News From Friends | Fall 2013

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NEWS FROM F R I E N DS FA L L 2 01 3

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A Language at Friends

Beardmaster (2009), Lauren Simkin Berke ’97

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s p ot l i g h t o n a lu m n i a rt

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Lauren Simkin Berke ’97 is a Brooklyn-based image maker and illustrator whose work appears in galleries, on book covers and in publications including the L.A. Times, The Boston Globe, and The New York Times. Beardmaster is part of a series of 61 small works titled Excavations and Adaptations, first exhibited at A.I.R. Gallery in 2009, and included in A FACE BOOK of Missed Connections, the magazine that combines a subset of these works with posts from Missed Connections section of Craigslist. The works in Excavations and Adaptations combine ink drawings, through the use of xerox transfer, with collage. The drawings are based on photographs, mostly found, some personal, with a few drawn from direct observation.  www.simkinberke.com

nf f features

departments 1 | Mission Statement

9 | Class of 2013 Commencement

2 | A Message from the Principal

13 | Found in Translation: Language at Friends

3 | Buzz on 16th Street

17 | Growing Old in the Ancient World at Friends Seminary by Philip Schwartz 20 | Alumni Profiles

6 | Notes on Silence 29 | Class Notes 44 | Tributes 47 | Back in the Day

Meredith Rahn Oakes ’08 | Anthony Shore ’85 Alicia Rubin Yamin ’83 & Jeremy Yamin ’83

25 | Reunion 2013

News from Friends is published by the Development Office at Friends Seminary two times each year for alumni, parents, grandparents and friends of the School. The mission of News from Friends is to feature the accomplishments of alumni, while capturing the School’s remarkable history, values and culture. Each issue will have an underlying theme, such as (but not limited to) the sciences, the arts, athletics, history, literature and service. Additionally, the magazine gives insight into recent events at Friends Seminary.

Editor Ernie Grigg Assistant Editor & Graphic Designer Anna Pipes

Photographers John Galayda, Johnathon Henninger, Chloe Aftel

Principal Robert “Bo” Lauder

Director of Alumni Relations Katherine Farrell

Director of Development Katherine Precht

Database Manager Valerie Delaine

Development & Special Events Assistant Kate Radlauer Director of Communications Ernie Grigg / John Galayda Director of Annual Giving Jenny Nichols

Graphic Designer & Communications Assistant Anna Pipes

our mission Friends Seminary educates students from kindergarten through twelfth grade, under the care of the New York Quarterly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends. Through instruction and example, students follow their curiosity and exercise their imaginations as they develop as scholars, artists and athletes. In a community that cultivates the intellect through keen observation, critical thinking and coherent expression, we strive to respond to one another, valuing the single voice as well as the effort to reach consensus. The disciplines of silence, study and service provide the matrix for growth: silence opens us to change; study helps us to know the world; service challenges us to put our values into practice. At Friends Seminary, education occurs within the context of the Quaker belief in the Inner Light – that of God in every person. “Guided by the ideals of integrity, peace, equality and simplicity, and by our commitment to diversity, we do more than prepare students for the world that is: we help them bring about the world that ought to be.”*

* This last sentence is adapted from Faith and Practice: The Book of Discipline of the New York Yearly Meeting of the Religious Society of Friends (1974).

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a message from the principal

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n essence, education is preparation. We teach our students to apply knowledge and experience outside of the classroom.

Even though we have a good idea about how they will use that knowledge, we can’t always predict how our lessons will serve students later in life. For me, that makes the learning process even more exciting. Encountering alumni and hearing how our School has impacted them is one of the signal pleasures of heading a school.

Flipping through the Found in Translation issue, I’m reminded that only our imaginations limit the possibilities of a good education. Our Modern and Classical Languages Department has added Mandarin to connect students with a culture that exists not just on the other side of the world, but a few blocks away in Chinatown.

Additionally, Philip Schwartz writes about how studying the classics offers insights for a lifetime.

Language can be a unifier —allowing us to communicate with and learn from a rich variety of experiences and points of view. It can also serve as preparation for challenges and opportunities that we haven’t yet considered. That’s why we’ve committed so many institutional resources to language and culture in recent years.

Friends alumni are proof of the boundless possibilities that come from learning a new language. A Fulbright scholar picked up Turkish to help refugees in Istanbul.

A professional “namer” plays with the meanings and roots of words to distinguish products and companies. A security expert learned Spanish because he fell in love and followed a career path that took his family from South America all the way to Tanzania.

On the following pages, you will also read about other members of the Friends community who have recently celebrated accomplishments and maybe even suffered a few setbacks. In every case, they have grown in some significant way, and I hope you join me in recognizing their milestones.

In every language, I wish you all the best,

Robert "Bo" Lauder Principal

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Buzz on 16th Street

Visited April 17 Vivian Rosenthal ’94 spoke to Upper School students about the expanding career opportunities in technology and her own start-up SNAPS!, an app that allows users to add virtual content to photos. April 23 Children’s book author David A. Adler, best known for his Cam Jansen mystery series, paid a visit to Friends thanks to the Elizabeth Claster ’79 Library Fund. After an interview with a group of

Gabriella Ansah ’09

Vivian Rosenthal ’94

Liz Suda

Lower School students, he spoke in the Library about his writing process. Listen to the interview at http://bit. ly/123GLnK. May 15 After an introdution from Lizzy Weiss ’12, entrepreneur and activist Liz Suda spoke to Upper School students about founding peaceBOMB, a project that takes American bombs dropped during the Secret War in Laos, crafts the metal into handmade jewelry and uses the proceeds from sales to support the development of communities in Laos. May 15 Two education delegates from China, Dian Du, Coordinator of U.S. Exchange Programs and Daniel Wang, Management Committee Member at Beijing No. 4 High School International Campus, visited Friends to research the development

top Friends

faculty with education delegates from China, Dian Du, Coordinator of U.S. Exchange Programs and Daniel Wang bottom David A. Adler with Lower School students

of collaborative educational programs at the K-12 schools they represent in China. May 17 Gabriella Ansah ’09 gave a talk titled No Bed of Rhodanthions: A Study of Roman Marriage through Inscription at the

Latin Colloquium at Reunion 2013. May 22 Finn Kelly ’91 shared with Upper School students his personal story and an introduction to The Go Game, a location-based team-building game.

Alumni Events April 4 Alumni volunteers gathered at the Cosmopolitan Club for a “thank you” reception hosted by Edes Powell Gilbert ’49, Liz Peale Allen ’60 and Sandra Jelin Plouffe ’93. April 10 The Alumni Council partnered with Sidwell Friends School for a

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professional networking session open to alumni from both schools.

Alumni participated in a speed-networking activity with the Empire State Building as a backdrop thanks to host, Alumni Council Clerk Jordan Barowitz ’89. April 11 the Class of 2013 received a

2013 Art of Teaching April 3 Lower School teacher Courtney Retzler presented the 2013 Art of Teaching Lecture in the Library.

