The Prefect Council announced in a school-wide email that several sophomores have been disciplined for buying and selling photos of tests and quizzes. Dean of Students Jordan Church handled disciplinary actions on a case-by-case basis following recent investigations by his office, the Honors Chemistry team and Honor Board.
“The student responsible for taking and distributing the photos has been suspended for the remainder of the year and will receive a failing grade in the class,” the email said. “Other students who admitted to giving and receiving these exams faced combinations of single-day suspensions and zeros on the affected exams.”
Head of Upper School Beth Slattery said the root cause of cheating likely comes from the school’s emphasis on academics.
“We’re trying to remind people that cheating is not a victimless crime,” Slattery said. “But it all gets back to the biggest problem with our school, where the toxic agenda culture and the obsession with college is just absolutely insane. I do think if you take away the obsession with getting good grades and getting into colleges, there would be less cheating.”
President Rick Commons said the school is determined to continue instilling integrity and academic honesty in its students as its mission.
“It is an essential part of our mission as a school and an essential part of the training that we aim to give students at Harvard-Westlake an education on how to have integrity in their lives,” Commons said. “It’s a big deal when there are violations of academic integrity. In my career as an educator, I’ve never had a year where there haven’t been some significant violations of the institutional commitment to academic integrity. Of course, when I learned about the violations that had taken place, I was disappointed.”
Renovations to create wellness suite in Seaver, expand history department
By Yuna Jeon
The school plans to renovate the second and third floors of Seaver starting this summer. The renovations will include a new wellness suite on the second floor, a new Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) office, a multi-purpose room and a new welcome center.
The changes will replace the receptionist desk in Seaver, relocate the history department office to the second floor and relocate President Rick Commons and Head of School Laura Ross’ offices. Construction is set to begin in June, with the new facilities set to open by the winter of the following year. The renovations will be in collaboration with architect Andrea Keller, who renovated the Mudd Library this past year.
Director of Wellness Marci Reichert said the new wellness center will serve as a place for leisure and build community in times of need.
“We want to make [the wellness center] a space where people want to come to build relation-
ships with students in a more fun and social way,” Reichert said. “Then they will naturally start to build a support system so that when they do have a moment where they need something, they’ve already built that relationship up. I see it as a community building place.”
Commons said the renovations will centralize mental health resources for students and give faculty operations more space.
“The project reflects our commitment to do everything we can to make the student experience healthier and give students access to resources to take care of themselves when they need it,” Commons said. “That’s the biggest impetus. It’ll help the history department and help create space for faculty and clerical services that currently are next door.”
Ross said the new wellness center will draw inspiration from the middle school campus.
“[The middle school] was able to move both of the middle school counselors’ offices next to each other so that people knew there
was a place to go to,” Reichert said. “That feels like something we might want to model here.”
History Department Chair Celia Goedde said the renovations will benefit the history department and their space.
“The history department was consulted about how we wanted to configure the space where our office will be on the second floor, and we also got to work with the architect about designing the office space,” Goedde said. “We wanted to have plenty of shelf space for books and were happy that it could be accommodated.”
Reichert said the new wellness center will serve as part of the school’s broader movement toward prioritizing student wellness.
“With the loss of students that we experienced, I think it really pushed the school to realize that we need to prioritize our student wellness,” Reichert said. “This is part of just the bigger movement that the school is working towards, looking at how we can make things more fun and joyful for students.”
Applications decrease by 13%
By Connor Tang
Applications to the school were down 13% for both prospective seventh and ninth graders this year, according to the admissions office. The 2023-24 admissions cycle had an admit rate of 24%, the lowest on record. The admit rate increased to 31% the following year for rising seventh and ninth graders and reached 35% in the most recent admissions cycle. Head of Admissions and Enrollment Chris Sanders said the sizable drop in applications can be attributed to the death of student Ben Ellis ’27 and past student deaths. Displacement caused by the Palisades and Altadena fires also caused a drop in applicants, Sanders said. Sanders said the admissions department decided to be transparent with all prospective families regarding the tragedies, even if some were apprehensive about the situation.
“[President Rick] Commons and [Head of School] Laura Ross were willing to really talk about the deaths and how the school has responded all together,” Sanders said. “Families respected us for not running away from it. We talked about how mental health and wellness was a priority for the school well before the very first student death even happened. But now that we have some renewed resources and focus on it, including our director of wellness, we were able to highlight that [to prospective families].”
According to Sanders, a large number of prospective families affected by the Los Angeles wildfires withdrew applications early in the process.
“We do draw a large number of applicants from both the Palisades and Pasadena,” Sanders said. “There were families that mentioned they were going to exit the process because they were relocating to a different place because of losing their homes.”
Despite the drop in applications, Commons said the admissions department was still able to draw from an ample number of talented applicants.
WELCOMING WELLNESS: A student talks with Counselor Tina McGraw in her office. The renovations in Seaver, set to completed by winter 2026, will feature a new wellness suite offering mental health resources.
LUCA GONZALEZ/CHRONICLE
Cheating addressed by school
“I felt that it was important that the school make a big deal about it to make it clear what our values are to everybody involved. When we fall short in significant ways, we’ve got to identify and recognize that we ve fallen short and pledged to do better.”
Upper School Science Department Head Melody Lee said that although not all departments were involved in the conversation after the incident, the Honors Chemistry teachers are working to revise any testing material that was compromised by the students.
“We did not have a larger faculty meeting discussing the Honor Board cases, but we did have meetings within the Science Department,” Lee said.
“To move forward, the Honors Chemistry team now needs to rethink and revamp their entire assessment curriculum.”
According to anonymous student sources, quizzes were sold for $40, and tests were sold for $60. Lenny*, who was in the class where the incident occurred, said he believes the stressful environment of the class may have influenced the students’ actions.
“I heard rumors that there were some people cheating, but not much more than that,” Lenny said. “My teacher, at the start of class, talked to us about how she was disappointed and frustrated that we violated the Honor Code. While this is a big problem, it should also be looked into why students are pressured enough to be willing to pay for pictures of a test. I feel as though there is definitely, to a certain extent, overwhelming material, and because the class is an honors [class], it progresses at a faster pace, making it easy to get behind or lost. ”
April*, a sophomore enrolled in Honors Chemistry, said she is upset over the choices made by the students involved in the incident.
CELEBRATION OF REPRESENTATION: Students gathered on the Quad to take part in the Multicultural Fair, celebrating the vast number of cultures and ethnicities represented at the school, enjoying a variety of foods and refreshments prepared by the affinity groups while also participating in a dance.
Affinity groups, SLIDE host Multicultural Fair on Quad to celebrate diversity, culture
By Ella Jeon
Student Leaders for Inclusion, Diversity and Equity (SLIDE) hosted the annual Multicultural Fair on the Quad May 2.
At the event, affinity groups organized and ran tables with different cultural foods and treats, followed by a dance number and raffle held on the Quad. The purpose of the fair was to celebrate and represent the diversity of cultures within the community. Affinity groups from a variety of races, cultures, ethnicities and religions all gathered to share their traditions.
Japanese Language and Culture Club leader Anju Higashi ’26 said she appreciates the sense of unity found at school events for celebrating diversity and culture.
“My favorite aspect of the Multicultural Fair is the way
in which it brings our school community together while also providing a learning experience through the food, music, performances and handson activities,” Higashi said. “It’s one of the few times throughout the year when all of the affinity groups get to interact at once, so it really feels like a celebration of everyone, not just individual identities. Sharing our cultures in a unified space is empowering and reflects the richness of all our backgrounds as a whole.”
Trachtenberg said. “In a way, you could travel the world in a few steps.”
Calia Trachtenberg ’27 said she was inspired by the number of cultures represented at the event.
“What I love most about the fair is the amount of life you could see in such a short area,”
Special Olympics hosted on field
By Tali Gurule and Chloe Kim
Community Council hosted the Unified Games for athletes from The Help Group on Ted Slavin Field April 28. Along with the school’s soccer, football and basketball teams, students volunteered to lead the athletes in soccer drills, track races, flag football and cheer exercises.
The Help Group is a nonprofit organization with the aim of serving people with autism, learning disabilities, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and developmental delays. In its six campuses throughout Los Angeles, The Help Group offers specialized elementary, middle and high school experiences with mental health, therapy and vocational programs.
Counselor and Community Council Adviser Michelle Bracken said the event gave students a chance to empathize
with the athletes from The Help Group.
“We often don’t know what we don’t know,” Bracken said.
“When able students compete alongside non-able students, it gives Harvard-Westlake students the opportunity to appreciate the everyday things they may take for granted. Our students kick the soccer ball, throw the football or run around the track without thinking about it. This event gives our community some insight into the privilege we have.”
Community Council Member Cole Grossman ’25 said he values the event because he wants to ensure that children with disabilities have the opportunity to enjoy playing sports.
“I chose to participate because sports have brought me so much joy throughout my life,” Grossman said. “It feels very unjust that some people are denied that joy simply because of a disability they were born with.
I wanted to do what I could to help give the kids a positive and memorable experience.”
Community Council Member Mia Ushiba ’26 said the Unified Games aimed to provide direct contact between students and the students from The Help Group.
“For this event, the students connected directly with the athletes and they experienced the impact that they were making right then and there,” Ushiba said. “The students formed meaningful connections, and it was overall a very fulfilling experience.”
Hollen Vann ’27, who volunteered at the event, said she appreciated the school’s commitment to inclusion.
“Hosting events like this shows that our school values equity,” Vann said. “HarvardWestlake creates a space where all students are both celebrated and supported.”
Tractenberg said she values the preservation of history for the sake of both growth as well as remembrance. “I think that the stories and traditions are the best when promoting diversity,” Trachtenberg said. “Hearing what other people have gone through can help make sure it never happens again and can continue keeping all of these stories alive.”
Higashi said the current day events make discussions about both representation of culture and equality particularly relevant and important.
“Celebrating diversity is especially important today when
conversations about identity and inclusion can sometimes be misunderstood or seen in a negative light,” Higashi said. “Events like the Multicultural Fair are a constant remind to us that diversity is not about division but is about celebrating who we are and honoring the unique backgrounds that make up our community.”
Multiethnic Inclusion x Diversity Club leader Micah Parr ’25 said that the fair has always been a major highlight for him throughout his time at the school.
“Ever since my first year on the upper school campus, I have always loved the Multicultural Fair and everything that it had to offer,” Parr said. “Getting the opportunity to engage with a variety of different cultures through delicious foods, dances and music has definitely been among the most rewarding experiences at the school.”
EXCEPTIONAL ATHLETES: Students form an arch to deliver a farewell to the participants competing in the Special Olympic games.
YUNA JEON/CHRONICLE
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Micah Parr ’25
Adopting AI Into Curriculum
Faculty and administrators discuss how the school’s new policy about upholding integrity for AI use in the classroom will impact the school.
By Alex Reisner
With this year marking the expansion of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the world, the school has begun to find ways to utilize this new technology to enhance education.
Both faculty and administrators are redefining education by incorporating AI into the curriculum, ensuring that the use of AI aligns with the school’s mission of maintaining ethics and academic integrity, according to Associate Director of Teaching and Learning Maggie Thompson. The newly released school policy regarding the use of AI in a classroom setting is as such: “We believe generative AI can elevate teaching and learning at Harvard-Westlake. With a focus on integrity, creativity, sustainability and connection, we are committed to using AI to further the school’s mission.”
work after a human writes it.”
The school’s Information Technology (IT) team helps facilitate the integration of technology on campus in addition to technical support for faculty and staff. They are currently working strategies for how to most effectively incorporate AI into education at the school.
Chief Information Officer Dan Alig said he is currently working in partnership with AI companies to understand how to effectively use AI in an academic setting.
better understanding of how to use technology to increase productivity and efficiency in work rather than do the work for them.”
One concern the IT department is facing when introducing new technologies to faculty is that they have the potential to do work for teachers. Alig said introducing the teachers to AI and showing them specific strategies to enhance their work will prevent them from using it in a dishonorable manner.
room to people who are integrating it directly into assignments,” Garrison said. “What the council does is allow teachers to share their own innovations with technology in order for other people in the council to think about how their discipline might utilize AI.”
ty to organize, synthesize and provide me with headlines for specific topics. I have already learned and taught this material for 25 years, but just having AI be like a personal assistant to refresh me before class is helpful.”
“ We have skilled [faculty], and [IT] wants to make sure they use [AI] to enhance work, rather than
replace
it.”
— Dan Alig Chief Information Officer
“The school is forming a partnership with OpenAI, the makers of ChatGPT, to think about how something like ChatGPT exists in a school like Harvard-Westlake,” Alig said. “As of this week, we have provided all faculty with access to ChatGPT.”
