in mid-November, saying that NMH is “a place where all of you belong, every single one of you of every race, religion, nationality, gender, sexual orientation, and ability. Any offensive act you encounter while you’re away — or while you’re here — that denies you your rightful place in the world is an offense to all of us, and counter to the mission and values of our school.”

THE ELECTION is old news by now, but schools like NMH continue to wrestle with how to talk about politics and government in an era of heightened divisiveness — to ensure, as Martha Neubert, NMH’s dean of diversity, equity, and social justice, says, that “we’re fulfilling our responsibility as a school to produce informed, empathetic citizens.”

As the school year began, NMH administrators, acutely aware of the

32 I NMH Magazine

“

After the election, the immediate response was, ‘I don’t want to talk to anybody about this,’ and that is never good in a democracy.” polarized political atmosphere, set their sights on fostering the kind of respectful political discussions that were lacking on the national stage.

Fortunately, the school had a vehicle with the VOTES project, a national mock presidential election run by NMH that connected more than 150 public and private schools across the country. It included weeks of campus campaign events, a debate, guest speakers, and a night of election-results news coverage that was streamed live over the internet.

According to Jim Shea, the history teacher who co-founded VOTES 28 years ago and oversees it every four years, the 2016 project was especially difficult. He says, “Due to the uniqueness of the candidates and the contentiousness of the political situation, trying to work on the ideas we talk about so much — how do you agree and disagree with people in a fashion that’s productive and constructive? — we struggled with that all fall. And we made some progress.”

That progress dissipated after Nov. 8.

Clinton won the VOTES mock election, both at NMH — where Trump netted 25 percent of student votes — and at the majority of other participating schools. But the actual election result caught people off guard. While

Trump proponents welcomed his win as as an example of democracy in action, some students who’d supported Clinton skipped classes. Shea says, “The immediate response was, ‘I don’t want to talk to anybody about this,’ and that is never good in a democracy.”

Two hours away, at Andover, “the whole campus pretty much stopped,” reports Flavia Vidal, an English teacher and the director of the Brace Center for Gender Studies. Vidal and several of her colleagues canceled their classes and gathered with students to offer support. Andover’s dean of students, Jennifer Elliott, wept openly as she spoke at an all-school meeting, where people were dressed in black.

This kind of reaction made sense to NMH Dean of Students Nicole Hager.

“If you’re black, if you’re an immigrant, if you’re gay, the ground is always unsteady and unpredictable, but the sands suddenly shifted in a way that made you feel enormously unsettled,” she says. “When students were cheering for Trump, they were just happy, but they didn’t have an understanding of what his election meant to the feeling of safety for so many people.”

At NMH, adults quickly launched into a balancing act, says Dean of Faculty Hugh Silbaugh — “helping Trump supporters celebrate without

Before Nov. 8, NMH’s VOTES project — a nationwide mock election — gave students a respectful, constructive way to discuss politics, despite the contentious campaign.

Top to bottom: casting a ballot, signing in to vote, tracking election results.

gloating or succumbing to the extreme language” that was surfacing around the country, while also “supporting our African American students, and other underrepresented student groups, and the NMH Democratic majority, helping them hold themselves together.”

Because of that Democratic majority, in the dorms and classrooms, “there was a sentiment that the only acceptable way to feel was horribly depressed,” says Mihaly. Conservatives felt quieted. Ellery Halsey ’18 says, “The school’s response was like, ‘We’re so sorry, we’re going to support you guys, you’re going through a hard time,’” she says. “But we weren’t all going through a hard time. Some of us were happy. Some of us were neutral.

And yes, some of us were sad.”

THERE’S BEEN a lot of debate over how teachers should approach politics in the classroom, and whether they should share their personal views with students. Silbaugh stayed away from the word “neutral,” opting instead for words like “careful,” “circumspect,” and “respectful.” “Our responses and comments need to be tempered enough

spring 2017 I 33

that students can state their ideas without a feeling of unfair judgment,” he says. He confesses, “I find it personally very challenging.”

Some NMH teachers turned to media coverage of events, or primary government documents. In the history department’s Foreign Policy course, teacher Charlie Malcolm asked students to examine the National Intelligence Council’s report on Russian “activities and intentions” during the 2016 election; a few weeks later, his focus was Trump’s approach to Asia — the Trans-Pacific Partnership, the one-China policy, and North Korea.