In her talk, The Wonder of Metamorphosis: Monarch Butterflies and the Minds of Children, she discussed her curriculum which is based on the life cycle, metamorphosis and migration of the Monarch butterfly.

Legal Lessons April 24 Michael Bachrach ’92 visited Charlie Blank’s Law class to share his experience with capital defense cases. May 1 Heidi Reavis ’77, a partner at Reavis Parent Lehrer LLP, also visited Charlie's class to talk to students about discrimination in the workplace and employment law. She also lead a workshop for administrators earlier in the year. May 6 Peter Nichols ’74, an entertainment lawyer visiting from Los Angeles, took time to meet with students and offer advice about careers in the entertainment industry. May 21 Melissa Crane ’82, who was elected to the New York City Civil Court in November 2012, visited Charlie's class to talk about how she became a judge and her work on the bench.

Wylie Dufresne ’88 (center) with his former teachers Ben Frisch (left) and Faculty Emeritus Charlie Blank (right).

Demonstrated May 9 Wylie Dufresne ’88, chef and owner of WD-50 on the Lower East Side and Alder in the East Village gave a hands-on demonstration of his chemistry-derived cooking methods to an audience of Upper School students and faculty in the School's new cafeteria. The audience then enjoyed a poached egg with an edible man-made shell created with an immersion circulator, balloons and a vacuum pressurizer. May 17 Paul Allersmeyer ’55 and Susan Allersmeyer Foster ’63 visited Judy Adams Anderson’s ’66 kindergarten classroom for balloon-designing fun.

Reading

Heidi Reavis ’77

surprise celebration marking their remaining 60 days as students at Friends. A group of alumni spanning five decades welcomed them to the alumni community and shared red velvet cupcakes baked

by Indira Wiegand ’89. April 20 Alumni and their families joined Upper School students for a day of service.

March 4 Author Susan Sachs Goldman visited the Friends library to read from her book, Friends in Deed: The Story of Quaker Social Reform in America.

Susan, who is a parent of Sidwell Friends alumni, spoke to an audience of both Friends Seminary and Sidwell Friends community members.

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a Have you seen these

lost alums?

Charles Blitzer ’44 Rano Bourgeois ’44 Suzanne Solomon de Brantes ’44 Nina Ruth Mori ’44 Frederick M. Peyser ’44 Peter Rigney ’44 Stephen Benjamin ’49 Florence Stoneman Herd-Smith ’49 Bradley L. Jacobs ’49 Sally-Ann Palen Pontier ’49 Barbara Barling Rangel ’49 Phoebe Wolfe Vance ’49 Rod Young ’49 Sarah Cooke Burke ’54 Roger N. Greene ’54 Terry Stokes ’54 Helen Schelkoff Strickler ’54 Frederick Walz ’54 Joan Arnold ’59 Ann Bayer ’59 Edwina Ross Besthoff ’59 Cricket Cornell ’59 Larry Hunt ’59 Peter Laqueur ’59 David Leidesdorf ’59 Janet McVeigh ’59 Ann Russell Sammis ’59 Margaret Worthington ’59 Peter Benet ’64 Jonathan Cerf ’64 Irene Chang ’64 Michael Doyle ’64 Elizabeth P. Eames ’64 Jane Ellen Gelfand ’64 Susan Hayes ’64 Judith Hudson ’64 Stephen Kende ’64

Jacqueline Lea ’64 Philip Mendlow ’64 Jonathan Prude ’64 Paul S. Richardson ’64 Nancy Sutherland ’64 Douglas Wally ’64 Mark Altemus ’69 Frances Stead Braine ’69 Gael Doar ’69 Debbie Frame ’69 Laurie Harth ’69 Patrick R. Johnson ’69 Jeanne Mahoney ’69 Lynn Zeiger ’69 Anthony Marc Abraham ’74 Geoffrey H. Braine ’74 Daniel Duchovny ’74 Jonathan Duffy ’74 Diane Perlmuth Gern ’74 Laurence J. Parker ’74 Linda Simmons ’74 Margot Simmons ’74 Daryl M. Turner ’74 Richard P. Anthony ’79 Megan Bucci Breuning ’79 Matthew Kaufman ’79 Tony Kono ’79 Ilene Ng ’79 Nicholas Philip ’79 Adam Rodriguez ’79 Kelly Ryan ’79 Theodore Shulman ’79 Kathleen Weaver ’79 Susan Zimmerman ’79 Gail E. Bain ’84 Christopher Day ’84 Nick Edelson ’84

Mark Koyama ’84 Susan Tanenbaum Leon ’84 April Lerner ’84 Sara Flynn Murphy ’84 Domingo Ramos ’84 Philip Ross ’84 Joanna Ross ’84 Edward Smith ’84 Ashley H. Vernon ’84 Melissa Emily Zarem ’84 Tracy L. Charters ’89 Eniko S. Ferenc ’89 Jonathan P. Flaum ’89 Alison R. Friedman ’89 Audrey B. Kasindorf ’89 Jennifer Kochenthal ’89 Jan E. Lethen ’89 Jonathan C. Metzler ’89 Joanna G. Morehead ’89 Lisa Schottenfeld Pillette ’89 Emily Poler ’89 Matthew J. Reiss ’89 Ariel J. Roland ’89 Stacey A. Schaffer ’89 Rebecca A. Schraffenberger ’89 Mohm P. Sheehy ’89 Aaron C. Traub ’89 Deborah Wallis ’89 Roxanne Wolanczyk ’89 Elizabeth Berlinger ’94 Rahim Bost ’94 Rebecca Cohen ’94 Rebecca Cross ’94 Blake Elinson ’94 Sara Michelle Elnahal ’94 Sarah Jenny Goldoff ’94 Erik Hartman ’94 Cabell Hatfield ’94 Anya Riva Hurwitz ’94 Tysan Sara Lerner ’94 Georgia Elizabeth Lindahl ’94 Alexis Lucente ’94 Cary-Paul McBee ’94 Eleonor Lang Pigman ’94 Mark Andrew Poons ’94 Benjamin Aaron Roschke ’94 Benjamin Tarr Rosenblum ’94 Adina Soffer-Reihan ’94 Julien Baumrin ’99

Joshua M. Bender ’99 Lucy Childress ’99 Erica N. Eber ’99 Danielle Goldstein ’99 Benjamin Golombek ’99 Matthew Hedge ’99 Colette James ’99 Lindsay Key ’99 Cerrone Lundy ’99 Jeremy Lusk ’99 Clementine Mallet ’99 Christian Niedan ’99 Katherine Schafer ’99 Erik Schafer ’99 Morgan Solomon ’99 Jessica Wildman ’99 Andrew Willmore ’99 Jacob Wolper-Gosler ’99 Deborah Aguirre ’04 Philip Binioris ’04 Hayley Blatte ’04 Jake Bluttal ’04 Jennifer Conrad ’04 Alex Drlica-Wagner ’04 Katharine Goldstein ’04 Aidan Gould ’04 Misha Greenberg ’04 Chloe Guttridge ’04 Tiffany Hickman ’04 Moira Kerrigan ’04 John Koenigsberg ’04 Elizabeth Kolleeny ’04 Eva Kuhn ’04 Andre Mayers ’04 Matt Monness ’04 Christopher Perretta ’04 Truan Savage ’04 Jaya Saxena ’04 Charlie Wood ’04 Sarah Yesko ’04 Nathaniel Black ’09 Clayton Fujimura ’09 Diego Laurenti ’09 Misha Naiman ’09 Schuyler Quinn ’09 Stephen Rutishauser ’09 Emma A. Weinstein ’09