Thompson said another way the IT team is fostering AI literacy on campus is by exposing different forms of AI to teachers at the school.
Head of Upper School Beth Slattery said the school wants to ensure AI does not replace feedback and teaching, but enhance it by using AI as a complementary tool.
“The school’s statement for faculty use of AI prioritizes human connection, sustainability and efficiency because the use of AI does not have to be all bad, it just needs to be used ethically,” Slattery said. “When using AI for work, it should start and end with human work to make sure work does not become unfiltered. I do not think the use of AI has to be a bad thing when it is used to enhance
“Teachers are all at different places with how they use AI, and so I want to build different opportunities for teachers to experience the technologies pertaining to their subject so that they understand how it works,” Thompson said. “One thing [IT] has done is having specific experiences during faculty meetings to enhance understanding of how to use the technology. For example, one thing we have done is put the same prompt into different technologies such as ChatGPT, Claude and Java to see what happens. These opportunities provide teachers with a
“It is really easy to get AI to do things for you, and that is a trap a lot of people fall into,” Alig said. “However, that outcome is not great because it does not align with the educational standards of the school. Whether teachers are using it for their writing or just for planning [lessons], it is important they only use it as a potential thought partner and not as a replacement for the work they do. We have a lot of highly qualified, very skilled professionals here, and [IT] wants to make sure faculty are using it to enhance their work, rather than replace it.”
The IT department formed an IT council where representatives from different departments can collaboratively discuss various aspects of technology on campus such as the functionality of projectors and discuss their varying opinions about AI within the school. They have held two meetings where teachers are currently discussing their individual concerns about how AI impacts each of their subjects.
English Teacher and IT council member John Garrison said the council allows faculty to consider new ways to utilize AI within their subjects.
“Across the school, there is a lot of variance between people who aren’t using AI at all in their class-
The history department’s representative on the IT council, Peter Sheehy, said the history department is working to ensure that AI is being used in a cautious manner and only for specified work by students and faculty.
“The key consideration for the history teachers is to be really clear about what skills they are trying to develop,” Sheehy said. “The skills the department is trying to prioritize the most among students are the ones where AI should be used the least. In other cases of secondary importance such as busy work, then the use of AI can be appropriate. If students are organizing large amounts of data, AI often tends to display bias in its response depending on the specific phrasing of the question. Until we all become experts in prompting and understanding how it works, there are lots of dangers to AI use.”
Sheehy said he uses AI to increase efficiency when preparing for class by having ChatGPT formulate daily summaries for his lessons.
“I have always created memos to prepare me for class,” Sheehy said. “I will take academic articles that I’ve read, notes and documents and put them into ChatGPT to have AI organize them for me. It has the abili-
Some teachers are incorporating these new technologies into instruction. For example, World Language Teacher Marc Schuhl recently assigned a project where he encouraged students to use AI to complete it. After consulting with the IT department, he was able to provide his class with access to ChatGPT Pro to generate images for the project, and 80% of his class took advantage of this resource. Schuhl said the challenges that arose from this project revealed the unpredictability of how AI will become integrated into education, and reminded him of the similar change that occurred after the invention of the internet.
“With AI, everything’s so new that I just have to commit to knowing the process is going to be a little ugly, that my students are patient with me,” Schuhl said. “The unexpected challenges that occurred [during the project] reminded me of the beginning of my teaching career when the internet first became a thing. It was obviously going to be a transformative change, but the first couple of years using it with students was a mess because it was super slow, would disconnect and people would get frustrated. I knew it was going to get really good and robust, and I am feeling the same way about AI right now.”
Survey results regarding faculty use of AI for classroom instruction
Have you ever used AI to help prepare for a class/ instruction?
Do you believe AI can enhance instruction and teaching?
Have you used AI to help assess a student’s completed work?
Have you introduced/outlined ways for AI to be used in your class?
Have you used AI to create material for assessments/ assignments?
Does your department/department chair enforce specific rules regarding the use of AI?
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Speech and Debate teams attend yearly TOC competition
By Colin Ho
The school’s Speech and Debate teams sent 16 students to the J.W. Patterson Tournament of Champions (TOC) in Lexington, Kentucky from April 26-28, with six breaking into the finals of the tournament.
Molly Block ’26 and Assistant News Editor Erin Ryu ’26 advanced to the finals of the tournament, with Block earning second place in Oral Program Interpretation and Ryu placing sixth in Dramatic Interpretation. Lyra Majumdar ’26, William Lin ’26 and Sally Ramberg ’26 reached the semifinals, while Hannah Yang ’28 made it to the quarterfinals. Each competitor must garner two bids to be eligible for the tournament by placing as a finalist or semifinalist at other top-tier regional tournaments in the country. The TOC is held for Congressional Debate, Lincoln-Douglas Debate, Policy Debate, Public Forum Debate and Speech categories.
fidence that carries over into every part of their lives. This year, we’ve had students advocate on a variety of issues like the Asian-American identity, the policing of women’s bodies and even the impact of the California wildfires. Watching students grow into articulate and thoughtful individuals is the most rewarding part of coaching.”
Speech Team member Esther Goldman ’26, who qualified for the TOC, said she enjoys speech because it allows her to share her beliefs on important subjects.
“I do a form of speech where we get a topic 30 minutes before and prepare a seven- minute speech in that time frame,” Goldman said. “I enjoy that format because I get to present on a wide variety of topics and think quickly. I was really grateful for the opportunity to both qualify and attend the TOC. Being able to interact with people who have the same interests as I do was a very fun and exciting experience.”
Science class presents findings at Stan-X Science Symposium
By Chloe Kim
Speech Coach and Interdisciplinary Studies and Independent Research Teacher Sarina Wang said students must put in hours of dedication and preparation to have a chance to attend the TOC.
“When someone qualifies, it means they’ve consistently performed at an elite level against some of the best speakers in the nation,” Wang said. “Preparation for TOC starts at the beginning of the year. Students compete in a variety of tournaments and continuously revise and fine-tune their pieces through multiple rounds of feedback, practice rounds and peer review. By the time they get to TOC, their speeches will ideally be in their strongest possible versions.”
Wang said she started coaching the Speech Team because she believes that it is an activity that empowers students and creates change.
“I coach the Speech Team because I’ve seen how life-changing this activity can be,” Wang said. “Speech gives students the power to tell their stories, speak out on issues they care about and develop con-
Speech Team student leader Sally Ramberg ’26 said she cherished the supportive community and gratification that being a part of the Speech Team has given her.
“I’m a leader on the team, so I get to introduce all of the new kids to it as well,” Ramberg said. “Everyone’s really upbeat and helpful, and it’s not internally competitive. It’s a wonderful environment, and it felt extremely validating to make it to the TOC. The uncertainty was very stressful, [because] I didn’t want to feel like I put so much time into it for nothing.”
Debate Team member Daniel Baek ’26 said that qualifying for the TOC is the ultimate achievement for competitors across the country.
“The TOC is the culmination of all the effort that speakers and debaters put in throughout the year,” Baek said. “For many competitors, it is the pinnacle of their career. If you do well at the TOC, then that means you are the best debater for that division in the entire nation.”
The Research in Molecular Genetics Class went to Stanford University in collaboration with the Stan-X program for a symposium to present their year-long research April 27. Students from various schools came together to present their findings about the Drosophila Melanogaster fruit fly genetics and how genetic mutations affect them.
Julien Liu ’25 said even though the team had a difficult time preparing their lab results, he ultimately found it rewarding to see how the mutations eventually affected the flies.
led to some uncertainty in our results. After precisely breeding and sorting through different fly genotypes, it was interesting to analyze the movement of the element and the effects on the gene that it inserted itself into.”
Upper School Science Teacher and Department Head Melody Lee said the unpredictability of the outcomes is a big reason why the project is so informative.
“We ran into some challenges leading up to the trip regarding our individual Drosophila fly crosses and analyzing our DNA sequencing results for our fly presentation,” Liu said. “In our research, we were not completely sure what results we would get and which gene our transposable element would insert itself into, which
School hosts annual Career Fair
By Luca Gonzalez
The Career Fair was hosted in the Feldman-Horn Gallery April 22. Throughout the fair, recruiting sessions and product demos were available and students had the opportunity to inquire about possible jobs or internships. The companies Gnomon, Hom, and Smartwear all attended the fair. Gnomon is a college that helps students pursue careers in the entertainment industry, often related to technology. Hom is a startup company looking to help connect homeowners with contractors to assist in the process of renovations. Lastly, Smartwear is a foundation with the goal of supporting people with mental illness through the use of data management.
Head of HW Works Kwaisi
France said the career fair provides students with an early introduction to the job process, allowing them to discover occupations or internships they might be interested in.
“Career Fair is an opportunity to be exposed to three aspects of the job process,” France said. “One is how organizations go through the recruiting process. Two is actually aligning yourself with the companies that you’re applying for, whether it’s jobs or internships, which is why we have them do presentations if they want to. The third part is more practical. It’s late April, and a lot of you all are HW students, and you’re busy, and not everybody has a chance to see Mr. France during the school year. So the third is to kind of sort of set yourself up for the summer.”
Founder of Hom Catherine
James said the aim of her company is to give students real job experience compared to other internship opportunities.
“It’s not every day that a sixteen- or seventeen-year-old can help build a startup from the ground up,” James said. “This summer will be our beta launch, and by the end of summer, that’s where we’d go big, and [the students] would be there in the trenches with us. They’d be building out the platform from the tech side and also from the marketing and communication side, helping us with our socials and everything else. They’re not doing coffee runs and not answering the phones for us. It’s like they are literally members of our team side by side.”
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“I can’t anticipate [the results of the project], but that’s also what makes it so much fun,” Lee said.
“Every student is doing something different, and there’s always something that I did not expect to happen because part of the project is introducing a random mutation in the flies. The students and I have no control over the mutation, so it’s like a learning journey for both of us, which is what I love about [the project].”
Aviv Pilipski ’25 said listening to various students speak about their projects allowed
him to view communication from a new perspective.
“I learned that clarity is just as powerful as complexity from the symposium,” Pilipski said. “Hearing my peers and students from other schools speak, I realized that the most impactful presentations weren’t the ones that were just loaded with jargon but the ones that were distilled into something profound and graspable. That changed how I think about communication a lot, not just in science but in any space where you need to get ideas across.”
Lee said she appreciated the quality time she spent with her students throughout the school year and at the symposium.
“I enjoyed getting to know the students and spending a lot of time together,” Lee said. “Also, the two classes that don’t usually interact got to spend time with each other. I got to see my students outside the classroom and really got to know them, and they got to know me. It’s definitely the best symposium I [have] attended over the past couple of years.”
FLY FINDINGS : After studying and selectively breeding multiple generations of fruit flies, the Research in Molecular Genetics class convened at the Stanford University School of Medicine to present and share their findings.
LUCA GONZALEZ/CHRONICLE
JOB HUNTING: Assistant Opinion Editor Audrey Kim ’26 discovers start-up Hom, which uses AI to visualize completed homes before construction.
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Julien Liu ’25
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Sally Ramberg ’26
Global Affairs Club hosts LAWAC AI panel
By Colin Ho
The Global Affairs Club hosted the Los Angeles World Affairs Council (LAWAC) on campus in a forum in Ahmanson Lecture Hall on April 25. The discussion, titled “The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence (AI),” was moderated by Occidental College Associate Professor of Cognitive and Computer Science Justin Li.
Global Affairs Club Founder and Presentations Editor Nathan Wang ’25 said he was happy the community came together to make the event possible.
“I was so proud to be able to finally host an event on our campus,” Wang said. “It was the most ideal way to give back to the organization, which has provided so much for us. The process of organizing the event itself was difficult, con-
sidering the time it took to meet with members of the planning committee and arrange the space.
We are grateful to others clubs in the school community who moved their meetings from Ahmanson for us to host this event.”
LAWAC Chief Executive Officer Richard Downie said it is important to maintain independent thinking skills and to limit AI from being pervasive into everyday thinking.
“There was a study done by Harvard recently that found cognitive decline in people who relied too much on AI,” Downie said. “You really need to exercise your own brain and do the cognitive work that helps your brain develop, as opposed to depending on generative AI tools. Use AI to complement what you’re doing, but don’t replace it with your own thinking and ideas. People don’t want to hear something that’s
regurgitated from AI, they want to hear your ideas.”
Li said he has already seen the impacts of AI on the job market and urged both individuals and the government to hold companies accountable to using it ethically.
“Companies are not necessarily thinking about how their use of AI will affect anything other than profits,” Li said. “It’s up to the people and the government to voice concerns to companies. AI already has changed the way we go about our daily lives and the job market. People are already being laid off because AI has taken over many of the jobs that they were doing. It’s only going to get worse in the next three or four decades. If you want to survive and make a living in this new economy, it’s your own responsibility to learn how to use AI to your advantage.”