In Tim Relyea’s World History class, students assessed the media characterization of Trump’s populist rise — whether his appeal to blue-collar workers and his targeting of Muslims bore any resemblance to the rise of authoritarianism in 1930s Germany, with the German response to hyperinflation, the promise of a better future, and the scapegoating of Jews.

English teacher Margaret Eisenhauer asked students in her Ancient Epic class to put themselves in the shoes of former Acting U.S. Attorney General Sally Yates, who in January issued a legal statement against President Trump’s first travel ban and was fired within a day. “In the Iliad, we see men willing to fight [to the death]: for timê, for aretê, for kleos; for friendship, for kinship, for revenge,” Eisenhauer wrote in her assignment. “If you truly believe in something, you are willing to accept the costs. What are you willing to fight for?”

The students read and discussed Yates’s statement, and then wrote their own personal statements.

Outside the classroom, that travel ban, one of Trump’s first executive orders as president, caused mild panic on campus, where 25 percent of the student body is international and where more than one-tenth of the student body participates in study-abroad programs every year. The ban affected

34 I NMH Magazine

“

Try to keep moving from principles to action. We’ve all got principles, but it’s the action that’s invigorating.” two students directly, yet many more worried it could somehow limit their academic careers in the U.S. Hager says, “They were asking, ‘Who’s next? Am I not welcome in this country as an international student?’”

The travel ban also reverberated in NMH’s admission office. Dean of Enrollment Claude Anderson had to reassure parents of several prospective students from Mexico, who asked how safe their children would be at NMH. One family reported that their child was choosing between NMH and a school in Canada, which they felt would be a “friendlier place for international students,” Anderson says.

AS WINTER turned to spring and Trump established himself in the White House, students showed up at campus discussions about the travel ban and the Standing Rock protests in North Dakota, yet the overall feeling of political urgency waned. After Inauguration Day, Hunt says he tried to move on.

“I have to stay focused, do my job as a student, do well on the basketball court, make my family proud, because they sent me here for a reason,” he says.

“That’s the beauty and maybe the curse about teenagers — they compartmentalize,” Hager says. “They go to class, do their activities, apply to college.” What NMH can do for them, Neubert says, is “to keep coming back

to the school’s mission and ask, what groundwork are we laying for you? How are we empowering you to act with humanity and purpose?” Humanity and purpose, after all, don’t belong to only one political side.

For starters, Shea suggests that students write letters to government officials, sign a petition, attend a rally, or raise money for a cause they believe in.

“Democracy is not a spectator sport; it’s a day-to-day thing,” he says. “Figure out what your rights are and how you can protect them and exercise them … And try to keep moving from principles to action. We’ve all got principles, but it’s the action that’s invigorating.”

Halsey, who is 17, has an ambitious action in mind: She’s considering a run for the presidency in either 2034 or 2038. Her platform is still undeveloped, she says, but she wants to combat the tendency she sees in her peers to close themselves off from people who think differently than they do. She steers clear of aligning herself with a specific political party. “I don’t like the idea of playing for just one team,” she says. “I’m open to change.” [NMH]

Several dozen NMH students joined the Women’s March on Washington on Jan. 21, 2017.

WHEN AN ESTIMATED HALF-MILLION PEOPLE descended on the nation’s capital on Jan. 21 to participate in the Women’s March on Washington, 35 NMH students and more than a dozen faculty and staff members were there.

They carried signs that declared, “We ALL Can Do It” and “Fight Like a Girl.” They hung on the words of speakers that included Gloria Steinem, Angela Davis, and Sens. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois and Kamala Harris of California. They got to be “a part of history,” says faculty member Margaret van Baaren, who led the NMH group to Washington.

Grace Briggs ’19 had heard about the event from her mom, and signed up for the NMH trip because, she says, “The whole idea of marching for women’s rights — I thought that was over, that we were OK now, but I saw throughout the election that’s not really true. I want equality, so why not fight for it?”

Most of the NMH contingent paid their own way to ride an overnight bus to Washington, with several

PHO TO: SUZ AN N E C L E ME N T S

donations from parents and NMH employees funding students who couldn’t afford the travel.