If you have any contact info for any of these alumnus, please call Katherine Farrell in the Alumni Office at 212.979.5035 ext. 106 email kfarrell@friendsseminary.org.

notes on silence

The Sounds of Silence

by NALEDI SEMELA ’06

Illustration by Michelle Lorenzutti

F

rom my earliest days, silence has been far from the first word associated with me. I’ve always been a talker; I talk with my closest friends over the phone, I talk to strangers on the street—I even talk to dogs and babies as if they can understand me. When I’m not talking (which is rare), I’m most likely listening to or making music of some kind. This was true before my arrival at Friends Seminary in the seventh grade, and it has been mostly true since my graduation in 2006.

That said, attending something called Meeting for Worship consistently for the six years that I was a student at Friends has had subtle and profound effects on me. I was a commuter in those days as I am now. My ride to school from Queens was long, but I was fortunate to be able to ride the trains (and bus) with a couple of my classmates from the same neighborhood. Needless to say, silence was not a big part of that routine. Homework, yes. Jokes, always. We didn’t need to squeeze silence out of these moments, but then, we knew we had silence coming up once we reached the School building.

I’m by myself as I commute to the Upper East Side these mornings from Brooklyn, and every once in a while, I stop myself from pressing play on my mp3 player and think: Maybe this morning I will have my own little Meeting for Worship as I fortify my

mind and soul for another day’s work.

Maybe I will close my eyes for just a second, and it will be as if I were back in the Meetinghouse taking a deep breath before AP Statistics or the inevitable notso-surprise pop quiz on Shakespeare in John Byrne’s English class. Mass transit ought to be as perfect a place for Meeting for Worship as any. After all, Simon and Garfunkel did say in “The Sounds of Silence” that “the words of the prophets are written on the subway walls.”

In the Meetinghouse, just as on the subway, there is never absolute silence.

Maybe there is a cough or a sneeze during allergy season, there is the sound of thumbs clicking buttons on a mobile device that goes undetected by faculty, and maybe someone will stand and be moved to say something insightful.

These sounds remind us that we are not alone though we are free to perceive these moments in a personal and unique way, silently.

As kids, some of us were anxious during Morning Meeting. Some of us wished we had the extra minutes to cram for tests or work on calculus problem sets. Others wished we just had the extra time to sleep before coming to school.

But I think we can all appreciate, especially looking back, that it was not time wasted. In silence, one has the opportunity to explore oneself. One may reflect on current events or on the architecture of the space one inhabits. One can, as many of us do, sit and watch without reproach as others engage in these same reflective exercises. That may be something we miss, or it may be something that we take with us even after Morning Meetings are behind us.

I’m still a talker, a whistler, a constant iPod listener—I am all the things I have been since high school. But I am also still a Friends kid, and I cherish my little Meeting for Worships where I find time and space for them.

Naledi Sean Semela ’06 currently works at The Spence School as the Communications Coordinator. After graduating from Colgate University in 2010 with a Bachelor’s in Art History, he spent a year traveling in southern Africa. He briefly worked with the NBA and NBA Africa offices on the 2011 Basketball Without Borders camp in Johannesburg, South Africa. He is a Class Agent for the Class of 2006, continuing the work he started as an Ambassador while a student at Friends.

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Congratulations, Class of

20 13 Commencement June 10, 2013

Faculty Commencement Address College Destinations By the Numbers

“Lifers� 2000-2013 9 | nff

Student speakers Ian Garland, Chelsea Ettlinger, Christian Hoyos, Rosa Shipley, Peter Frisch, Isabeaux Mitton

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Class of 2013

Faculty commencement Address

Christopher Doire The following is an excerpt from the English teacher’s commencement address:

T

here’s a section in Walden in which Henry David Thoreau discusses the promise of formal education. You may remember that Thoreau’s book is about the two years he spent in the 1840s in a house he built himself by Walden Pond in Massachusetts. He built his own house and he eked out a living subsistence farming, and at the outset of his book he’s careful to show that he made a tiny profit in those years, even accounting for the cost of the materials he used to build his house. Not that those materials cost him much — about $28, or about $700 in today’s money. Thoreau goes on to consider the rooming cost at his alma mater, Harvard College, which was $30 a year then, and concludes that students would get a more comprehensive education for less money if they built their own residences!

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Thoreau puts his reasoning thus: The student who secures his coveted leisure and retirement by systematically shirking any labor necessary to man obtains but an ignoble and unprofitable leisure, defrauding himself of the experience which alone can make leisure fruitful.

“But,” says one, “you do not mean that the students should go to work with their hands instead of their heads?” I do not mean that exactly, but I mean something which he might think a good deal like that; I mean that they should not play life, or study it merely, while the community supports them at this expensive game, but earnestly live it from beginning to end… Which would have advanced the most at the end of a month—the boy who had made his own jackknife from the ore which he had dug and smelted, reading as much as would be necessary for this—or the boy who had attended the lectures on metallurgy at the Institute in the mean while, and had received a Rogers’ penknife from his father?

Not that Thoreau was against formal education; he asks only that education be useful. Thoreau’s practice of simplicity and the integrity of his way of life are examples that resonate with the values of a Quaker school community, particularly one with a commitment to experiential education.

The disconnection between formal education and living might not be wholly a thing of the past, however. Today, Thoreau’s alma mater offers 48 different areas of concentration, from African and African-American Studies to Visual and Environmental Studies. Students go there with a wide variety of interests.

Yet before the economic crisis, as many as 40 percent of a single Harvard graduating class (that of 2008) flocked to jobs in consulting or financial services. Only half of them would have made the same career choice if money were not an issue, but half wouldn’t, according to a survey of those graduates in the Crimson newspaper. But of course: the money is good!

I myself was akin to that latter half, as I studied postmodern literature and literary theory in college and graduate school and then promptly found myself a job at a big hedge fund. I stayed in finance for nearly a decade, much to the surprise of many people who knew me, especially to the surprise of the people who knew me better than I knew myself; and who, when I at last resigned from my job to go into teaching, wondered only, “what took you so long?” I know a lot of people who, on the recommendation of their degrees, very easily found jobs on career paths that, however, didn’t bring them the happiness or deep satisfaction they were looking for. (I do also know some consultants and financiers who wouldn’t be happier doing any other work. My concern here is the way in which people often find themselves freely choosing to do things, whatever the field, that they might have known they wouldn’t ultimately find to be fulfilling.)