Downie said he hopes the eth-
Holocaust survivor gives presentation
By Tali Gurule
Louis Corper Fogelman, a Holocaust survivor, spoke to the sophomore class about his experience during World War II in Rugby Hall on April 22. Sarah Anschell ’26 and Sophia Wicyzk ’26, who intern at StandWithUs, a nonprofit organization that hosts educational programs to combat antisemitism, hosted Fogelman in anticipation of Holocaust Remembrance Day. Anschell and Wicyzk worked with Coordinator of Jewish Life and Community Engagement Sarah Rapaport and the History Department to plan the event.
Anschell said Fogelman’s presentation was meant to provide sophomores with a first-hand source from the Holocaust, which they are currently studying in their history class, Rise of the Modern World.
“We felt Fogelman’s story would bring an invaluable personal touch to the material they’re learning,” Anschell said. “It’s one thing to read about the atrocities of the Holocaust for homework or to take a test on the extremes of fascism, but it’s totally different to hear a person right in front of you talking about real things they lived through.”
Born in the Netherlands in 1941, Fogelman was one-year-old
when he and his parents were captured by the Gestapo and sent to Hollandsche Schouwburg, a Dutch theater used to detain Jewish people before they were deported to concentration camps. Though Fogelman’s parents were unable to escape, a resistance movement smuggled Fogelman out of the theater and sent him to live with a Catholic family for the remainder of the war. Fogelman said his parents were sent to Auschwitz, where they were killed.
“I was separated from my parents, never to see, feel or smell them ever again,” Fogelman said. “My parents were transported in cattle cars to Auschwitz, where they were murdered. My mother was 24 years young, and my father was 28 years young when they were murdered. And for what? For being Jewish.”
Years after the war, Fogelman uncovered the story of his escape from the Hollandsche Schouwburg Theater. A 17-year-old nursery teacher, Sieny Kattenburg, cared for the Jewish children in the theater and worked for the resistance. She quietly asked Jewish parents whether they wanted the resistance to take their babies from the nursery and transport them to safety. If they agreed, Kattenburg would hand the children over to the resis-
tance. Fogelman said Kattenburg saved over 600 Jewish children, and he still feels connected to her.
“Kattenburg has been a part of my soul since the day we first met,” Fogelman said. “Her beautiful face and kind eyes will live in my heart forever. I always referred to Kattenburg as my earth angel. She passed away about four years ago, and now she’s become my guiding angel.”
After the war, Fogelman lived with his aunt and uncle. They decided to move to the United States, where they adopted Fogelman, and he became a citizen. Fogelman said he was thankful for the community that had helped him during the war.
“I was one of the lucky ones,” Fogelman said. “I only survived because of all the wonderful people in my life.”
Jonah Greenfeld ’27 said Fogelman’s presentation helped him connect to the stories of the Holocaust on a personal level.
“Hearing this firsthand account brought so much emotion to the stories of the Holocaust,” Greenfeld said. “It’s important for people like Fogelman to speak to students so we can better understand the experiences of the people during the Holocaust.”
Teacher and student write article
By Holden Kim
English Teacher John Garrison and Max Turetzky ’25 co-authored a book review analyzing three new Shakespeare teaching guides published by the Folger Shakespeare Library. The guides focus on “Hamlet,” “Romeo and Juliet” and “Macbeth,” with upcoming guides for “Othello” and “The Tempest.” The review will be published in the peer-reviewed journal “Studies in Medieval and Renaissance Teaching.”
Garrison said the collaboration emerged from his and Turetzky’s shared experience studying Shakespeare in Garrison’s Honors English IV: Good Grief class.
“Max and I read Hamlet together in class, but we also read parts of other Shakespeare works,” Garrison said. “When there was this opportunity to write a book review of these new guides, we decided it would be a fun project to integrate what he sees as a student and what I see as a teacher.”
ics of using AI will become more prominent in political discourse.
“Despite all of the wonderful advantages of AI, there are real downsides, like deepfakes,” Downie said. “While there are ways to detect them, they’re getting better and better. To stay ahead of that, there absolutely needs to be government regulation to minimize the impacts of the downsides of AI and still allow for its benefits.”
Sophia Wong ’27 said she believes young people play a critical part in deciding the role AI plays in society.
“AI has both the potential to develop for good or for worse,” Wong said. “As members of Generation Z, we need to be very considerate about how AI will be used in the future. Our generation will shape how AI will develop, and it’s up to us to control it.”
Turetzky said he and Garrison split the writing tasks before coming back together to review and revise each other’s work.
“We had a rough outline for what we wanted to write,” Turetzky said. “We each wrote drafts of our assigned paragraphs, then met several times to put them together and edit. Through that process, we created one unified, coherent voice.”
Turetzky said their review examined how the guides engage current students by incorporating today’s cultural references and discussions of themes like race, gender and class.
“What we tried to do was strike a balance between what the books did well in engaging students with Shakespeare and constructive criticism about elements that could be improved,” Turetzky said.
LEARNING FROM THE BEST: The Global Affairs Club partnered with the Los Angeles World Affairs Council for an event, hosting a variety of panelists to speak to attendees from schools throughout the city. The speakers facilitated discussions on the repercussions and ethics of artificial intelligence.
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editorial
Have Faith in Administration
In the upcoming 2025-2026 school year, major changes including a revised schedule and tightened phone restrictions will significantly alter campus life for students, teachers and faculty at the Upper School. A schedule that keeps students on campus longer and the return of the Middle School’s more restrictive phone policy may seem like a step in the wrong direction, but in order to improve as a school, we must work to embrace change and trust the administration’s ability to address problems within our community.
In the past five years, the school endured numerous hardships including a COVID-19 pandemic with pervasive impacts, student tragedies and devastating wildfires. Although all of these events had varying impacts on the community, they have affected every student and faculty member in some way or another. As a result of these difficulties and the school’s intrinsic rigor, students and faculty alike have the tendency to isolate and seek comfort within themselves. Combining this harmful habit with the existing dangers of social media on adolescent minds, students have a heightened desire to distract themselves with their phones while on campus or leave school at their earliest convenience.
The new changes will allow students and faculty to be more present with one another during the day and feel a genuine duty to other members of their community rather than themselves. The removal of phones will prompt students to interact with their peers without any distractions, which will foster friendship and connection without feeling forced. Teachers will feel a larger presence in the classroom with the undivided attention of students not constantly distracted by their phones. In addition, events
and speakers specifically designated during the community time period will help build rapport and connection among students and faculty alike.
Although many may think limiting student privileges will be detrimental to the overall student experience, preparing students for college, socializing with peers and faculty and being a meaningful part of a community are arguably just as important as utilizing one’s freedom. Especially when considering poor student behavior and a clear disregard for our campus and fellow community members in the past year, the student body has not shown that they have earned the amount of freedom previously granted by the school. With students staying on campus for longer periods of time without access to the distraction of cell phones, students will come to appreciate the value of a strong community and the impact they can have within it.
For the longest time, students have antagonized the faculty and administration when policy changes have restricted their privilege and comfort. Despite the school being one of the best private educational institutions in the nation, students need to let go of their entitled behavior and understand how their actions and habits contribute to the lack of real community on campus. Many in the administration have seen the school change over several years, and instituting vast changes is not new or foreign to them. Although it may seem like they lack an understanding of student life, we need to put our trust in the administration to make decisions that may not be appealing to students in the short term, but that are sure to improve the experiences of both students and faculty in the long term. about us
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ILLUSTRATION
TImplement required summer reading
By James Corman
he joy of a good book is a feeling that teens today are decreasingly familiar with. Less than 20% of teens read daily for pleasure, according to the American Psychological Association. Because they get such little practice, some students have never built up the stamina and attention span to read novels; the American Psychological Association reported that since 2004, attention spans have decreased from two minutes to 40 seconds as a result of screens and social media. On top of the allure of shortform content, students are also swamped with homework, athletics and extracurriculars, and many struggle to find the time to read for pleasure. If the school introduces a mandatory summer reading program, it could help to alleviate these issues by helping lengthen attention spans, increasing exposure to new ideas and improving reasoning and critical thinking.
There are reasons why our school in particular should implement summer reading. 40% of colleges have a summer reading assignment for incom -
ing freshmen, according to the University of South Carolina. These books often make strong statements and are meant to give the class ideas to grapple with, according to the New York Times. With the school being a college preparatory institution, it would be fitting for students to grow accustomed to summer reading before higher education. Faculty and staff have summer reading assignments. Before this school year, employees of the school read “I Never Thought of It That Way” by Mónica Guzmán. The book
Reading is crucial in a world filled with shortform entertainment.
discussed how to bring together multiple perspectives and help people from opposing viewpoints reach a consensus on various issues. The teachers and administrators benefitted from this summer reading, and students would gain insights from similar discourse.
The summer reading system can function as follows: Students would select a book to read over the summer from a list of appropriately challenging novels selected by the English Department, and present a book review at the start of the school year. This would be a fun, low-stakes way to ensure that students do the reading. For grade-motivated students, the presentations would be graded based on general effort. Summer reading allows students to read at their own pace. There is no need for SparkNotes or a summary when there is no imminent deadline or quiz. Students should not feel stressed or shackled by summer reading. For many students, the experience of reading “for pleasure,” as opposed to cramming five chapters the night before an essay, will be a new and enlightening experience. Summer reading can consequently help students discover that they do, in fact, enjoy reading and may cause them to continue casual reading throughout the school year and their lives.
• Continued on hwchronicle.com
IPerformative activism is unproductive
By Audrey Kim
f you’ve been active on Instagram for the past couple of weeks, you have likely seen videos of people dumping ice water over their heads for the USC Speak Your Mind ice bucket challenge. From your friends to people you barely know but follow anyway, everyone seems to be posting videos that depict the video creator pouring ice water on themselves and nominating three or four others to do the same. The ice bucket challenge dominated Instagram for weeks, but after scrolling through all of these stories and posts, do viewers really understand why people are doing the challenge, or why it started in the first place?
The ice bucket challenge first gained popularity over a decade ago to raise funds and awareness for ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig's Disease, a motor functionaffecting illness. The challenge went viral on social media platforms, especially Facebook, during the summer 2014 and raised $115 million, according to the ALS website. In February 2025, a club called the Mental Illness Discussion Club at the Univer-
sity of South Carolina revived the challenge to spread awareness for mental health and remove stigmas surrounding mental health and suicidal ideation, dubbing it the “ USC Speak Your Mind Ice Bucket Challenge.” The trend has since gone viral amongst teenagers and young adults on Instagram and TikTok.
This new iteration of the ice bucket challenge did go viral and has been an effective strategy for the USC club to market their cause. The origins of the chal-
Quick social media posts simply may not be an effective format for raising awareness.
lenge were well-intentioned, and its popularity shows the potential of viral social media trends to spread awareness for important causes. However, in many ice bucket challenge videos, people forget to even name the challenge and just go straight to nominating other people and dumping water. Some people even forget to tag
IRevise the new schedule
By Ellika LeSage
t’s Day 5, and I’m walking out of school at 1:00 p.m. The sun hits my face as I step off campus, and the air feels fresh. I have the whole afternoon ahead of me, and I can do whatever I want. Maybe I’ll get lunch with friends, take the long way home with music blasting or just crash on the couch with a book before even thinking about homework. There’s no rush, no pressure. Just freedom. On days like this, I feel more like a real person than simply a student moving from class to class. So, when I opened the March edition of The Chronicle and saw the headline about the new 2025–2026 Upper School schedule, my stomach dropped. Those early dismissals and little moments of peace and possibility will be taken away. In the administration's bid to fix the student and teacher experience, they’ve forgotten what really makes one’s day enjoyable. Under the new schedule, Community Time and Conference Time will be moved to 9:20 a.m., right after the first class of the day. Other blocks will be moved accordingly, meaning students will not be able to leave before 2:15 p.m. on any given day of the cycle. The new structure is designed to limit students’ ability to leave early in order to encourage more oncampus interaction and more all-school events, according to Head of Upper School Beth Slattery. It also aims to reduce
the pressure on teachers to meet with students during lunch and to allow for a more standard lunchtime. While these goals are admirable, the unintended consequences of this shift deserve serious consideration.
One of the main concerns is the removal of flexibility. Under the current schedule, on odd days, students without a Directed Study can leave campus once they finish their last class of the day. For many, this has been an important time to recharge or catch up on work. The new schedule removes that option by moving non-academic blocks to earlier in the day, ensuring that students remain on campus longer. While the schedule may create more structure, it limits student autonomy. Leaving school early does not inherently take away from our community. If anything, it alleviates stress and offers students structured times during the week to spend time with their friends off campus. There’s also the question of how effective a change in timing will really be in fostering connection. While scheduling more events during Community Time may result in a greater all-school presence, it doesn’t guarantee engagement. Community isn’t built by requiring everyone to be in the same place at the same time. In fact, over-scheduling can have the opposite effect: student disengagement.