One of the students’ favorite moments of the event was when feminist icon Gloria Steinem, who spoke at NMH last spring, took the stage early in the rally.

“Her visit to campus was what motivated me to start thinking differently about female-to-male issues,” says Zach Weiss ’18. He joined the trip because “with some of the themes of the Trump campaign, it seemed like people’s rights were being devalued. Even if you can’t change who is in the government, you can try to change what people view as OK or not OK.” It was a long day of marching, listening, cheering, and bus riding, but for Mia Flowers ’19, getting on the bus was a no-brainer decision. “As a woman and as a person of color, I feel like if I hadn’t gone, I would be subjecting myself to a world where I don’t have a say,” she says. “The march was a continuation of what I’m trying to do at NMH overall — be involved as much as possible.”

spring 2017 I 35

ALUMNI HALL

A L U M N I C O U N C IL PROFILE

W E N D Y A L D E R M AN C OH E N ’ 6 7

Hometown: Yarmouth Port, Massachusetts Education: Simmons College, bachelor’s in biology

New Boathouse on Deck Rowing is one of the few sports that teenagers can try for the first time in high school and end up on an elite college team just a few years later. That’s what happened for Tessa Gobbo ’09, who was introduced to rowing NMH rowers go on at NMH and went on to a 2013 to nationally ranked NCAA championship at Brown collegiate programs, including: and a gold medal in the 2016 University of Summer Olympics (“My Twin, the Pennsylvania Olympian,” Fall 2016).

Harvard University NMH rowing coaches will be University of Virginia better able to support studentBrown University athletes like Gobbo when the University of Michigan school opens a new boathouse on Syracuse University the Connecticut River. NMH has U.S. Naval Academy unveiled plans for a 7,000-squareWesleyan University foot facility to replace a 50-yearTufts University Northeastern old building that has long been University too small for the program it serves Rochester Institute today. NMH parents Rob and of Technology Michelle Smith (P’15, ’15, ’17, Princeton University ’19) have led fundraising for the project, giving $2.7 million toward an estimated cost of $6 million.

NMH offers competitive rowing in both fall and spring. Approximately 70 students

36 I NMH Magazine

participate, making it one of the school’s most popular sports. The current boathouse does not accommodate all the racing shells required by this number of rowers, nor does it have running water or full electrical service, or space for “erg” training, boat rigging, and team meetings.

Gobbo, who returned to campus last fall to talk about her Olympic experience with students, says, “I received a great education at NMH, and the school deserves to have a rowing facility that matches the quality of its program.”

The new facility will include a two-bay boathouse, new docks, and improved river access, with space for all of the team’s boats, as well as a large multipurpose room overlooking the river that can be used for indoor practices and special school and community events. The facility is expected to help draw top student rowers and strong coaching staff; it will also allow NMH to host more regattas.

“We have a thriving crew program and a beautiful river to row on,” says boys’ head coach David Reeder. “This new boathouse will link the two in spectacular fashion.”

Learn more at nmhschool.org/boathousestory.

RENDERING: ARCHITECTURE RESOURCES CAMBRIDGE

Profession: Retired high school/middle school science teacher, 34 years Volunteer positions at NMH: Reunion co-chair, 35 years; Reunion Advisory Committee, 2007–15; chair, 2010–15; Alumni Council secretary, 2015–present Why volunteer: NMH made a huge difference in my life, and my biology teacher (Jean Hatheway) had a major influence on my career.

Volunteering is a way to say thank you and help the school move forward. And I simply love the place.

Most satisfying Alumni Council experiences: Representing the Northfield School era as the council has grown in size, effectiveness, and influence; working with alums of all ages, and with outgoing council President Carrie Niederman ’78 — she’s been inspiring.

Secure your future ... and the future of NMH

FOUNDERS’ CHALLENGE

Donors Honor Moody In February, NMH’s second annual Founders’ Challenge raised more than $400,000 in four days, celebrating not only the birthday of school founder Dwight L. Moody, but also other NMH “founders” who have adopted the school’s “head, heart, and hand” philosophy to steer their own businesses.