Thoreau’s two knife owners seem to have this in common, that they know

what they want, even if they have different approaches to getting it. But elsewhere in Walden, Thoreau shows how deeply he understands that this kind of self-knowledge can be hard to come by. Bill McKibben, thinking about our contemporary way of life, says that Thoreau “posed the two intensely practical questions that must come to dominate this age … How much is enough? and How do I know what I want?” The latter question is echoed by the title character of Ellison’s Invisible Man, alone in the big city after his college years are over, when he enjoys, intensely and in a way that would have been anathema to his social aspirations, a baked yam with melted butter. He realizes that he doesn’t even know himself well enough to tell in some cases whether he really likes or dislikes something or has been tricked into thinking he does. He wonders about all that he’s lost because he unthinkingly follows the paths prescribed for him by others. It’s no wonder that this novel resonates with so many teenagers who find themselves in the middle of their own journeys of self-discovery, acutely feeling the anxieties that come with it.

One freshman expressed that anxiety recently with a portrait of herself as Sleeping Beauty, who, as this student pointed out, sleeps her way through the story that is supposed to be about her!

I trust that your Friends education has given you in plenitude the skills and knowledge that you will need to succeed in this world. I have witnessed the fruits of that gift in the four years you’ve been Upper Schoolers, writing papers, creating short films, songs, poems, and plays; performing the works of Shakespeare, Miller, Porter, and Mingus, among others, with passion, commitment, and excellence; painting and sculpting; building robots and

Thoreau asks only that education be useful ... Simplicity and the integrity of his way of life are examples that resonate with the values of a Quaker school. competing in sports championships; conducting scientific studies and experiments; demonstrating social and political engagement. You’re off to terrific schools and will be able to achieve great things. In the process you will at times be faced with the questions, “How much is enough, and how do I know what I want?” Part of the value of your Friends education lies in the way it will have given you the mindfulness to ask, and the tools with which to answer, those questions for yourselves. Only by answering them will you not sleepwalk through your own lives, but earnestly live them to the end.

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class of 2013 from left to right Kevin Alters | School of Visual Arts Emery Andrew | Gettysburg College Brian Arroyo | Harvard College Alexander Bactat | George Washington University Kaleigh Balken | Skidmore College Quinn Batten | Carleton College Noah Beckwith | Rhode Island School of Design Nicole Bennett | Skidmore College Sonia Brozak | Washington & Lee University Olivia Creamer | New York University Olivia Daddi | Smith College Andy Deng | Princeton University Hannah Eisner | Wesleyan University Audrey Engelman | Elon University Kevin Ensuncho | Baruch College, CUNY Chelsea Ettlinger | Oberlin College Gregory Fauerbach | New York University Lindsey Feinstein | Vanderbilt University Eve Felsenthal | Reed College Elise Ferguson | Vassar College Simone Fillion-Raff | McGill University Max Friedlich | Wesleyan University Peter Frisch | Brown University

college destinations 64 seniors applied to college...

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123

different colleges accepted them

Where in the world will they go?

19 12 will stay in New York State

will attend college in the Mid Atlantic

15

5

will go will head to New to the England West Coast

5

5

will go will go to the down Midwest South

3

will leave the U.S. [Canada & Scotland]

Ian Garland | George Washington University Alexander Gillah | University of St. Andrews Perry Goodman | Cornell University Antione Gray | University of Pennsylvania Alexandra Hale | University of Chicago Perri Haser | Dartmouth College Christian Hoyos | Williams College Sophie Kasakove | Brown University Devon Kasarjian | University of Vermont Jordan Kasarjian | University of Vermont Aren Lawton | Ithaca College Noah Lesko-Kanowitz | Pomona College Ethan Levenson | Bard College Heidi Loening | Reed College Anna Mairs | Mount Allison University Matthew Maitland | Dickinson College Evelyn Mandel | Smith College Shivanii Manglani | Emory University Emily Margolis | Franklin & Marshall College Ross Mechanic | University of Pennsylvania Isabeaux Mitton | New York University Aqil Nabi | Colgate University Jordan O’Neil | College at Geneseo, SUNY Deniz Oncu | New York University Alexandra Pauly | Bennington College Cooper Pillot | Tulane University Max Redinger | Syracuse University Molly Revenson | New York University James Richardson | Bucknell University Bella Rubinton | Binghamton University, SUNY Benjamin Ruskin | Tufts University Mia Samuels | Franklin & Marshall College Lucas Sandtroen | Pitzer College Isadora Schappell-Spillman | Wesleyan University Rosa Shipley | Kenyon College Stefanos Tai | Savannah College of Art & Design Amina Theis | Skidmore College Dyulani Thomas | Case Western Reserve University Ruvianne Torres Fetsco | San Francisco Art Institute Michaela Unger | Brandeis University Aja Watkins | Syracuse University

Skidmore College received the most applications—15 in total

NYU

accepted the most Friends students—8 in total

83%

were admitted to their first, second or third choice college

55%

of the class received merit scholarships ranging from $500 to total cost of attendance

39%

will head off to college with at least one Friends peer

{

Brown University • Franklin & Marshall College • George Washington University • New York University • University of Pennsylvania • Reed College • Skidmore College • Syracuse University • University of Vermont • Wesleyan University

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found

IN TRANS路LA路TION

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language at friends

Study Spanish, and you can order coffee in Santo Domingo or Washington Heights. Chinese lessons will help you get directions in Beijing or Chinatown.

Become fluent in Sanskrit, and raise your IQ … Hang on. What was that last part?

In the past decade, researchers have discovered that the benefits of speaking multiple languages extend far beyond enhancing your communication abilities. It turns out that being bilingual improves cognitive skills unrelated to language and even slows down the brain’s aging process.

For most of the 20th century, experts thought that a second language delayed a child’s academic and intellectual development. To some extent, this is true.

Multiple languages can cause interference in the brain.

However, researchers are finding that competing mental systems actually create positive results by helping the brain resolve internal conflicts. Think of it as learning to swim against a strong current. You would swim in calm waters with relative ease.

Multilingual communication improves the brain’s executive function—the command system that ignores distractions and switches attention between tasks without forgetting important information. The positive effects appear from infancy to old age. While children develop complex problem-solving skills, elderly bilingual speakers show resistance to onset dementia and other symptoms of Alzheimer’s. The best part is that it doesn’t seem to matter when the speaker learns the second language.

At Friends, language has always been an important facet of the curriculum. Students not only build a cognitive intelligence, but they also learn to put value on the voices and views of every person. When communication barriers break down, consensus will follow.

Students receive language instruction in every division. Lower Schoolers take Spanish beginning in Kindergarten. Fourth Graders have the opportunity to study Spanish, French, Arabic, and Chinese before choosing to pursue one language in depth in Middle School. Latin is a required course for Seventh and Eighth Graders, and students may continue throughout their Upper School careers.

Those learning the commonly used languages become fully immersed in the culture. “There is no better way to be a cultural ambassador than to learn the language spoken in a country other than one’s own,” said Micah Morris, Head ofthe Modern and Classical Languages Department. “The acquisition of a second language is the ultimate gesture of friendship to the world.”