• Continued on hwchronicle.com
the original club or the university in their posts, making their nominees and viewers are unable to view the original challenge or its fundraiser links. Overall, as the challenge has spread nationally, the mental health-related intentions have faded into the rearview mirror, with the spectacle of people shrieking from the shock of ice cold water taking over as the main reason for the virality of the trend.
The new ice bucket challenge seems to have devolved into a form of performative activism, a type of activism that is ultimately done for attention despite appearing to genuinely support a cause on the surface. People seem to be doing the challenge mainly to dare their friends and not to actually focus on mental health. The original creators of the trend at USC were most likely genuine in their desire to raise mental health awareness, and many nominees or creators are not deliberately leaving out fundraising links or forgetting to name the challenge. Quick social media posts simply may not be an effective format for raising awareness.
• Continued on hwchronicle.com
ILLUSTRATION BY ELLIOT MURPHY
ILLUSTRATION BY AMELIA CHIARELLI
ILLUSTRATION BY ANIKA NORTON
EDUCATION OVER EXECUTIVES
By Eila Shokravi
When I toured colleges, I picked up each school’s newspaper and flipped through the pages to further my understanding of the life on each campus. As I read more and more, I noticed a common thread: rioting against President Trump’s hostile policies on educational funding. Many of these articles depicted students protesting and school boards rejecting Trump’s funding attacks in order to achieve individual independence from the government. Although the federal government should not have significant control over educational funding, academic institutions must utilize their existing funding from donations and tuition intelligently by prioritizing the financial support of their students and faculty.
Early April, Trump froze billions of dollars in funding from academic institutions such as
Assistant Opinion Editor Eila Shokravi ’26 argues that elite colleges should prioritize the education and financial stability of their community while President Trump freezes funds.
Cornell University, Harvard University and University of Pennsylvania, among many others, due to recent civil rights investigations into universities. It is important to consider the repercussions of these anti-DEI initiatives and frozen funds on students and faculty, impacting academic quality and research opportunities. Regardless of if these colleges protest against Trump’s frozen fund initiatives, they will likely be forced on schools so it is important that these institutions adjust where they allocate their funding to important areas such as research, financial aid and employee salaries.
Trump’s initiatives to punish universities because of his opposing views on what civil rights are appropriate is a political overreach; it is not Trump’s place to control the diversity approaches of private institutions. According to Quad Ed ucation, a team
STATS AND FACTS
Will Trump’s attacks on higher education impact your college application decisions?
rent schools that have had funding
erage unweighted grade point average of between 3.9 and 4.0 and SAT scores over 400 points higher than the nations average.
tense dedication
ics over their high school career, scoring mostly A’s and almost acing their standardized demically gifted and hard-working
tutions applied for ed education and opportunities that these colleges offer but will not receive the same options cent freezing of funds. Increasing nities for students is a goal among most colleges and universities across the nation and
with funding frozen those opportunities will only decline. Impacted colleges should allocate their funding to necessary things such as updated textbooks and technology rather than miscellaneous clubs and events in order to uphold the standard of their education — at least for now.
Most if not all of the professors at these Ivy League colleges have PhDs or an equivalent doctorate. Depending on the area of study, doctoral degrees take four to six years to complete. After all of the effort these professors have put into their education for their careers, they deserve adequate research opportunities and wages. With funding being paused, universities run the risk of needing to limit research in order to support students onfinancial aid and pay faculty salaries. A lot of these professors are dependent on their research possibilities provided by the school to further their careers and knowledge. Also, many students conduct research with their professors, so the lack of funding will not only affect the professors’ opportunities but the education and research experience of their students.
Although the federal government froze funding, donors still send money to educational institutions. Given that donors aren’t going to stop donating, schools should shift their focus to using donor funds to support financial aid students and faculty wages. Before the freeze, the federal government’s funds covered the costs of financial support and salaries and without their grants, there will be little money going into these
academic institutions to in support of these goals. But, these schools are not entirely dependent on donors now. These colleges should utilize tuition money and endowment funds and look into possible savings to support the necessities. They should while cut down on unnecessary funding toward smaller campus organizations and speaker events in order to make up for what is lost with the lack of federal funding. Although clubs and speaker events are important for the school community, it is necessary that colleges prioritize the financial stability of their students and employees until the federal college funds unfreeze and are able to support financial assistance and employee wages again.
The decisions made by these college boards can and will affect the school’s students, as these are institutions that students often apply to. In fact, 54 students in the class of 2024 attended the same Ivy League colleges that are getting their funding frozen and 33.8% of students polled said they will be dependent on financial aid as college students. If colleges don’t step up to support students dependent on financial aid, many of the students at Harvard-Westlake can be left with fewer opportunities just because of their financial status. It is important that we recognize how necessary it is for these collegiate institutions to disregard Trump’s decision and support the education and financial stability of their students and staff with the funds they currently have, independent of the federal government.
Should private universities be able to make decisions on DEI without federal input?
Are you concerned that frozen funding will impact the quality of higher education?
AND DASH: A suspect was apprehended on April 25 in front of a home on the intersection of Coldwater Canyon Avenue and Clawson Place (not pictured). The pursuit started in Hollywood Hills after the suspect got in an argument with her partner and attempted to run him over. The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) and SWAT team were able to corner the culprit.
Hit-and-run
By Lydia Gugsa
A hit-and-run suspect was taken into custody Friday afternoon after a slow-speed chase ended with a multiple hour standoff in front of a Studio City home on Coldwater Canyon Avenue, half a mile away from the school.
It began in Hollywood after the suspect got into an argument with her partner, according to Fox 10. He got out of the vehicle when she allegedly hit him and attempted to run him over. The pursuit was initiated shortly after Los Angeles Police Department officers arrived at the scene.
Around 30 minutes later, the
suspect arrested on Coldwater Canyon
suspect continued driving with flat tires, even after officers deployed spike strips in hopes of putting the pursuit to an end. Along the way, police attempted a Precision Immobilization Technique (PIT) maneuver to disable the truck and eventually boxed the car in front of a Studio City home.
Just after noon, SWAT team members in three LAPD armored vehicles arrived at the scene and boxed-in the truck. Livestreams of the incident showed SWAT team members smashing out the truck’s rear and driver windows with a metal pole, then using the pole to drop canisters of gas inside the truck cab to force the driver out.
Seniors showcase local eats in end-of-year list
By Jack Letterman
Wolvereats, a Studio City restaurant review account ran by seven seniors, has posted their ratings of local eats on their Instagram account. Below, they have compiled a list of their top nine lunch spots.
9. Henry’s Tacos: We filmed our second episode here, and it was a pretty decent experience. The tacos were really good but also had an unconventional structure. They were almost like burrito tacos. The taste was there, but the overall vibe was not up to the other restaurants you’ll see on the list.
8. Muffin Can Stop Us: Because this was our first video, we did rate it a little high. If you’re in a hurry, we might recommend this spot. It does the job.
7. 8oz Poke: Eight Oz Poke was kind of a letdown. There’s other poke spots in the area that are better. But overall, it does take
the edge over Muffin Can Stop Us because it has more variety and more options.
6. Cactus Taqueria: This was our very first A-. We’ve been going here since sophomore year and we absolutely love the place. So many options, and almost everything tastes great. We recommend the horchata with some tacos.
5. Twin Castle: Twin Castle has donuts and burgers. The burgers are alright, but between everyone in our group, burgers are just a staple meal and Twin Castle does the job. If you want to try something new and get some sweets afterwards, this is not a bad option.
4. Ggiata: Recently, Ggiata has blown up, since it opened a new location right across from the Joan’s on Third. There’s nearly 20 different sandwich options, and they all taste great. We recommend the grilled chicken caesar wrap.
3. Hawaiian Hot Chicken:
The suspect was taken into custody around 12:30 pm.
Head of Upper School Beth Slattery said the school acted quickly to ensure student safety.
“We initially became aware because of the helicopters overhead,” Slattery said. “Then we contacted our security team which has contacts in the LAPD and they were able to tell us the nature of the police activity.”
Slattery said the administration took precautionary measures despite there being no immediate threat to the school.
“Because we were in contact with LAPD and knew the nature of the situation, we knew there
was not a danger to our community,” Slattery said. “But, in an abundance of caution, we did not allow students to leave campus and we suggested that adults not leave campus either.”
Kyle Henderson ’27 said he was alarmed by the sudden presence of helicopters around the school.
“I was in math class when I saw multiple helicopters hovering above the school,” Henderson said. “It was really scary at first because none of us knew what was going on. I went back inside and one of my classmates told us that there was a hit and run suspect who wouldn’t get out of her car a couple minutes away
near the junior parking lot. It was very surreal.”
Kailani Yap ’26 said the school’s cautious but calm response helped students feel safe despite the initial shock.
“I was pretty shocked because I didn’t realize something like this could happen so close to us,” Yap said. “I’m glad they figured it out in a couple of hours. The school’s clear communication through email and telling us not to leave campus didn’t raise any fear for me and my friends. We all felt protected and safe because it felt like the school was on top of the situation and taking the right steps to keep us informed and calm.”
DINE AND DISCUSS: Seniors spend their lunch eating at local Studio City restaurant Pico Pica Rico. The group tries restaurants close to the school and reviews them on their Instagram account @wolvereats.
Hawaiian hot chicken is just so consistent. When you go to a restaurant during lunch, what you’re looking for is consistency. And every time we go there, it delivers. There’s so many hot chicken sandwiches shops all over LA, but the seasoning here is really exceptional. It’s very unique, and has a Hawaiian twist.
2. Pico Pica Rico: Pico got a C/B- environment. We recom-
mend getting the taco plate, not the not the asana plate, which we had some issues with. What they’re lacking in vibes, they make up for with their great prices and delicious food. They also had soccer playing in the background, which we always appreciate. The biggest con though is that it’s kind of out of the way from school.
1. Big Daddy Shawarma: How could Big Daddy Shawarma not be
number one? Every time someone goes to Big Daddy, they tell us, ‘We’re going to Big Daddy.’ This was the first time we’d given out an A. You step inside and the decor is very nice. My personal favorite is the chicken shawarma plate. All the sides are very customizable and there aren’t really any misses. I’ve heard no complaints. This is definitely the true number one restaurant, and our very best review video. We had so much fun here.
CRASH
Speaking From The Heart
By Lydia Gugsa
Jack Austen ’23 rose up in shock as he heard his name called at the Cum Laude Ceremony in May of 2023. He had just been selected to be the valedictorian of the Class of 2023. As he went up onto the Rugby stage to shake President Rick Commons’ hand, he felt a rush of excitement. Austen said he never thought he would be being named valedictorian, but he was thrilled when it happened.
“I had never worked towards being valedictorian in particular,” Austen said. “Of course broadly I was trying to take difficult, interesting classes and do well, but valedictorian was never on my radar. I was very surprised. I had an inkling that I might be one of the people up for consideration, but I thought beforehand that it was very unlikely that I would be selected.”
Leo Craig ’24, who was also selected as valedictorian, said his experience was positive and filled with support from his peers.
Faculty and alumni reflect on the evolving traditions and changing significance of the valedictorian and salutatorian roles over time.
“Traditionally the valedictorian has the highest GPA in the class, but because at Harvard-Westlake that top student is maybe a 1000th of a decimal point above the next student, it’s a difference without a distinction,” Cuseo said. “We’ll generally look at the top five students, and look for a natural break so that we aren’t splitting between two students who are a 1000th of a point difference. Once those students have been determined, we’ll announce the people in contention for valedictorian, and the faculty vote based on intellectual engagement, curiosity and speaking ability.”
“It was such an amazing moment,” Craig said. “Being called up on stage there and shaking Mr. Commons’ hand was such an honor. Everyone else was really supportive and congratulating me. There was not any bad emotions at all with people being jealous, or anything like that. The whole process of being at the ceremony was pretty easy, and it was good.”
In many schools across the nation, valedictorian is awarded to the student with the highest grade point average (GPA), and salutatorian is awarded to the student who has the second highest GPA, according to transizion.com, a knowledge platform of college admissions and career development experts. Upper School Dean Sharon Cuseo said the selection process for valedictorian at the school is not based
Austen said his experience with the selection process for valedictorian was surprisingly non-competitive, even among his friends who were also in contention.
“It did not feel competitive,” Austen said. “Even with my friends who I knew had wanted to win the award themselves, the conversations and interactions were all very positive. It didn’t really bother anyone because these are people who have very well-defined senses of self-worth. The valedictorian award, while it might seem like a big deal at the time, is not actually that important.”