Sam ’88 and Mariah Draper ’89 Calagione P’18 of Delaware — who more than 20 years ago established Dogfish Head Brewery, one of the fastest growing independent breweries in the U.S. — were this year’s Featured Founders. Their challenge: If 1,370 donors (to honor 137 years of school history) participated in giving to the NMH Fund, they, together with seven of the school’s youngest trustees, would collectively donate $137,000 themselves.

Success: The challenge attracted 2,078 participants, a 28 percent increase over last year. And the feel-good fundraising event didn’t just take place online; NMH hosted 15 Founders’ Fests that were attended by more than 600 people across North America, as well as a celebratory postchallenge event at Dogfish headquarters in Delaware.

By the Numbers

181

Number of donors making either their first gift or their first since their senior year

179 Number of parent and grandparent donors

277

Number of donors who graduated in the 1980s

219 Number of current students who donated

A charitable gift annuity gives you: • • • • •

Fixed lifelong payments Favorable annuity rates A secure investment Tax benefits A gratifying legacy

Sample rates based on a single life CGA* Age 68 73 78 83 Rate 4.9% 5.5% 6.4% 7.4%

Visit www.nmhschool.plannedgiving.org 2016–17 ALUMNI COUNCIL EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE www.nmhschool.org/ alumni-get-involved Caroline N. Niederman ’78 President Wendy Alderman Cohen ’67 Secretary Molly Goggins Talbot ’93 Vice-President

Carolyn “Ty” Bair Fox ’59 Nominating Committee Co-chair Tanya Luthi ’96 Nominating Committee Co-chair

Thomas Baxter ’59 Awards Committee Chair Stephen Green ’87 Reunion Advisory Committee Chair

Stuart Papp ’93 Strategic Advisory Committee Chair

Courtney Fields ’06 Tracy Korman ’81 Diversity Committee Co-chairs

Brendan Mysliwiec ’04 Advancement Committee Chair

Kate Hayes ’06 Young Alumni Committee Chair

or contact:

Jeff Leyden ’80, P’14

Director of Capital and Planned Giving 413-498-3299 jleyden@nmhschool.org

Sue Clough P’06, ’08

Senior Associate Director of Planned Giving 413-498-3084 sclough@nmhschool.org *Rates displayed are for illustrative purposes only.

PHOTOS: GLENN MINSHALL

spring 2017 I 37

PARTING WORDS

Fast Enough

Good company and 20-minute miles on the Pie Race course

by WILLEM LANGE ’53

Everything changes — or at least appears to — and the older we get, the more we feel the acceleration of the pace. But the two red-brick posts at the entrance to the long, pine-sheltered drive up to the Northfield Mount Hermon campus seem remarkably the same as when I first saw them in September 1950. A tiny stream runs under the drive just outside the posts. That first fall, my roommate and I — outsiders, both of us, living in the attic of a faculty house near Shadow Lake — discovered it was full of brook trout. That’s probably not true anymore, and if it is, I’m inclined these days to leave the fish alone.

Each year, when the school’s fall events calendar arrives, my eyes are drawn irresistibly to the date of the Pie Race. Like an old fire horse whose nostrils still flare at the sound of the alarm, I wonder if there’s another one left in me.

I ran it first as a sophomore, in 1950. A year later, as a junior varsity cross-country team member, I actually got second place. That was probably the high point of my life at Mount Hermon; the red-ribboned medal sits in a little box in my odds-and-ends drawer four feet away as I write. Senior year’s result wasn’t as notable; then life and raising a family intervened. I did return in 1977, on the 25th anniversary of my last run, and still won a pie. That winter my orthopedist decreed an end to my running, and a few years later began replacing joints and repairing bones

88 I NMH Magazine

in my legs. But none of that killed the urge, which remains strong.

When I heard from the school last fall that any old alums who even finished — let alone within a certain time — would win a pie, the die was cast.

I emailed the alumni office to let them know I was returning. They were probably thinking about a standby ambulance, but they couldn’t have been more welcoming.

The weather, too, was lovely, and the gazebos set up in front of the gym gave the event a festive atmosphere. A tall young man approached, introduced himself, and announced he’d be walking with me. Uh-oh. A minder.

“Wait a minute,” I said. “You have no idea how slow I am. It’ll drive you nuts.”