Latin scholars of all ages may not have many opportunities to practice skills with street vendors or dry cleaners—except for maybe in the Vatican—but their expanded knowledge opens other doors almost every day.

“The Latin curriculum provides an opportunity to study both language and literature. Students read original literature, compose formal explications, and complete projects designed to draw connections between their lives and those of the lives of ancient peoples. The pleasure of studying a classical language is to penetrate a magnificent realm—to understand human thought and to discover the past in the present,” Micah said.

Regardless of whether you want to increase brainpower, visit a foreign country or immerse yourself in classic poetry and prose, studying languages will help you exercise your imagination and move us one step closer to “the world that ought to be.”

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Chinese at Friends The Modern & Classical Languages Department is expanding its vocabulary.

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Friends expanded its language offerings again with the introduction of Chinese language in the 2012–2013 school year.

This new addition is part of the School’s continuing effort to give students a complete picture of the world outside of 16th Street.

Knowledge of Chinese does more than just allow communication with one-seventh of the world’s population (see sidebar on next page). “Chinese characters are still used in Korean and Japanese writing, so learning Chinese and Chinese culture is a great first step in understanding the whole of East Asian civilization, history and culture,” said Chinese teacher, Mia Huang.

Despite the benefits, native English

speakers typically find the transition to Chinese jarring. Rather than group together letters to form sounds, the written language is based on ideograms, which are characters that symbolize concepts. Lower and Middle School students enjoy this visual element to Chinese. They get to learn a new language by drawing pictures.

On top of the new approach to writing, Chinese students have to learn four different tones of pronunciation.

Beginners tend to have trouble both picking out and making the tones, so students come prepared to train their ears and their tongues.

Upper School students practice their new language skills inside and outside

language at friends

the classroom. Working around a 12-hour time difference, Mia’s students use Skype to videoconference with native speakers in Taipei, Taiwan, where she grew up. Classes also have to use Chinese to shop and eat during an annual daytrip to Chinatown.

Additionally, Mia holds karaoke sessions in her class. “Not only does it expose students

Top 5 Languages By native speakers by percent of world population.

to Chinese pop culture, but karaoke forces them to read and speak quickly,” she said.

As daunting as it may seem to study a language and culture that literally focuses on the other side of the world, Mia sees other value in studying Chinese. “For example, reading ideograms helps designers think visually, and hearing a tonal language helps with pitch in music,” she said. “You don’t have to excel in Chinese to train your brain in new ways.”

Lifetime Learners

Our faculty tackle ambitious language projects.

Anna Swank-Bothwell, Arabic In the 2013-14 school year, Friends will expand its Arabic program into the Middle School. Having never taught students as young as Grade 5, Arabic teacher, Anna found that preparing a curriculum was not as easy as she had hoped. “There is a real paucity of pedagogical materials for that age,” she said. “So I decided, why not create them myself?” Anna used a Third Century Grant to travel to Lebanon for some initial work on her curriculum. She will try out her new materials this year, and with any luck, she’ll have an early draft of a textbook by summer 2014.

Christel Johnson, Latin Christel Johnson will be this year's Art of Teaching lecturer. During her 10-year tenure at Friends, Christel has completed her PhD while teaching full-time and

has presented at numerous professional conferences. She is also the architect of the annual Classics Colloquium here at Friends.

Eric Quiñones, Spanish Eric is taking a sabbatical for the 20132014 School year to finish his PhD in Spanish Literature. His doctoral dissertation focuses mainly on the little-known Puerto Rican poet, José de Jesús Domínguez. “Some of the poetry had been lost for a very long time,” Eric said. “It was my job to find it.” The rediscovered works reflect different styles and provide a window into a similar phenomenon in the plastic arts and architecture of late 19th century Puerto Rico. Eric’s work on the artistic effects of new economic models and technologies should bring a new perspective to his work in the classroom.

CHINESE 14.1% 955 million SPANISH 5.85 % 407 million ENGLISH 5.52% 359 million HINDI 4.46% 311 million ARABIC 4.23% 293 million

What’s an ideogram? ideo·gram a written character symbolizing the idea of a thing without indicating the sounds used to say it.

III



Roman numeral for three

No smoking sign

土

Chinese character for earth

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language at friends

Growing Old in the

Ancient World at

Friends Seminary

PHILIP SCHWARTZ English and Latin teacher at Friends for 48 years reflects on the classics.

A recently published remembrance of Calvert Watkins, (1933-2013), Friends Seminary Class of 1950 and the world’s most distinguished Indo-European linguist of the present century, traces his teachers all the way back to Ferdinand de Saussure, the most distinguished linguist of the 19th century.* This academic genealogy reminded me that education is a traditional craft. We “hand down” influences from our teachers and their teachers before them, and so on.

We are the progeny then not only of our biological parents, but also of our academic “parents.” On the “English side” I can trace my ancestry back through Wayne Booth to R.S. Crane; in modern literature and in Anglo-Saxon to C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkein; on the Classical side, back to Cedric Whitman.

When I think about it, it is exhilarating to teach not only Latin and Greek, but also these influences that stretch back into the past.

After 20 years of teaching English and another 16 teaching Latin and Greek, I thought it would be appropriate to be trained as a classicist. I applied to the

City University of New York. They made me take the “grad record” exams again—the first time was in 1958. Forty-seven years later, I earned the same score in the math section – 390. Somewhat higher, however, in the verbal. Then, taking one course a term, alternating between Latin and Greek topics, I spent eight years earning another degree. Curiously enough, I wrote my master’s essay about a man coming to terms with old age.

••• Let’s set the chronological sequence of prophecies in the Oedipus myth straight.

First: Oedipus the King had a childhood with issues: because of the prophecy about marrying his mother and killing his father, his parents, the king and queen of Thebes, Laius and Jocasta, wanted him dead, etc., etc. Abandoned, he finds foster parents, who happen to be the king and queen of Corinth. He runs away from home again, fleeing the prophecy; road-rage at the intersection, then riddle-solving, winning throne and queen as rewards, learning identity, terrible deeds ending in eyegouging, blindness and exile.

* Please see page 40 for a tribute to Calvert Watkins ’50.

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The second part of the sequence is Aeschylus’ account of the sons/halfbrothers of Oedipus contending for the throne in Seven Against Thebes, and finally Sophocles’ Antigone, the daughter/halfsister, who defies the civic authorities to bury her renegade brother, after both her brothers, Eteocles and Polynices, die in the assault on Thebes.

The plot of Oedipus at Colonus is that Polynices and Eteocles, the sons and halfbrothers, are more interested in acquiring temporal power than abiding by the nomos custom, that we have an obligation to care for aging parents. Now it turns out that the genesis of the Theban generational conflict is another Delphic prophecy: namely, that

O

nly the very young and the very old hold on to the bannister when we walk up and down stairs.

the political party, either of Polynices or of Eteocles, that brings Oedipus back so he can be buried near Thebes will attain the throne. Each son, in effect, tries to “con” his father into returning to Thebes. However, Ismene, Oedipus’ other daughter/halfsister, has found her father and revealed the motives behind the feigned parental concern of Eteocles and Polynices.