The salutatorian is not selected not by GPA, but a student vote based on who the class wants to hear speak. During the same year that Austen was elected valedictorian, the vote for the class of 2023’s Salutatorian was tied, and former Features Editor Harry Tarses ’23 and Carter Staggs ’23 were both selected to speak. Tarses said the process was unexpected but special.
“Mr. Commons called us into his office beforehand,” Tarses said. “Carter and I had done a lot of the same things. We had very similar careers at Harvard-Westlake and I thought he definitely could get it, or I could maybe get it because peo
The job of the valedictorian and salutatorian is speak at graduation. At the school, valedictorian speaks first, followed by the salutatorian. Victor Suh ’25 said having student speakers at commencement helps the ceremony feel more meaningful.
“It’s always great when a send off for a student class comes from one or two of the students,” Suh said. “Commencement makes sense that way, and overall feels right. It’s symbolic, especially when they’re people that both the faculty and the student body recognize as representative of their class and its character.”
Austen said the opportunity to speak at graduation allowed him to reflect on the lessons he had learned during his four years at the school.
“
“My speech was about competitiveness and the good and bad forms of it, specifically focusing on how it could change one’s experience for the better, or be really hurtful at times,” Austen said. “My writing process began with getting the idea which came from my experiences with the hyper-competitive environment that we have at Harvard-Westlake and what I thought had been the most sort of defining mistakes I had made. I wanted to write a speech that I thought if I had heard and listened to earlier on in my Harvard-Westlake experience, I would have taken a lot away from.”
side of being selected was knowing how many of his classmates were equally qualified.
“The thing about the Cum Laude ceremony is that so many of those people are all at the top of the class, and they’re all really accomplished people,” Craig said. “It’s definitely hard to be chosen as one out of all those people, especially because I was in classes with so many of those people, and they’re all super deserving too.”
Cuseo said the school has considered rethinking the titles of valedictorian and salutatorian in order to better reflect Harvard-Westlake’s holistic selection process and to avoid the confusion tied to traditional GPA-based definitions.
Broadly I was trying to take difficult, interesting classes and do well, but valedictorian was never on my radar.”
Jack Austen
’23
Tarses said him and Staggs used humor in their speech to highlight their differences while still delivering a meaningful message.
“We just wanted to make a joke about how we were mad that we had to do it together, but that [it] actually was a huge privilege,” Tarses said. “What it allowed us to do through the lens of a joke or
“We’ve thought about it because some people feel really strongly that valedictorian means the highest GPA in the class, even if it isn’t a huge distinction,” Cuseo said.
“Salutatorian often means second highest GPA in the class. I understand why some people would think that because my high school made the student with the second highest GPA salutatorian. Instead, we’ve thought about calling them faculty speaker and student speaker. The conversation is definitely ongoing.”
Austen said he believes the true value of school lies more in growth than in competition.
“I would say competing for the valedictorian title specifically is just kind of silly,” Austen said. “It’s so much less important than the intellectual development that you will achieve through the process of being at Harvard-Westlake. There are certainly contexts in which competition can be a very good motivator for personal growth and personal success, [but] competing for a specific award is generally not that meaningful and important.”
Sharon Cuseo
L. wood
PurPose in
Alumni working in politics discuss when they became interested in politics, the school’s involvement in their journey and the most memorable moments of their career.
By Andrea Ricabal
Co-host of the War Room podcast Natalie Winters ’19 stood just offstage in Rugby Auditorium as the heat of the lights spilled over the crowd and the low hum of student voices buzzed like static. She had expected to see a handful of kids, maybe a bored teacher or two. Instead, the auditorium overflowed with chatter as students packed the seats, lined the walls and spilled into a secondary viewing room set up to accommodate the turnout. Winters approached the mic. She spoke sharply, challenging mainstream feminist narratives. Gasps cut through the room, and footsteps echoed as someone walked out of the auditorium. Although not the most positive high school memory, Win ters said the moment was transformative because the school gave her a platform to express her views even when some did not agree with her.
“That was when I realized people like watching these debates,” Winters said. “It was a very eye-opening moment be cause sometimes liberals who never [ac cept] my views are unfairly impugned as being very ossified in their ideology. [They] get very offended by hearing dif ferent viewpoints. That’s why I appreci ated going to Harvard-Westlake because it taught me how to cater my message and my arguments to people who I knew did not agree with me. I use those skills now on TV, but instead of being broad cast in an auditorium, we’re getting a million-plus views and are shared by the president and his advisors.”
The school’s alumni have gone on to politics across the ideological spectrum, with many working behind the scenes for campaigns or working in the media. For mer Los Angeles Mayor and current U.S. Ambassador to India Eric Garcetti ’88 and former U.S. Attorney and Special Coun sel Robert Hur ’91, attended the school. Hur is currently representing Harvard University in its confrontation over federal funding with the Trump Administration, according to Politico.
After graduating from Macalester Col lege, Emma Kaplan ’08 said she got in volved in politics by working under For mer Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, who taught her about the nuances of poli
tics and change-making.
“I got a job working for Nancy Pelosi, who, at that point, was the [House] Minority Leader,” Kaplan said. “I got this amazing close-up view of how you make change, and it wasn’t how I thought it was. I thought it was this lofty thing. [I thought] we had this vision and we’re going to get there by pushing forward, convincing everybody that this is the right way to do it. Instead, it’s very person-to-person. You have to convince people to get on board by knowing who they are and what makes them tick. Sometimes I manipulate situations in a
and forth more or less every week from DC to Chicago,” Winters said. “Then at the emergence of the first Trump impeachment, Bannon got back together to start the show that ultimately turned into the show I now co-host and hosted while Steve Bannon was in prison. I started working behind the scenes as a staff writer, and embraced the Harvard-Westlake hardwork mentality. Ultimately, I worked my way up to becoming Steve’s co-host at the age of 20. I started appearing on conservative media and broke a lot of stories.”
While Winters found her voice
skipping Peer Support on a Monday to go to Obama’s rally in Los Angeles.”
Like Kaplan, Luke Rascoff ’27 said he is getting involved in campaigns while still in high school.
“Politics has an incredibly tangible impact on people’s lives and the legislation that gets passed is something that people should be paying more attention to,” Rascoff said. “I’ve gotten involved by volunteering on political campaigns, a congressional campaign over the summer and, most recently, the Kamala Harris campaign in Pennsylvania in October.”
For individuals like Kaplan and Rascoff, political identities can develop through campaigning. However, in Winters’ experience, they can develop through a willingness to express political opinions even when her audience disagrees.
“I had an English teacher, and I thought she was one of the most wonderful teachers I had,” Winters said. “I loved the analysis of poetry [and] literary devices, but she was very left-wing and shared her political ideology with the class. I felt the need to sort of pretend to get along, but I didn’t like lying about my beliefs. Eventually, I outed myself as supporting Trump, but it was an oddly cathartic experience. From a psychological level, I just decided, from that moment forward, I would never lie about my political beliefs just to appease people.”
Both Winters and Kaplan reflect on their experiences in high school as formative and impactful on their careers. Kaplan said her experience as a prefect and participation on the Honor Board shaped her
“The Honor Board truly was this eye-opening experience for me,” Kaplan said. “It sounds corny as a 34-year-old person to say that, but it truly was a game changer for me. It made me think about the ways that we make decisions about other people’s lives, what we prioritize and what we include in the Honor Code. The things that grounded Harvard-Westlake as an institution translated into what I do and what I’ve been doing since I graduated from college.”
Former Georgia Press Secretary for Harris for President, Alice Nam ’16 said she found herself working
in Politics
closely with some of the country’s top Democratic leaders. Nam said working on political campaigns and gaining experience is incredibly valuable to her.
“I interned in Speaker Pelosi’s office in the beginning of 2020, and then in the spring of 2020, I ended up getting a job in Senator Chuck Schumer’s office,” Nam said. “I never looked back. I worked on his upstate press team and his national press team. I helped write guidance for Senate Democrats and went on to be Representative Marilyn Strickland’s communications director. I was Senator [Laphonza] But ler’s deputy communications director while she was in the Senate. In April of last year, I joined the then Biden-Har ris campaign that transitioned into the Harris-Walz campaign.”
“I got to be there for it and see him walk onto the floor and address the House, the Senate and the diplomatic corps with such conviction about what’s happening in Ukraine and the help they need from this country,” Kaplan said. “That moment will stick with me forever.”
“ I appreciated going to HarvardWestlake because it taught me how to cater to people who did not agree with me.”
Natalie Winters ’19
Nam said she used her voice to el evate underrepresented communities within progressive campaigns. She said one of her most rewarding moments in her political journey was her experience as the Georgia Press Secretary for the Harris campaign because she was able to give a voice to the Asian American community.
“To see people and their struggles, to acknowledge them and then to be able to help elevate them to a public or more national stage has been one of the most re warding parts,” Nam said. “That is why I continue to want to do [this work]. Moments when you [are] not just working for a specific presidential candidate, but [are] able to hear peo ple’s struggles is one of the privileges of [doing] political work. I bear witness to people’s struggles and triumphs and share those with the rest of the world.”
On a personal level, Kaplan said one of her most memorable career moments was working on and helping plan the joint session of Congress when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelen skyy spoke to Congress.
didn’t make it my brand or my personality, but now I maybe play into it a little more but only because the left media has made it a thing.”
Although Winters said she is proud of her accomplishments at a young age, she has also faced criticism. Winters
reporting, which ironically is coming from the left.”
Gen Z is a dominant force in the electorate, but many young voters express a sense of fatalism about the political system’s ability to address these challenges, according to University of California, Berkeley Research.
The alumni have made their impact on national politics, Rascoff said he wishes students of his generation were more involved in politics and got more informed about issues.
“I wish that there was more discussion of politics by students at Harvard-Westlake,” Rascoff said. “It seems like something that people are not as excited to talk about. I am more liberal, and I support Democrats, but I hope that no matter what political affiliation someone has or what their interest in politics is, they feel comfortable discussing it with their teachers [and] with their fellow classmates in as many settings as possible because I think the more students discuss politics, the more engaged they are and the more young people we have in the political system, the more positive change we’re going to produce. Right now, it feels like everyone’s kind of scared to talk or say the wrong thing. [It] doesn’t feel like they’re informed enough. I wish people jumped in more.”
When reflecting on her experiences throughout her political journey, Kaplan said she recalls both positive and negative moments.
“I’ve gotten to be a part of once-in-a-lifetime experiences, some of them amazing and some of them truly tragic,” Kaplan said. “I was there on January 6 and I was there when we had a unified Democratic government. We were able to pass such significant legislation, like the Inflation Reduction Act, the Build Back Better infrastructure bill and the Tips and Science Act. We passed the PACT Act, which protects veterans who have experienced burn pits and provides them with healthcare. Legislation big and small made a difference in so many people’s lives. Getting to be a part of two impeachments was also kind of wild to me personally. I’ll just never forget that.”
Traditions of Trust
Students and faculty discuss the history, impact and the future of Peer Support at the school and the program’s influence on campus.
By Sienna Dall’Olmo
It is 2022. While most classrooms at the school sit empty at 5:45 p.m. on a Monday evening, Rugby and Chalmers are quickly filled by students splitting into their Peer Support Rooms. Sophomore Nate Arnold ’25 walks into Rugby, for his first Peer Support meeting, nervous to meet the seniors in his group. As more students crowd the room and the loud conversations gradually quiet down, group leaders open the floor for members to speak — and one by one, students begin sharing vulnerable moments. As he watches the group grow closer and more open each week, Arnold’s nerves begin to fade. After coming back every Monday, he said he no longer felt intimidated by the older students in his group. Arnold said Peer Support has encouraged him to get to know people beyond his initial perceptions of them.
“Seeing how people in your group, who you have maybe created idealized versions of, are human too has been really great,” Arnold said. “They’re flawed and going through intense stuff sometimes, just like you. Learning all that has increased my baseline compassion and empathy for random strangers that I meet because I’ve had this experience of going from not knowing them to realizing that stuff is going on in their life.”
Peer Support began on the Upper School campus in 1992, a year after the Harvard and Westlake classes merged. It was started as an interpersonal counseling program where students in the new school could meet and form connections, with confidentiality being its main selling point. Peer Support has since grown to become the largest club at the school, with hundreds of students involved. It is run by two faculty program heads—Head of Peer
Support and Interdisciplinary Studies and Independent Research Teacher
Tina McGraw ’01 and Upper School Counselor Brittany Bronson — alongside four student coordinators, 26 senior leaders and 25 junior trainees.
Peer Support Coordinator Pearl Gatins ’25 said being a coordinator is about having dedication and being a welcoming figure for everyone that is part of the program.