“That’s OK,” he assured me. “It’ll be fast enough, whatever it is.”

If I meet an NMH person anywhere in the world, I know something about him or her. Our shared experience, even though it may be separated by decades, engenders a mutual trust, and even an affection. I liked this kid immediately.

Estevan Velez was his name. Class of 2016, now a freshman at Amherst. On the cross-country and track teams and involved in a student-run EMT program. Aha! So that was it! But at least he wasn’t carrying an oxygen bottle.

The usual speeches. The gun went off, and so did we. The very serious runners, many of them alums, took off like a shot. I was encouraged to see there were plenty of walkers, too, but as we passed Crossley and then Wallace, I noticed that just keeping up with them

was about all my cane-assisted legs could manage.

Luckily, it was just legs, not lungs; so Estevan and I kept up a lively chatter all the way around. He wondered if the school was as I remembered it.

Essentially, yes, it was: still the emphasis on hands, head, and heart. But it was no longer “coed with a five-mile hyphen,” as we called it, which was a tremendous improvement. The place felt a lot happier now.

Each mile on the course was marked.

I’d been hoping for 15-minute miles, but managed instead only a steady 20.

It became obvious, as we turned at the far end of the course and headed back downhill toward the campus, that the watering stations were closing up shop after we passed.

I couldn’t believe Estevan’s cheerful patience as we broke out of the woods at Shadow Lake and headed into the last half-mile or so around Overtoun.

The race still ends today as it did when I first tackled it 66 years ago, with that lovely uphill to the gym and the waiting crowd. But there wasn’t any crowd; almost everybody’d gone home except the timers, the photographer, and the pie carriers. And the headmaster, who, along with his small daughter, Sofia, had come walking back along the course, looking for his two lost sheep and reminding me once again why I love the place so much. [NMH] Willem Lange is a writer, storyteller, radio commentator, and Emmy Awardwinning public-television host who lives in Montpelier, Vermont.

PHOTOS: COUR TESY OF WILLEM LANGE, NMH ARCHIVES, U.S. PATENT AND TRADEMARK OFFICE

GIVING BACK

The Mystery of Inventor Maximilian Hachita Maximilian Showzu Hachita of the Class of 1896 is among Northfield Mount Hermon’s more visible donors these days, despite the fact that he died nearly 50 years ago.

He’s also been one of the most surprising. While Hachita’s gift helped fund the new Bolger Center for Early Childhood Education, which opened last January, NMH had no idea it was named in his will until decades after his death.

Hachita was born in Sanuki, Japan, in 1875. He traveled as a young man to New York City, and, sponsored by missionaries, applied for admission to the Mount Hermon School for Boys in 1894, right around his 20th birthday. He had been working as a cook and seems to have struggled in life.

On his Mount Hermon application, one of the questions was, “Has the candidate shown an ambition to excel in anything?” The answer: “Nothing.” “Has he formed any purpose in life?” “Nothing.”

“Has he had bad companionships?” “Yes.” But Hachita knew more was possible. He was asked on another document, “What reason influenced you most in coming to Mount Hermon?” He answered, “to be wise and better.”

And during and after his Mount Hermon days, Hachita turned his life around. He went on to Lehigh University, where he graduated as the valedictorian. He became an engineer, settled in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, and in the 1920s, he invented and patented an apparatus used in the mining and treatment of coal.

He died just over 40 years later, in 1968. And here’s the mysterious part: Hachita had established a trust that included two beneficiaries; NMH, unbeknown to any school officials, was the second. After the first beneficiary died, NMH learned in late 2014 that it would receive a gift of $379,000 — to be used in any way that the board of trustees determined, as long as part of the gift served to recognize the Northfield School for Girls. Hachita’s wife, Daisy Ann Merriman Hachita, had graduated with the Class of 1896.

“Mr. Hachita’s gift demonstrates the impact that planned giving has on NMH,” says NMH Director of Capital and Planned Giving Jeff Leyden ’80. “This gift, established many years ago, has made a real difference for NMH today. Mr. Hachita understood the importance of paying it forward for generations to come.”

NMH

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RI S E UP Commencement morning, Thorndike Field, 2015 PHOTO: DORIS (YUNZHUO) ZHANG â&#x20AC;&#x2122;15