The custom of caring for parents seems to go back to Homer. He has a word for this custom: threptra—repaying the nurture of your parents, a nurture that to the ancient world engendered a profound obligation.

Hesiod, roughly a contemporary of Homer and a fairly cranky author, is concerned about people disregarding this nomos, but he is quite clear about its importance— “humans will dishonor their parents as they grow old, blame them with bitter words… they will not repay their parents for the cost of their nurture.” (Works and Days: 185-188).

In Athens, however, this obligation was so important that it was the law from the time of the great lawgiver and poet, Solon.

For the Greeks, the proper geometry of life seems to dictate that children become the caretakers and nurturers of their aged parents. The persona/narrator of

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the Iliad has this epitaph about a young warrior killed in battle: “but he could not repay again the care of his dear parents.”

(Homer, Iliad: IV: 477; XVII: 302) There is a Sophoclean summation of this Greek ethos about the care of parents. It is the Ismene Rule: “If it is hard work to care for parents, we must not complain about it.” (Sophocles: Oedipus at Colonus: 508) In this custom we discover the present in the past and the past in the present. Surely, the Greeks understood that, in fact, we do become the nurturers and caregivers for our parents. It is a universal obligation of life; all of us pass over this threshold.

In fact, old age generally was held in some reverence in the ancient world,

perhaps because the life expectancy was so short. Remember garrulous old Nestor in the Iliad speaking often to the Greek Joint Chiefs of Staff, usually geriatric autobiography, but always allowed to speak first and listened to attentively.

Cicero claims, taking his cue from the Greeks: “Sophocles composed tragedies to extreme old age; and when, because of his absorption in literary work, he was thought to be neglecting his business affairs, his sons hauled him into court in order to secure a verdict removing him from the control of his property on the ground of imbecility, under a law similar to ours, whereby it is customary to restrain heads of families from wasting their estates.

Thereupon, it is said, the old man read to the jury his play, Oedipus at Colonus, which he had just written and was revising, and inquired: “Does that poem seem to you to be the work of an imbecile?” When he had finished, he was acquitted. (De Senectute: VII) ••• So perhaps there is some palpable connection between my studying old age in Ancient Greece and growing old at Friends Seminary. I think it must have something to do with the Chorus of men too old for

war in Aeschylus’ Agamemnon. Here we have a Herald returning from a war in the Middle East, describing the intolerable conditions in which the soldiers had to live.

And the Chorus of old men, after hearing the account, claims: “from youth to old age it is good to learn well.” (Agamemnon: 584).

This is an account from an intolerable war in the Middle East that happened 2,700 years ago. Even if we don’t learn from it, the past does matter.

The Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs are sponsoring the Theater of War Project, which performs dramatic readings of classical tragedy to get combat veterans to talk about war and its horrors. Sophocles’ Ajax is an incredible account of what war does to a good man, even a hero.

That is part of what I have learned growing old at Friends Seminary. The ancient past speaks to the present. I have also learned that only the very young and the very old hold on to the bannister when we walk up and down stairs. Little people have no idea of mass: that two physical objects do not easily occupy the same space at the same time. Walking through the halls, they will bump into you, and when they do, like a shark hitting into a piling at a pier, they simply back up and move around you, without noticing you at all. Every so often, I am invited into a Lower School class to read some Old English, or Latin or Greek. I do my presentation: and we talk about the funny letters and whether the students can recognize any word. They don’t know it, but this is their first lesson in Indo-European linguistics. Then a month or so later, a little person will pass by without bumping into me and say, “Hi, Mr. Schwartz.” For some reason, I value that recognition very much.

Of all the lessons I have learned, perhaps the most important have been handed down to me from my Greek and Latin “ancestry.”

Cicero tells me, “An attentive farmer plants trees from which he will never see the fruit.”

(Tuscan Disputations 1.14) and Aristotle adds, “Education is the best provision for old age.” (Aristotle from Diogenes Laertius, Lives of Eminent Philosophers)

ALUMNI PROFILES MEREDITH RAHN OAKES

’08

Delighting in Turkey

“Sorry I’m late, I forgot that my mom always tries to feed me breakfast when I’m home,” says Meredith Rahn Oakes ’08, only 21 years old and freshly graduated from Georgetown University. Despite her tremendous accomplishments and her precocious talent (she graduated from Friends Seminary at age 16), she is down-to-earth and effortlessly humble.

Studying languages is a lifelong passion for Meredith, and her pursuit of multilinguality has taken her to places she never thought she’d go.

In September, Meredith will travel to Turkey on a Fulbright Scholarship to research immigration legislation. She’s looking for a way to grant greater access to healthcare, education and legal services to refugees and asylum-seekers. In Istanbul and Ankara, the capital city, she will work with the United Nations High Commissioner on Refugees (UNHCR)—two non governmental organizations that work closely with UNHCR—and a migration research center, all while continuing her Turkish language studies.

Meredith had no idea that she would become so entrenched in Turkish culture and policy. She took up Turkish because her college Arabic courses concentrated too much on formal, written Arabic and not enough on the dialects actually spoken. “I never wanted to learn language in a vacuum,” says Meredith.

Meredith’s love of language started at the ripe old age of three.

“What I first liked most about speaking French was that I could speak it, and my parents couldn’t understand,” confesses Meredith, who has been speaking fluent French since attending

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language at friends

the French International School in Philadelphia before moving to New York. After transferring to the Upper School at Friends, she dabbled in Latin and Spanish. Since then, she has found language useful for much more than foiling her parents.

At Friends, she learned how to be comfortable with less tangible ways of communicating.

Silent Worship taught her to embrace her own wordlessness, and to become absorbed in the act of listening. In silence, she found commonality between seemingly disparate people and cultures.

“I love that my language skills have enabled me to have conversations with people from very different backgrounds than my own,” says Meredith. “Language allows you to emerge out of a tourist or expat bubble into lesser-known terrain.”

Getting to know different cultures from the inside out has been invaluable to her academic career and has formed her path in the world of foreign policy.

Her knowledge allows her to make insightful comparisons and make more subtle conclusions in argument.

On a personal level, Meredith enjoys hearing other languages even when she doesn't understand. She used to insist that her college roommate speak with family in their native Korean.

“If you listen to Korean, you can actually hear similar intonation patterns to that of Turkish, which makes sense since the Mongol invasion spread from East Asia and all the way to Turkey. The two languages are distantly related.”

In any situation, she has come to learn that language is as much about listening as it is about speaking.

Q&A ANTHONY SHORE

What’s in a name?

Anthony Shore ’85 director of Operative Words, a naming agency based in San Francisco, answers a few questions about his calling in life.

When did you realize that words were your passion?

