Upper School News

FRESHMAN CHALLENGE

After a year hiatus, the Freshman Challenge overnight trip returned for the Maclay Class of 2025. The Freshman Challenge is a favorite tradition for 9th grade students who, along with their upperclass counselors spend two days playing games, acting out skits, and bonding as a class.

National Merit Scholars

Maclay School Seniors Kate Krizner, Collin Roberts, and Nirmay Bhanderi were named 2022 National Merit Semifinalists by the National Merit Scholarship Corporation.

Senior Social

Maclay seniors enjoyed the perfect cool night at the Fall BBQ social at Phipps Farm. The Class of 2022 enjoyed dinner, smores and a movie.

National Honor Society

Congratulations to our 40 new National Honor Society members who were inducted on December 9th in the Upper School lawn.

ICC Fair

The Interclub Council (ICC) Fair gave Upper School students a chance to explore and sign up for clubs to get involved in. Over 30 clubs and organizations from the Music Club, the Multicultural Club, Key Club, Green Club, and Coding were on hand for new memberships.

Honorable, Respectable, Accountable

New students and faculty in the Upper School came together for the annual Honor Signing ceremony, which was held in the Webster Center. The special speaker was Judge Stacy Paddack who spoke before each student signed the Book of Honor while Maclay musicians from all divisions performed.

Youngblood Named Teacher of the Year

Maclay’s Latin teacher, Kristen Youngblood was named the 2021 Classical Association of Florida Latin Teacher of the Year during the Florida Foreign Language Association’s Annual meeting in Jacksonville.

CAREER DAY

Maclay Upper School welcomed 16 parents, alumni, and friends of Maclay to campus in-person and virtually for the annual Career Day. Students chose three sessions to visit and hear from professionals who talked about their career path in the areas of law, nursing, technology, Google, the Air Force, engineering and many others. Notes from the Underground

PowerForward

Students in the Entrepreneurship class attending the inspirational PowerForward speaker series this year with Chris Gardner, self-made millionaire, entrepreneur, and international author of “The Pursuit of Happyness.”

COLLEGE COUNSELING RETREAT

Maclay College Counseling hosted the Junior Retreat, where our 11th graders had the opportunity to participate in an Admission Game activity presented by special guests Bob Rowe from Florida Institute of Technology and Joe Madigan from Florida Southern College. The juniors worked as a mock college admissions department and evaluated three applicants from a fictitious university to determine who to admit, who to waitlist, and who to deny. Once the files were reviewed and each team made their decisions, the students reconvened and presented their reasons for their decisions. The program taught students about the process of admissions, giving them a first-hand look at what colleges are looking for while reviewing applicants. In December, Dr. Beaven’s Creative Writing and Literary Publication class released the new 145-page Notes from the Underground (NFTU) – a compilation of short stories, poems, drawings, art, and photography. The publication includes pieces from not only Maclay students but contributors from across the world like an amazing young poet from Australia and two high school art students from Zimbabwe. Special to this issue is a section on the issue of human trafficking and domestic violence. Earlier this year, several NFTU editors met with victims of domestic abuse at a shelter in Tallahassee and encouraged them to tell their stories. Many of our contributors were also inspired by the resilience of these women and made works of art and literature that respond to this important topic.