Tapping Into a Campus Treat

Trust us, there is no sweeter treat than some local Shattuck-St. Mary’s pure maple syrup.

Led by Director of Residential Life and Campus Naturalist John Blackmer, the maple trees behind the Dane Family Fieldhouse were transformed into sap-making-machines this spring. With the help of Mr. Blackmer’s ecology class and about a dozen adult volunteers, nearly 1,000 gallons of sap was collected from about 60 trees, to be turned into the sugary sweet condiment we know and love.

“From the first stages of tapping trees, to lugging buckets of sap through the woods, keeping the fire HOT in the evaporator for hours and hours, to the final boiling and bottling process in the servery, the entire process is very involved,” exclaimed staff volunteer Amy Cox ’94. “It is a busy few weeks, at complete mercy of Mother Nature, added to already full ‘boarding school life’ plates. But as the famous Midwesterner Laura Ingalls Wilder once said, “It’s the sweet, simple things of life which are the real ones after all”.

In the end, a dozen gallons of maple syrup were produced, ready to be bottled and enjoyed by the School community over pancakes, waffles, and even ice cream.

The Major Takes a Bite Out of the Big Apple

In April, members of The Major Center of Excellence shifted their classroom in lower Shumway to somewhere with more of an “Empire State of Mind”-to New York City that is.

As the locale of choice for their annual offcampus trip, students along with The Major Director Craig Peck and faculty chaperone Carrie Homuth spent a handful of days exploring the Big Apple, packing in both entertainment and education. They visited The Museum of Modern Art, The Museum of Natural History, the 9/11 Memorial Museum, and the Hayden Planetarium.

Additionally, they were able to tour the United Nations and meet with several executives at Morgan Stanley, who shared insight into the global economic system.

“We try to find a balance between fun and learning,” stated Craig. “Every year, I ask the students to schedule the main aspects of the trip and this gives them a sense of ownership. I also think it is important to actually see these places in person. The world becomes more real and less abstract.”

Maddy Katz ’23 agrees. “The best part about The Major is that we are able to choose to do whatever interests us most, and that definitely showed in our trip to NYC,” she shared. “Besides being able to do what I wanted to do most-a tour of the United Nations Headquarters-we were able to get to know more about each other by experiencing what others wanted to do, such as the three boys from Korea taking our group to eat authentic Korean food. Because of this, we all gained new perspectives and got to know each other in ways we can’t inside a classroom, and that was a really important part of what made this trip so memorable.”