“Being a [coordinator] means that you really are constantly giving your all to the program,” Gatins said. “It really helped me become a lot better at public speaking because there are so many opportunities to speak in front of the whole program. Most importantly, you’re just someone that everyone can go to. I really prioritize making sure I’m as approachable as possible for anything that’s peer support related. It isn’t much different from being a leader when in our groups, though. If anything, the dynamic shouldn’t be different.”
In 2023, the process of selecting new coordinators for the program switched from an all-student vote to a decision made by both faculty and student leaders. Currently, coordinators are selected through a multi-step process where they submit written applications and perform speeches for other leaders. Two coordinators are selected through a student vote and two are selected by the faculty heads.
Newly-elected Coordinator Sophia Wiczyk ’26 said Peer Support is a program which is really unique to the school and is hard for students from different schools to grasp.
“Sometimes when I drive to Peer Support, I call friends from outside of school in the car and explain where I’m going and what it is,” Wiczyk said. “Every time I try to explain it to them, they
it. Harvard-Westlake does have a reputation for being extremely tough and for having stressed out, competitive students and [Peer Support] is just so unique to [the school] community. Peer Support was really made for this community, and really gives a space to walk away from all of that. It allows us to just be close and reconnect with peers because it reminds us of what a high school experience should be.”
In a 2020 interview with HW Life, Former Head of School and a founder of Peer Support Harry Salamandra said the program began as a small training program even before the merger. In 1988, Salamandra and Harvard School foreign language teacher Jordan Hampton began a training program for juniors and seniors to learn how to be supportive leaders on campus. The two taught students through a small textbook titled ‘Teens Helping Teens,’ which they adopted from the California Peer Support Association, according to Salamandra. Salamandra said that the program evolved post-merger because of the opportunity for collaboration between the boys and girls of Harvard-Westlake.
about half a year before we merged the two groups of students together on the same campus. It turned out to be a wonderful program that continues to grow. Typically, on Monday nights, we have easily 400 students attending.”
McGraw said that Peer Support has evolved since it began, but the program has maintained its founding values.
“When I was a student here, it was a much smaller program than it is now,” McGraw said. “But it still has the goal of bringing the community together, and a lot of people who attend Peer Support say they actually feel a sense of community that they don’t get from the bigger school. Because we are such a big school, finding these little pockets of time and space for kids to connect [who] wouldn’t normally be together is meaningful.”
“ Peer Support truly changed my life. It was the first time, as a young person, that I was empowered to feel and not have shame.”
Lily Collins ’07
Former Peer Support Member and Actress Lily Collins ’07 said in an interview on The Supporting Cast podcast that Peer Support was the first community that made her feel more comfortable embracing vulnerability.
“We really expanded the program once the merger was announced because it was a good place for students, both boys and girls, to connect and work on a project together,” Salamandra said. “We figured Monday evenings were probably the least impacted by athletic events, so one Monday we would run it on the Coldwater campus, and one Monday on the North Faring Campus. We did that for
“Peer Support truly changed my life,” Collins said. “It was the first time, as a young person, that I was empowered to feel and not have shame attached to feeling and communication. I really believe that having a program like Peer Support was so life-changing because it allowed us, as students, to be able to feel empowered to ask questions, listen to one another. If you start at a young age being comfortable with your feelings and how you communicate, that helps you on your path to adulthood.”
· Continued on hwchronicle.com
Members of the school community discuss the unique experiences of students who are originally from other countries.
By
and Ivy Wang ’26 is studying for the In dependent School Entrance Exam (ISEE). Her study materials are a little different than those of her peers, though. Instead of study ing area formulas and the order of operations, Wang has a pile of pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters on her desk. Unfamiliar with American currency, she struggles to recall the seemingly random values of each coin. Having emigrated from China a few months prior to applying for middle school, Wang faced many difficulties with adjusting to American culture. She said it was hard to adapt to different measurement and currency systems, making things like math harder.
“The biggest struggle for me when I was doing the ISEE math section was that I could not differentiate between all the coins in the currency,” Wang said. “I was so confused. To me, this was such a foreign language. The [U.S. Customary] system was also so confusing. I was like, ‘What are inches?’ I didn’t know how to do Fahrenheit. Every single system is essentially different.”
About 11% of students at the school immigrated to the U.S. from another country, according to a Chronicle poll. Assistant Head of School for Community and Belonging Janine Jones said having a diverse student body affords many benefits to all students at the school.
“Having students originally from countries outside of the U.S. as members of the HW community fosters a more globally-minded environment where students regularly learn first hand about diverse cultures, perspectives and experiences,” Jones said. “This kind of exposure builds empathy, compassion, curiosity and open-mindedness—all of which are core skills that are essential in today’s world. It also brings fresh ideas into classrooms and conversations outside of the classroom [and] allows for meaningful and authentic cross-cultural friendships.”
grade because her parents wanted her to at tend a better school. She said it was hard to adjust to this school because her previous school had not been as rigorous.
“At Harvard-Westlake specifically, I have a quiz or a test every week, where as before, I didn’t have any tests or quiz zes,” Ramile said. “Tests are definitely a lot harder here. It’s a lot more academically challenging, and they put a lot more stress on grades. It was hard to get used to how the teachers teach here because back in my old school, it was very project based, but here it’s more test based.”
that for granted. There, if you have a bad day during your one test, you never get a second chance.”
Wang was born in Canada due to China’s one-child-policy, but grew up in Shanghai, China before moving to the United States at 11 years old. Wang attended an international school, but she said that at non-international, local schools in China, the value system and methodology is very different than American schools. Wang said physical discipline is often part of the culture of local Chinese schools.
International schools are private schools that typically offer curriculum in English for families seeking a globalized education. The school does not offer a program in English as a Second Language (ESL), so many students who formerly lived in other countries come from international schools.
Emma Calista Lee ’27 moved to the U.S. from South Korea in eighth grade so she could attend the school. Her father and aunt are alumni, and they wanted her to experience their alma mater. She attended an international school in South Korea, which she said eased the adjustment to American school.
“Going to an international school in Korea really broadened my perspective on a lot of things,” Lee said. “When I was living in Korea, I was talking to Korean people, who are way more conservative a lot of the time.
“Abuse was a super normalized thing in local schools in China,” Wang said. “If you did anything wrong or if you didn’t do your homework, they’d take a ruler and hit you. It was something to be expected, not something that people were shocked by. My own sister and my brother have been victims to that. Whenever I vis ited local schools, I felt scared.” The college application pro cess is very different in China compared to the U.S. The Ga okao is China’s national college entrance exam and serves as the primary determinant for university admissions. Taken annually by over 10 million stu dents, it tests subjects like Chi nese, math, English and either science or humanities. Unlike the U.S. system, where extra curriculars and essays play a role in determining wheth er or not a student is ad mitted, Chinese univer sities rely almost entirely on Gaokao testing scores when evaluating applicants. Provincial quotas and score cutoffs make the competition especially intense. In many cases, its results can influence a student’s future career path and social mobility, according to CNN. Wang said the culture around higher education and the college admissions process is very different in China.
Lee said although she grew up in a place with a different education system and culture, she feels content at the school.
grade to worry about how your own parents in addition to yourself are assimilating to society.”
Ivy Wang ’26
“My background is pretty unique to a lot of people [at the school],” Lee said. “When people talk about growing up in [Los Angeles], I sometimes feel like I can’t relate as much to them. But overall, I feel a sense of belonging because I made a really good group of friends, and they’re just really nice people.”
Ramile said that she feels a strong sense of
[who are] not from the U.S definitely comes with an extra set of worries,” Wang said. “Not only do you have to worry about how you yourself fit in, but it’s also stressful for an immigrant’s child to wonder how your mom is doing with the social scene here and how your dad is doing being away from all his friends. It’s a big thing for a little kid in ninth grade to worry about how your own parents in addition to yourself are assimilating to the society here.”
L.Wood
Ivy Wang ’26
Arts&Entertainment
WESTERN WEEKEND
Students and faculty discuss the rise in popularity of country music following student attendance of Stagecoach Festival, a country music event.
By Eila Shokravi
Joe Sterling ’26 sits behind the wheel with Barron Linnekens ’26 riding shotgun as they begin their two-hour journey toward Indio, California, to attend the Stagecoach Country Music Festival. On Interstate 10, they sit back and relax while “Dancing in the Country” by Tyler Hubbard comes on. The drive continues with a steady stream of country music, a genre the pair recently got into. Linnekens said he began listening to country music because of his Spotify algorithm.
country music and kept recommending new artists to me.”
Country music is one of the fastest-growing genres of music, accounting for 8.4% of the total volume of U.S. music streaming, according to entertainment data company Luminate.
“I only started listening to [country music] about a year ago,” Linnekens said. “Songs came onto my Spotify and I liked the rhythm. I got into certain tracks, and then the Spotify algorithm realized that I liked
Math Teacher Adam Varney said he believes the rise in popularity of country music is a product of younger generations wanting a genre that resonates with them.
“They want their own unique music to separate them from previous generations,” Varney said. “These kinds of things move in cycles. I assume in the next 20 years, country music will take another decline because the next generations will want a different, unique sound.”
Linnekens said he thinks country music has become more popular because of its more recent appeal to pop and folk listeners.
“There are two [branches]of
like country,” Varney said. “There have been many genre crossovers like Post Malone, Beyoncé and Diplo. Diplo had his honky-tonk event at Stagecoach.”
Dennett Stibel ’25 said she believes listeners should broaden their music choices by listening to artists whose work is associated with multiple genres.
“It’s important to expand your view and try new artists, especially some of the gateway artists like Noah Kahan, because he has a lot of pop and folk influence,” Stibel said. “The country world has always been very vast and broad, but the main thing is that people are expanding their music choices.”
Stibel said she enjoys country music because it feels more relatable to her experiences.
“There are a lot of songs that relate to a more personal experience and share anecdotes of life,” Stibel said. “Country music does a great job sharing day-to-day human experiences rather than one big event. It is more about the subtle things, and that’s nice be-
Stagecoach is an annual country music festival held in Indio, California, featuring around 60 artist performances. The festival sold out of tickets this year, underscoring the demand and popularity of the event, according to Palm Springs newspaper The
Stibel said she chose to go to Stagecoach as a way of bonding
“Country music has always been a big part of my family’s life, and it’s something that’s really spe cial to us,” Stibel said. “A lot of my family members went [to Stage
Addison Carson ’25 said she wanted to attend Stagecoach be cause of the impressive selection of performers and her past experi
“I saw the lineup and it was really good,” Carson said. “I saw
Zach Bryan in a concert last year and it was amazing, so I wanted to see him again. I had never been to a festival like it, so I wanted to see what it would be like.”
Stibel said Stagecoach is more about experiencing the festival, whereas Coachella is more of a social event.
“It is a lot more about the music compared to Coachella, where it’s more about taking pictures and being with friends,” Stibel said. “Stagecoach is more about being there for the artist, living in the moment and enjoying the music. There was a lot less recording and a lot more watching.”
tral and less political.”
Stibel said country music can be associated with the Republican party because of its southern origins, but that it is important to separate the music from the political stereotypes.
“ Stagecoach is more about being there for the artist, living in the moment and enjoying the music.”
— Dennett
Stibel ’25
Politicians have long utilized country artists such as Johnny Cash to promote their campaign, according to the academic journal Dædalus. In fact, George Wallace, the longest-serving governor of Alabama, used country music to appeal to the working-class during his campaigns. Sterling said despite the controversy surrounding the political implications of country music, the genre has become less political in recent years.
“I think people are trying to turn it into something that it’s not,” Sterling said. “There are some older songs that are maybe more controversial, but I think a lot of the newer artists are trying
“Some people might see the country genre as music for a certain political party because it’s centered in the south, which can have political leanings,” Stibel said. “I don’t think those stereotypes are true at all, and it’s important to separate [politics from art]. Many people who are left-leaning enjoy listening to country music, and it has nothing to do with politics for us.”
Linnekens said that liking country music has now become less politically charged because of the decline in stereotypes associated with the genre.
“I think if you asked somebody five to ten years ago if they liked country music and they said ‘yes,’ you had a negative opinion of who they are as a person and even what they may believe,” Linnekens said. “Now, I would say that the reactions to people listening to country music are less about who somebody is as a person and what they might believe, and more so something they get made fun of a little bit for.”
L. Wood Barron Linnekens ’26
Jazz combo performs for ‘Lights Up’ Festival
By Riya Iyer and Zara Groves
The Upper School Jazz program hosted its annual spring concert in Rugby Auditorium April 25. The performance took place as part of the “Lights Up!” arts festival, which showcases student work from performing arts classes during the spring semester. The program featured a set by the Middle School Jazz Band in addition to performances by the Jazz Ensemble, Jazz Band Trio and Studio Jazz Band.