There were two points I remember distinctly. My first memory of word-love was when I was a child and I received the American Heritage Dictionary as a birthday gift. The edition included a Dictionary of Proto-IndoEuropean Roots where I spent an inordinate amount of time discovering 5,000-year-old word parts. The first time I became self-aware of my logophilia was in college at UC Santa Cruz. I was already in the linguistics program, but it wasn’t until I was interviewing a potential housemate who asked me, “What do you want to do with linguistics?” It was then that my mouth said, “I want to name things” and I suddenly noticed that that was what I was meant to do.

Which teachers at Friends inspired you?

I transferred into 11th grade from another school where

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’85

I had been taking Latin and I continued on studying at Friends under Phil Schwartz.

At my old school, I was ready to go into fifth year, but under Phil’s gauntlet. I was only ready for third-year Latin. I also took an Iliad class with Phil, which taught me some Greek. I continued to study ancient Greek in college—and also took a trip to Greece for a month between Friends and college. The demand and rigor at Friends, and Phil in particular, inspired me. I also learned a great deal about English and writing from Friends teachers Ron Singer and Ann Sullivan, both of whom inspired me.

How did you transition from a major in linguistics to naming?

At first, my professional obsession with words took form visually. I was a typesetter for a magazine, then for an ad agency. This was before desktop publishing, so I was working on photo-mechanical typesetting systems that required developing rolls of set type in toxic, smelly, photographic chemicals. I then moved into desktop-based typesetting, graphic production and advertising copywriting. My first taste of

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The Namer in His Element Anthony gives a tour of some the greatest hits on his desktop.

1 LYTRO A revolutionary “light field” camera that lets you shoot first and focus later. The name Lytro was inspired by the words “light” and “nitroglycerine.”

2 SNAPDRAGON This microprocessor

by Qualcomm helps create amazing devices like smartphones and tablets. The name

brings together two oppositional ideas: small/easy/fast (snap) and big/mythological/ fantastic (dragon).

3 SOYJOY Years ago, I was reviewing name candidates for a new line of soy-based protein bars. Off the cuff, I added the name Soyjoy into the mix.

The client loved it.

4 LAUGHING GLASS A line of ready-to-drink cocktails. It’s a fun name that reflects a fun product. Laughing Glass margaritas can now be found in Northern California and will be rolling out nationwide in 2014.

5 PAUSE A line of relaxation beverages for hard-working people. My company

created the name, the tagline (“Make Now Yours”), and directed the design of the bottle.

6 VIBE A fruitflavored malt beverage that Coors launched in 2002. I don’t think the product lasted in the market very long. It goes to show, there’s only so much a name—even a great one—can do.

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language at friends

tasked with naming cocktails for a local ho-

How do you use foreign language to come up with names?

tel. My first full-blown naming project was

Every name has a unique set of objectives

naming a Monterey, California, real estate

that must be accomplished. Sometimes,

development and all of the streets in the

a name based on a foreign language can

development. From there, I had a few other

accomplish those objectives. For example,

jobs, including wine list design, software

I named a line of authentic Mexican fro-

naming was at the ad agency, where I was

marketing and software product manage-

Kanisa means ‘you must think’ in Lingala, a language of central Africa.

The name has no obvious meaning to English speakers, but it helps the client tell a good story. ment. I began naming full-time in 1996 for

zen dinners Menu del Sol. That required

a large branding agency called Landor As-

looking at Spanish words that would be

sociates. Eventually, I became their Global

obvious to English speakers. I was inspired

Director of Naming and Writing. I also

by the Sanskrit word for “unity,” ad-

worked for a spell at Lexicon Branding, a

vaya, to name a unified communica-

well-regarding boutique naming firm.

tions company,Avaya. Other classical

Why did you decide to start your own company?

languages I’ve drawn on include Latin for

After 13 years at Landor, I had accomplished everything I could hope for. I was Landor’s first, and, to date, only Global Director of Naming and Writing. I had codified best practices in name development and helped create naming software, databases and training materials. I also personally created many names I was proud of, like Accenture, Yum Brands, Avaya, Qualcomm Snapdragon, Edy’s Slow-Churned Ice Cream, Photoshop Lightroom and Panorama Meats. I left Landor to start my own agency, which would give me an opportunity for quantum growth, not just incremental growth. My agency, named Operative Words, specializes in anything that’s six words or fewer. Corporate and product naming is my bread and butter, but I also write taglines, develop nomenclature systems, define brands, and direct visual identity of new brands.

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the names Alterra (ecological pest control), Metris (financial services) and Sensata (Texas Instruments sensors spin-off company), and Greek for the names Lytro, a revolutionary new camera, and Xiameter, a division of Dow Corning. One client in the ‘knowledge management’ business wanted a name with a direct relationship to their category. The challenge was that English words like think, brain, mind, et al., and Greek and Latin roots were already prevalent in their category. My team and I looked at more exotic languages and discovered a lovely word, Kanisa, which means “you must think” in Lingala, a language of central Africa. The name has no obvious meaning to English speakers, but it helps the client tell a good story. Other companies do this; for example, Samsung (which I did not name) means nothing to English speakers, but Koreans recognize it means "three stars."

ALICIA RUBIN & JEREMY YAMIN

’83 Serving for Justice Sometimes it seems as though Jeremy Yamin ’83’s life is straight out of the Tintin comic strip. As an agent of the Diplomatic Security Service, he has investigated human trafficking, international organized crime, terrorist incidents, and pretty much everything from traffic accidents to murder investigations.

He is now stationed in Tanzania where he manages about 500 personnel—Tanzanian guards, U.S. Marines, federal agents, security engineers, and investigators—at the U.S. Embassy in Dar es Salaam.

Moving to Tanzania meant that he and his family had to learn Swahili on the spot — not an easy feat when most Tanzanians you encounter want to practice their English. His 12-year-old son, Sam, who is at ease communicating, negotiating and striking bargains in Swahili, often serves as the family translator “much like recent immigrants to the U.S. who rely on their kids.”

He and his wife, Alicia Rubin Yamin ’83 have had many stops on their world tour.

Before Tanzania, they lived and worked in the major cities of the Spanish-speaking world. Since they both graduated from Harvard College in 1987, they have lived and worked in Argentina, Mexico, Peru and Uruguay.

Friends sparked Jeremy’s interest in Spanish. He was attracted to the language because of Señora Olga Maidique’s encouraging attitude.

She may not have been the most conven-

Photo by Jeremy and Alicia’s son, Sam Yamin tional teacher—sometimes she would look the other way when students whispered to each other during tests—but she left students with the impression that language is about speaking and learning, not memorization.

“She was so pleased and excited that we were trying to speak her language that she made it fun. I wasn’t made to feel self-conscious about my ability or lack thereof.”

Alicia, however, can be credited for Jeremy’s sustained commitment to the language. He continued his Spanish studies in college, but when he re-met Alicia in 1985 during their sophomore year in college, Jeremy decided to become fluent and focus his studies on Latin America.