Upper School Jazz Director Chris Sullivan said the performance was a valuable experience for middle school students and a way to recognize the upper school students in the program.
said. “[They are] both incredibly talented improvisers and represent the very top of the jazz program here. Additionally, I love the cut to half-time in the middle of ‘2/3’s Adventure’ and I would be remiss not to mention the cascading solis of each horn section on ‘Count Bubba’.”
Sophomore Prefect Charlotte Im ’27 said the performance was exciting and that she enjoyed watching her friends perform.
“It’s meaningful for ninth graders and eighth graders who will be coming up to the Upper School soon and joining the program,” Sullivan said. “I want them to see that the people that they’re listening to were in their same seats three years ago and I hope that message can resonate with them. It’s also a way to honor the seniors since it’s their last big performance for almost all of them. It’s fun for me to listen and be proud of them on their final voyage and their final performance.”
The setlist included classics from Duke Ellington, Count Basie and Thad Jones. The performance also featured a composition from 2025 Blues Competition Contest Winner Hugh Cheng ’25, entitled “Hugh’s Blues”.
Jazz Band and trombone player Hal Craig ’27 said performances from the seniors, as well as the horn section, were highlights of the concert.
“Some standout moments are [Cheng] and [Vourgourakis’s] solos on ‘Groove Merchant’,” Craig
“This was my first time going to an Upper School jazz concert and it was truly incredible,”
Im said. “My favorite song was ‘Perdido’ by Duke Ellington because of its fast-paced nature and liveliness.
I loved seeing and supporting my friends in their element.”
Dr. Sullivan, following the Upper School Jazz ensemble’s most recent trip to Spain, accompanied those styles of Latin jazz songs, which included “All of Me,” “Groove Merchant,” and other pieces.
Jazz Band member Noah Ramsey ’27 said he liked the collaboration between the Middle School Jazz program and the Upper School.
“For me, the most memorable parts of the concert were getting invited to perform with the lower ensemble band,” Ramsey said. “It gave me a chance to work on my skills even more and pushed me to keep improving.”
Jazz Band member Michealla Armour ’27 said she felt every musician had to put time and effort into their pieces.
“I felt that a key learning experience among the students in the jazz bands is not to rely on big band rehearsals to relearn or practice pieces,” Armour said. “Instead, it’s very important to take the initiative and practice independently, ensuring a better performance when the whole
Upper School choir ensembles sing in final spring performance
By Angel Song
The Choral Concert took place as part of the “Lights Up!” arts festival in Rugby Auditorium April 23. The festival also included a dance showcase, orchestral concert and jazz concert. The school’s Chamber Singers, Bel Canto, Wolverine Chorus and Jazz singers all performed, concluding with a combined ensemble of all the choir groups.
Bel Canto singer Maylie Macias ’26 said the anxiety of performing can be overwhelming, but the experience of connecting and singing with the others helped ease her nerves.
“Our biggest challenges during or before concerts have always been the anxiety,” Macias said. “Sometimes the day of the concert, we start messing up songs that we’ve practiced so many times, but we just make sure to correct them and wish each other good luck. By the time we get on stage, the nerves go away and we feel happy to perform together.”
Chamber and Jazz singer Alexa Chang ’25 said the small amount of time to practice was challenging, but their hard work
Orchestra plays at spring showcase
By Angel Song
The Upper School Symphony and Chamber Orchestra performed in the Spring Instrumental Concert in Rugby Auditorium on May 1. The concert featured the pieces “Romance for 6 Hands,” “Sonata for Violin and Piano No. 3, Op 108 Allegro & Adagio,” “Pictures at an Exhibition,” “Brook Green Suite” and two concert pieces from the film “Angela's Ashes.”
Performing Arts Teacher
Neli Nikolaeva said that this concert was especially memorable because she was saying farewell to many students she had taught since they were at the middle school.
“The theme for the spring concert is always celebrating this commitment and artistry of the seniors who've been with us for many years,” said Nikolaeva. “A lot of these seniors were students I had since my very first year as a teacher, when I was teaching them in seventh grade, in Beginning
Strings and Concert Strings. So it was a very special goodbye for us, as a final concert.”
Chamber violinist Alexia Aridi ’25 said that she appreciated the friendships she formed during her time working with other students in Chamber.
“The most meaningful part was the friendships I built during rehearsals,” Aridi said. “Working closely with classmates toward a shared goal created a strong sense of camaraderie. This performance was especially meaningful because it marked our final time on stage together as seniors. Everyone was more sentimental, especially Nikolaeva, and knowing it was our last performance added a layer of emotion that made the experience memorable.”
Symphony violinist Katie Wang ’27 said that she enjoys playing in the symphony because how instruments can create a collective harmony.
“I really like how the violin sounds, and I love symphony because I get to play it,” said Wang. “My favorite part of
the concert was hearing different instruments and how they sounded in the piece.”
Chamber violist Kyle Henderson ’27 said he values the community and the experiences that come through his relationships with juniors and seniors.
“My favorite part of prepping is being in a community of kindness and fun,” said Henderson. “I also enjoy meeting new people I might not have known otherwise.”
Nikolaeva said that the short amount of time that the orchestra had to prepare made it difficult to practice and perfect their pieces, but the end result was rewarding for the entire orchestra.
“The repertoire was really exciting and wonderful, but the challenge was having very little time after we came back from a tour during spring break to prepare a brand new repertoire,” Nikolaeva said. “That was exciting yet challenging in its own way, and the students did an amazing job just coming together.”
paid off in the end.
“I remember feeling nervous, especially for our jazz performance, since we had so many songs and not enough time,” Chang said. “We had rehearsals every possible break for a week leading up to the concert to try and get our music in the best shape possible. I could tell our set was received well, which made me really proud.”
Bel Canto singer Alice Torosyan ’27 said although preparing the songs was challenging, rehearsing in smaller groups made the process easier.
“Practicing songs for the concert was hard because there were some songs that we had to put together last minute,” Torosyan said. “But we just practiced extra hard and dispersed ourselves into small, self-directed groups where we could work together to figure it out.”
Upper School Performing Arts Teacher Zanaida Robles said a student’s live performance brings out a different energy than rehearsals.
“Being in the moment means singing with character and stylistic efficacy,” Robles said.
“Sometimes it’s hard to capture that in rehearsal, but when you get on stage and actually perform, a lot of that rises to the surface because our students really want to perform well. They give it their all for the audience, and they’re able to actually overcome things that they couldn't in rehearsal.”
Torosyan said the strong sense of community in her group made the performances especially meaningful.
“I feel like Bel Canto, especially since we’re a small choir, is really close-knit,” Torosyan said. “I felt almost emotional whenever we we’re singing because you could tell everyone was coming together to perform.”
Robles said the singers have shown significant improvement in their confidence over the year.
“Our final concert is a representation of all the work that they’ve done,” Robles said. “So you hear bigger voices, you see them take more risks, you see them able to make bigger sounds, and all of that is evidence of their progress throughout the year.”
VIBRANT VOICES: Senior members of the Upper School Choir Program pose after a successful performance of songs including “Duel of the Fates, ” “Missa in Tempore Belli ” and “Be wise and treasure love. ”
L. Wood Charlotte Im ’27
STRING SERENADE: Hannah Fong ’26 and Mac Galaviz ’25 perform a strings and keys duet piece to “Brahms Violin Sonata No. 3.”
High School Hustle
LangxSaint: shaping street wear
By Annabelle Cheung
Gian Ngo-Willis ’26 and Langston Sparks ’26 established a startup fashion brand called LangxSaint, focused on graphic designs and basic streetwear pieces.
Ngo-Willis said the brand started off casually but quickly turned into a real project with growing demand.
“Originally, the idea started as a joke,” Ngo-Willis said. “Our friend [Sparks] is known for saying goofy things, so we thought it would be funny to put some of his sayings on t-shirts and tank tops for people in the community to wear. We never expected it to get big. Honestly, it’s still not anything crazy, but we definitely didn’t expect to make any money from it.”
Ngo-Willis said the first batch of shirts came together in a laid-
back fashion with the help of Upper School Graphic Design Teacher Whitney Lasker and some blank tees.
“I thought it’d be funny to make a few mockups and a few pieces,” Ngo-Willis said. “We showed them to Mr. Lasker, eventually got some screens, found some blank shirts and started printing. At first, we did a photoshoot, but we didn’t release anything from it. We gave all the pieces away for free. It was just a fun, one-off kind of thing.”
Sparks said his role in the brand began when his nickname unintentionally became tied to it, making him an unofficial figurehead.
“[Ngo-Willis] and his friends call me ‘Lang Saint,’ and he made a shirt with that name. He ended up using that as the [Instagram] account’s username, so I kind of became the public
figure for the brand while he focused on making the actual shirts. That’s how it first started coming together.”
Ngo-Willis said what started as free giveaways unexpectedly turned into a brand people were eager to support.
“My other friend Moses started a fake Instagram account pretending to be Langston,” Ngo-Willis said. “We thought it’d be amazing to drop the clothes and release the photos from the first shoot on the new account. So we did it, and it actually got a lot of traction.”
As interest in the brand began to grow, Sparks said Instagram became a key tool for reaching people beyond their friend group.
“Now we have an Instagram account called @langxsaint_official,” Sparks said.
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Enjoy art and coffee at Cafe Meech
By Andrea Ricabal
Mithra Ayati ’26 decided to transform part of Feldman Horn into a creative hub by combining the concept of a coffee shop and her love for art. Last spring, Ayati created Cafe Meech, which serves Italian-style espressos. The grand opening of her business was at the combined art show and flea market at the Feldman-Horn Gallery. Ayati said she combined her two passions because she noticed the space was underused.
“There was a lot of open space and we weren’t really utilizing it to its full capacity,” Ayati said. “So, [I thought] about how I could make the space somewhere people can come and enjoy as much as I do.”
Ayati initially struggled with funding, but she said Upper School Visual Arts Teach-
A teen’s story to dominating Depop
By Annabelle Cheung
Loren Park ’25 built a side-hustle selling second-hand clothing on Depop, a social marketplace where users buy and sell pre-loved fashion curated to reflect niche styles or vintage finds. A blend between Instagram and eBay, Depop became a go-to platform for novice sellers like Park, who began using it in seventh grade.
Park said her eye for trends helps her decide what’s worth reselling and what’s better to give away.
“My process is pretty specific,” Park said. “When I buy clothes to resell, I know exactly what will be popular. I used to do this a lot more during quarantine. I’d source items by buying them cheap and then reselling them for more, like a mini flip. With some clothes in my room, I already know I’ll just give them away because they’re
not worth selling. It really depends on what’s trending.”
Ava Hanasab ’26 said she often turns to Depop to shop for second-hand fashion. Hanasab said the app fosters a personal shopping experience that feels more meaningful and tailored than buying from traditional retail brands.
“Depop is kind of its own little fashion world,” Hanasab said.
“People get really creative with their listings, and there’s this sense of community when you can find sellers whose style you really like. It makes the clothes feel more personal because you’re buying from a real person’s curated listings, not just a big brand.”
Park said she has learned how to adjust her pricing based on demand.
“There’s definitely competition, and some sellers price things kind of ridiculously, but people are still willing to buy them,” Park
said. “So if I have something that’s trending, branded or rare, I’ll price it higher too. I know people will pay for something vintage or limited. The highest I’ve sold something for was probably $150. They were these vintage pants I got for $40.”
Park said building a following on Depop wasn’t difficult, especially with the right approach to listing items.
“Depop makes it pretty easy if you try,” Park said. “A lot of people are on there. You can tag brands and use keywords. Honestly, the biggest thing is how you post. If the listing is clean, simple and especially if you’re wearing the item, it sells so much faster. People want to see how it looks on a real person.”
Park said she loves second-hand fashion because it is more sustainable and it feels more special.
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ers Whitney Lasker and Conor Thompson helped support her.
“I told Mr. Thompson and Mr. Lasker that I had this crazy idea, and that I didn’t really know what to do because no one wanted to help me fund or start it,” Ayati said. They told me [we should] start on a small scale and do some pop-ups while we could. That’s not really what I envisioned, but I wanted to make it happen. Mr. Thompson and Mr. Lasker both got the Breville coffee machine so that I could use one of them occasionally.”
Lilly Stobo ’26 said she thought the concept of the coffee shop was a great way to bring together the community and spotlight the art department.
“I thought it was a cool idea to bring together a space where students and faculty could both get a caffeine boost and enjoy
art,” Stobo said. “It gives people a place where they can just take their mind off of school and be with friends or potentially talk to new people.”
Ayati said the first school event she organized with Lasker and Thomspon was this year’s spring gallery, which was both a nerve-wracking and fulfilling moment for her.
“We decided that the best time would be during the spring gallery opening for the first popup,” Ayati said. “I was very nervous and scared that [I would] make coffee that people wouldn’t like or no one would show up. We brought the coffee machine and got a mini fridge from the art teachers’ department. But once we organized everything, it was actually really fun. A lot of people came.”
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PRINTED WITH PERMISSION OF MITHRA AYATI
Culture is the Key to Success
Members and coaches of the baseball team reflect on a culture and mentality that has not had a losing season in fifteen years.
15 Consecutive winning seasons
2009-’10: 17-14-1
2010-’11: 23-8 2011-’12: 24-5-1
2012-’13: 28-4
By David Rothbart
As the spring sports season comes to an end, the Varsity Baseball Team earned its 15th consecutive winning season, the longest streak among the boys teams at the school. Over this stretch they had a combined record of 345-203-10, or a 76.4 winning percentage. Catcher Michael Gonzalez ’26 said that the biggest part of the team’s consistency is its coaching.
“[Jared Halpert] and our other coaches are always preparing us for everything,” Gonzalez said. “They always pay so much attention to detail and we practice all the little things so much, which is the separator in big games. Our team is super talented but there are a lot of talented teams. We stand out year after year because we don’t make the little mistakes that hurt other teams and programs.”
Lafitte said that the team’s culture was also a factor in its success.
“We’re a brotherhood,” Lafitte said. “We’ve all faced adversity together and that is essential to building a deep connection as a group. We all have each other’s backs and would go to battle for one another. That mentality we all have is key to the winning culture here. We all expect each other to put in work and we keep each other accountable. That translates year through year.”
Third baseman Jack Lafitte ’25 said the coaches help the team win by expecting a high standard and emphasizing the strategy of the game.
“The coaching staff prepares us year round for everything we may encounter throughout a baseball season and set high expectations for us and that allows for lots of growth as a team,” Lafitte said. “They also make sure we always excel at the details of the game. Our success is more than just using brute talent to win baseball games. Situational hitting, bunting and pregame preparation are just a few ways we find an edge over others.”
Gonzalez said that the team’s togetherness contributes to their winning year by year.
“We’re all so close,” Gonzalez said. “It helps us to communicate better and keeps all of us more accountable because we don’t want to let down our friends. Everyone is here to win and I think the program reflects that. In any team sport communication is super important, but it is even more important in baseball cause there are so many of us on the field at once and we all need situational awareness.”
Athletic Director and former Baseball Program Head Matt Lacour said the team’s culture of discipline, shared responsibility and sustained effort are what help the team be successful.
“The winning is a byproduct of the things that the program does on a daily basis,” Lacour said. “The base structure of our baseball program is commitment from the players and coaches, work ethic from the
players and coaches and buying into the team concept. That allows for them to be successful way more than they’re not.
There’s no magic pill to it. You have to show up every day and put in the work, and that goes for not just the players, but the coaches. Our baseball program, along with others of our school, have demonstrated that they can do that on a consistent basis, which leads to success that everybody sees.”
Lacour said the team was not always as consistently successful and that only through strong expectations did the team instill a winning mentality and culture.
“Each program has their own culture, and I can tell you that for people that have been around [the school] for a long time, that hasn’t always been the case,” Lacour said. “When I first got to [the school], our baseball program looked very different than it does today. I tried to change it from the very beginning though by instituting a very clear, non negotiable set of standards that our players and parents initially had to conform to. Now though, it has turned into what you just expect when you come to [the school] if you want to play baseball.”
Lacour said the team’s culture is driven by a desire to uphold the tradition of winning.
“There’s definitely a strong family type of bond from our players to know that they are part of a legacy that is important to them, is important to our school, and they are just shepherding that legacy from one group to the next,” Lacour said. “We don’t have a culture
where you see the younger kids getting bullied or picked on. The older kids are there to make sure that they’re ready to do it at the level they need to do it in order for us to be successful. They teach them and it’s a really healthy environment for young men to be involved in to where they also know that it doesn’t matter what year you are, whether you’re a freshman, sophomore, junior or senior. If you’re the best, you get to play. Everybody understands that going in. You’re on equal ground.”
Legacy Baseball Group is a youth baseball organization run by the school’s entire coaching staff. Lacour said the one way the team keeps having talented teams is through the pipeline of Legacy players to the high school.
27-6-1
8-1-1 2020-’21: 29-4 2021-’22: 22-8-1
2022-’23: 21-9 2023-’24: 27-5-1 2024-’25: 17-9
every year that keep us close like the trip to Texas this year and team events like the Hoedown & BBQ but most of the guys on the team I have already been friends with for a long time because of Legacy,” Gonzalez said. “I’ve done Legacy for a while and it’s how I met some of my closest friends now. We also have the same coaches there so it really doesn’t even feel all too different.”
Lafitte said that over the course of his time on the team, he learned that building a great team that lasts is about more than talent.
There’s definitely a strong family type of bond from our players to know that they are part of a legacy.”
“Legacy allows us to identify student athletes that fit the mold of what [the school] is as an institution,” Lacour said. “It allows us to get to know them and it allows them to get to know our facility and school. It also allows for kids to develop and get coached from a younger age level and have the skills that are necessary for them to play in high school.”
Athletic Director Matt Lacour
“I’ve been fortunate enough to play with many very skilled baseball players during my time at [the school],” Lafitte said. “But I’ve learned a team is not complete unless everyone buys in and sacrifices themselves for each other in the pursuit of a common goal. This unity is grown by the time spent with one another.”
Gonzalez says that with the culture instilled in the team, he foresees many more years of winning seasons.
Gonzalez said many of his teammates now are the same ones from his time on Legacy, and that continuity is important to the team’s culture now.
“We have lots of team events
“With the coaching staff we have and the older kids now passing down the tradition, I don’t see us being bad anytime soon,” Gonzalez said. “I know that the next few years will be just like the last couple, kids will come up and see all of us working hard and emulate that, which will lead to better baseball overall.”
Swimming and diving competes in league finals
By Max Nam
The boys and girls swim teams competed at the Mission League Finals at Crespi Carmelite High School on May 1, with the girls team winning the league championship and the boys team finishing second overall behind Loyola High School. Both teams now look ahead to the CIF Southern Section Division 1 preliminaries, which begin at Mt. San Antonio College on May 8.
The school will send six relays — three boys teams and three girls teams — to CIF preliminaries, along with individual swimmers Christian Indelicato ’27, Cooper Ren ’26, Eddie Tang ’26, Sophie Chang ’27, and Isabella Zhang ’27.
Swimming and Diving Program
We had many first-time high school swimmers and divers who bought in and developed into varsity contributors. Our water polo players who also swam were a huge benefit to the program. And of course, we have our swimmers who are the foundation, who work day in and day out and always race well. This year we got great leadership from our seniors. This was a great group of student-athletes to share the season with.”
Schwarz said the team had clear goals heading into the postseason and succeeded in meeting them.
Head Coach Jason Schwarz said he was impressed with how the team progressed throughout the season and responded to challenges.
“We have had a great season so far,” Schwarz said. “We’ve had many challenges too, but those helped us grow as a team.
“For the girls, the goal was to win the league title,” Schwarz said. “We were going up against an excellent Marlborough team that has some really great swimmers, so we knew it would be tight and it was going to have to be a team effort. From our divers who gave us a huge lead to our swimmers who swam great and scored major points, everyone on our team made an impact. And we got fantastic contributions from our water polo-swimmer girls. It really was
PUSHING THE PACE: Kieran Lyons ’26 swims butterfly during a
School on April 10. The meet was held at home and was the team’s senior
a complete team performance across the board.”
Schwarz said the boys team entered the meet with specific performance goals and successfully met each one.
“On the boys side, we held our position as second in the league,” Schwarz said. “Our objectives were to secure our league standing, get a few more CIF times, and qualify for CIF in the 200 free relay. Coming out of Mission Leagues, all those boxes were checked,” Schwarz
Track and field advances to CIF playoffs
By Connor Merrihew
The track team competed in the Mission League Finals at Notre Dame High School on May 1, one of the final meets on the schedule as the season approaches the CIF Southern Section preliminaries and finals. The boys team finished third overall, while the girls team placed second.
The boys 4x1600-meter relay team — consisting of Franklin Wimbish ’25, Charles Abemayor ’26, Tate Hastings ’27 and Chance Krenzer ’25 — set a new program record in the event earlier this season, running a time of 17:31. The group broke the previous school record by 29 seconds. Wimbish ran the fastest split in the relay, completing his leg in 4:15.
Sofia Rakfeldt ’25 was named Mission League champion in the pole vault, and Mimi Rhee ’25 earned the league title in the triple jump. Sloan Butler ’28, Alisa Wiliford ’26, Chloe
Schiff ’28, and Vicky Pugh ’25 won the 4x400-meter relay. Wimbish won the 1,600-meter race, and Abemayor placed first in the 3,200-meter race.
With postseason meets ahead, Abemayor said the group has shown steady progress throughout the season.
“Our team has improved a lot throughout the season,” Abemayor said. “We have been putting in the work at practice and are ready for the postseason. Many have [personal records] in league meets, and we’ve built a strong roster across multiple events.
Since the playoffs are around the corner, we are really training hard to make a deep run this year.”
Abemayor said consistent training and recovery protocols have helped runners manage the physical demands of the season.
“We have put in lots of great work over the last few months,
not only during the dedicated training block but also in our recovery,” Abemayor said. “That recovery has been essential for staying healthy and limiting injuries.”
Andrew Alpert ’26 said his commitment to recovery helped him return after a mid-season injury.
“I had a really strong start to the season and was feeling happy and excited about finishing the season and improving, but I got hurt,” Alpert said. “I tried to make the best of it and do what I could to stay in shape, but it was really hard because I couldn’t run. But because of my dedication to the recovery process, I came back two weeks later, and not much had changed. League finals are only my second race back, and I’m excited to race again.”
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said. “In addition, we saw some great swims from a number of kids, and we’re excited about what they accomplished and the future of our program.”
Swimming and Diving Head Coach Mircea Pitariu said he was particularly proud of the commitment shown by the student-athletes throughout the spring.
“Our coaching focus coming into Mission League Finals was on proper technique and refining skills to improve speed,”
Pitariu said. “We reminded everyone of their specific jobs and expectations for the team. We built in a lot of yardage midseason, then tapered and focused more on race speed. We’re proud of the sacrifices our athletes made. They’re balancing tough academics and a lot of extracurriculars, and for the season to culminate in a Mission League title is a strong reminder of what hard work can do.”
Robotics team returns to FRC dive challenge
By Wynne Davis
The Robotics team, Team 1148, has been working hard and improving on past designs to make a name for themselves this season in the 2025 FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) Dive Challenge, an oceanthemed challenge where teams build and program robots to perform tasks related to restoring and strengthening reef ecosystems.
The Dive Challenge is one of the most technically demanding annual competitions in high school robotics, pushing teams to design machines capable of completing precise, multi-step tasks in a dynamic environment.
“
Team member Max Meyer ’26 said despite the team being relatively new to FRC, they are still a capable group.
“Even though we haven’t been around in FRC for that long, the team is starting to get really competitive this year,” Meyer said. Robotics Coach Tripp Reed said he is proud of the group’s development.
mersed themselves on VEX Robotics instead. There, they won the California State Championship four times and won the VEX World Championship in 2015, 2021 and 2024. They returned to FRC in 2022 and have been improving every year since by teaching newer members all the essentials through mentors and older students.
This year, Team 1148 has already competed in multiple regional tournaments, including the Central Valley Regional and the Los Angeles Regional. At the Aerospace Valley Regional last season, they were the first seed and made it to the finals.
Meyer says being on the robotics team is more than just competing.
The team is like a second family. We spend so much time together and I think that bond is what makes us really strong.”
Max Meyer ’26
“We’ve had a mix of returning students and completely new ones,” Reed said. “A big part of our program is mentoring and teaching, so everyone learns together and builds each other up.”
Team 1148 originally competed in FRC from 2003 to 2016, but stopped focusing on that competition and im -
“This team is like a second family,” Meyer said, “We spend so much time together and I think that bond is what really makes the team strong.”
Beyond the competitions, the team is also committed to supporting the next generation of engineers. Members regularly mentor the school’s middle school VEX Robotics program, helping younger students learn the basics of engineering design, programming, and strategy. Students make sure the team stays strong in the long term.
“We’re not just trying to win this year,” said Meyer “We’re trying to build something that lasts.”
L. Wood Cooper Ren ’26
SPRINTING INTO ACTION: Ben Arinsburg ’27 bursts off the block as he begins the relay during a track meet. Running the opening leg, Arinsburg carries the baton down the first stretch of the race, setting the pace for his team.