“I was absolutely infatuated by this gorgeous American/Argentine who spoke such beautiful Spanish,” he said. Following this siren’s song, he became fascinated by Argentine culture and politics, and traveled with her to Argentina to conduct his

thesis research on the Dirty War. It should be noted that this was not the first time they met—Alicia attended Friends from Kindergarten to Grade Two. However, they had significantly less interest in one another as evidenced by their mutual absences from each other’s birthday party photos.

After college, Jeremy moved with Alicia to Buenos Aires to do consulting work. The next stop on their international “tour” was Mexico City—extremely different from Argentina. Alicia brought the first case to the U.N. Committee Against Torture detailing a systematic pattern of impunity among the Mexican Federal Judicial Police—the equivalent of the FBI. Their phones were tapped, their mail intercepted and she was followed, harassed and even detained by the police. The U.S. embassy strongly advised them to leave, but Alicia refused to abandon her case or her clients—many of whom had survived

horrendous tortures and some had family members killed for doing nothing wrong.

“For me, the constant harassment by the police and the corruption made me reflect on government, democracy and the rule of law,” said Jeremy. “In my mind you couldn’t have a democracy if you didn’t have the rule of law, and the rule of law requires trained and honest police and judiciary.” That reflection led him from his career in consulting and international marketing to the Diplomatic Security Service.

Jeremy thinks the globetrotting has benefitted his children, and he wants them to continue traveling long after the family has settled down. “I hope they can go even further than I have in the world, and in the world of languages. Despite the occasional headaches, it is a lot of fun.”

The views expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Department of State or the U.S. government.

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Come together! reunion 2013 1. Principal Bo Lauder and friends from the Class of 2008: Andrew Huson, Lex Singer, Rodger Sherman, Jackson Sinder 2. Faculty Bob Rosen and An-Lo Yu ’03 3. Mark Wilcox ’88 and Cory Diamond ’88 4. Class of 1983: Susan Bronzaft Santoro, Jennifer Geldard, Keith Smith, Jim Infantino, Susan Lowen Maniatis, Martha Ehrenfeld, Julia Bates 5. Martha Ehrenfeld ’83 flips through the Spring issue of NFF with Susan Bronzaft Santoro ’83 6. Max Frey ’93 and Jennifer Rudolph ’93 7. Emma Hayes ’02 and Alumni Council Clerk Joanna Hunter August ’02 8. Clockwise from top left: Sandy and John Schwartz ’57, Paul Chevigny ’53, Sally Christenberry Roth ’53 9. Class of 1978, from left: Elizabeth Steckman Bartlett, Andrew Owen, Alexandra Fingesten, Jack Moore, Amy Eppler-Epstein 10. Class of 1968: Blair Fensterstock, Jonathan Beckerman, Patsy Myers Hayes, Penny Craven 11. Class of 1973 and friends, clockwise from back left: Helene Abramowitz, former faculty Paul Supton, Barbara Michelson, Sabrina Hamilton, Dan Green ’72, David Hochman ’74, Robert Sheinbaum, Michael Varhol (husband of Alison Dale), Alison Dale, Julie Raskin and her husband, David Barnert 12. Nathalie Pacheco, Michael Martinez ’91, Bella Breuer, Lute Breuer ’93 13. Principal Bo Lauder and Principal Emeritus Rich Eldridge 14. Dave Sellar ’91 and Chris Scianni ’88 (in the foreground) rock out on the Meetinghouse steps

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50 Years

for the Class of 1963!

reunion 2013 The Class of 1963 celebrated their 50th reunion on May 17, 2013. After a private luncheon in the Alumni Room, they joined up with their Grade Four pen pals. As part of the Pen Pal Program, the Class of 1963 and Andy Doan’s fourth graders exchanged letters for three months.

At their meeting, the students showed off their class projects and demonstrated how they use iPad technology in the classroom.

The alumni showed students their yearbooks and chatted about what Friends was like in 1963.

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faculty & staff emeritus The faculty and staff at Friends Seminary are the School’s most treasured resources. They make up the substance of the School and create lasting memories for the community. Each year, the Friends Seminary Emeritus Program recognizes the legacy of an individual who exemplifies the giving and passionate involvement of those who make this community unique.

Toni Daly

Jennifer Fell Hayes Teacher and Director of Drama

Teacher of Math & Environmental Studies

Service to Friends 1991−2013

Service to Friends 1989−2013

“

Year after year, Jennifer has awakened our faith in the transforming power of art and in the particularly communal power of the theater.

Jennifer’s presence as teacher, colleague and friend has deepened and strengthened the community of Friends Seminary. Although we will miss her terribly, the worlds she has brought to life will linger here—the wood outside Athens, the streets of London, the Emerald City, an orchard in Verona, a Yorkshire fishing village, the plains of Oklahoma, the forest of Arden, to name only a few.

Maria Fahey, English Teacher

”

“

When green was just a color and not yet a celebrated moral choice, before Al Gore wrote The Inconvenient Truth and before Clinton popularized his Global Initiative, Toni was already in a green state of mind...

She is humble in her effect but fierce in her passion to make the world a safer, more enriched and joyfully sustainable place for all. Her gentle, kind demeanor belies an extraordinary moral sensibility which fortifies her personal strength.

Harriet Burnett, Director of Admissions

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Jonathan L. Cohen

Friends Grandparent ’26 ••• Parent of Alumni ’86 ’89 ••• Former Member of the School Committee

A lot at Friends has changed since my first child enrolled in 1972. From a small, financially challenged school in a then-obscure part of Manhattan, it has grown into a widely-recognized leader among New York City independent schools, which draws a strong and diverse student body citywide and beyond.

But a lot has stayed the same, such as Friends’ uncompromising commitment to Quaker values, top-flight faculty deeply engaged with students and a profound and lifelong impact on its graduates.

It has been a privilege to watch Friends evolve and grow for 40 years. And the School is so worthy of our financial support through annual giving, capital funds, and bequests. I am excited about my bequest, and only sorry I won’t be around to see it in use!

Excerpted from Jonathan's speech at a luncheon (hosted by Edes Powell Gilbert ’49 and Frederic Buse ’59) honoring his 40 years of involvement at Friends Seminary, as well as the dedicated members of the Friends for the Future society.

Friends for the Future, our Planned Giving Society, honors those members of our community who have arranged to support Friends Seminary through a planned or estate gift. These donors have helped provide for the School’s future through a variety of gift planning vehicles including bequest intentions, testamentary trusts, gifts of real estate, and other deferred gifts.

For more information on making a planned gift, please contact Katherine Precht, Director of Development, at 212.979.5035 ext. 180 or kprecht@friendsseminary.org. If you have made a provision for Friends in your estate plans, please share this information with us so that your generosity can be acknowledged.

future friends for the

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FRIENDS SEMINARY 222 EAST 16 TH STREET NEW YORK, NY 10003

MAY 16 & MAY 17, 2014 We need YOU to get involved at Reunion!

If your class year ends in a 4 or 9, your reunion celebration is coming up!

To volunteer for reunion efforts, contact Katherine Farrell in the Alumni Office: kfarrell@friendsseminary.org or 212.979.5035 ext. 106. f all 2 0 1 3 | D