Wakefield Epistula Summer 2008

Epistula

it’s the

thought

that counts

What does it mean to understand Wakefield’s mission?

A sampling of our standardbearers

Summer 2008

welcome Epistula is the magazine of Wakefield School. Its mission is to report on the school and its students, teachers, and alumni, and to make a twice-yearly examination of the question, “What is Wakefield School today?”

Epistula is published in winter and summer by Wakefield’s Office of Publications. We welcome ideas for articles, submissions for publication, and letters in response to previous issues, as well as alumni news.

Inquiries, comments, and letters may be sent to Tutt Stapp-Harris, Publications Director, at tharris@ wakefieldschool.org. Alumni news may be sent to AnnCharlotte Robinson at arobinson@ wakefieldschool.org.

As Wakefield grows, the value of a shared understanding of the school’s mission grows in step. Identifying our standardbearers—and listening to their insights on the school— becomes as central to achieving the mission as the mission itself.

This issue of Epistula focuses on some Wakefield figures whose efforts reveal a rich understanding of the school’s mission. Interestingly, tenure is not a shared characteristic of the individuals on the cover: they have been at Wakefield anywhere from one year to 22. The thing they have in common is that, despite different ages, disciplines, goals, and nationalities, they all get it.

In their words, and especially in their actions, we can see clearly how individual creativity and initiative can be channeled to serve an institutionally-shared purpose.

Witnessing their leadership can make each of us in turn better prepared to be part of the necessary critical mass of community members who understand that purpose in both concept and application.

Tutt Stapp-Harris Publications Director

cover story

Wakefield School 4439 Old Tavern Road P.O. Box 107 The Plains, VA 20198 www.wakefieldschool.org

Teachers, students, coaches, advisors, club members, club sponsors, members of community organizations—a common characteristic of Wakefield’s most on-board and dedicated is that they wear many hats. Learn what a sampling of Wakefield’s finest have to say about their various endeavors, which rise to the mission’s lofty goals on a daily basis. Pictured are [students, left to right] Alex Parva, Lilly Withers, Dominika Kruszewska, and Marcin Ostrowski; and faculty members Cyndi Williams, Scott Barron, Katie Hutchison, Paul Sipes, Karen Falcon, Carolyn Wyrsch, and Tony Wilson.

Features begin on page 22

it’s the 22

thought

that counts

MUTUAL BENEFITS OF SCHOLARSHIP The second year of the Polish Scholar program continued to bring richness and diversity to Wakefield’s Upper School—not to mention a 2008 valedictorian.

24 THE DOLLARS—AND SENSE—OF SERVICE Wakefield’s 08-09 Service Club members will be implementing a significant grant awarded them to assist the Fauquier Food Coalition, the very embodiment of making a difference.

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SAIL AWAY Fourth graders at Wakefield are guided not just to study the immigrant experience, but to live it for a day. And what a difference a day makes.

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SOUND MIND, SOUND BODY Serious in purpose, uncompromising in values, a little bit zany, a little bit Zen— but the bedrock of the Sipes and Barron athletics program is that it’s all about education.

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THE SENIOR INTERVIEW 2008 alumna Alex Parva on books, writing, chemistry, Africa, and how it feels to see your joys and your education come to inhabit the same senior thesis

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A CLOSING EXERCISE Departing senior faculty members Karen Falcon and Tony Wilson have a combined 38 years of Wakefield experience. They share a glimpse of their invaluable acquired wisdom in some closing reflections.

Alex Parva

DEPARTMENTS A Picture’s Worth...

Closings & Commencement

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Kudos 12 Athletics 18 The Arts 36 The Larger World

The 5th grade Poetry Tea brings delicious rewards off all kinds: sweet tea and treats, wonderful literature to share, and time to laugh and relax with friends.

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A Picture’s Worth...

T

he Medieval Faire continues to both amaze and delight.

Whether the topic is ancient weaponry or ancient games, a theme of the day seems to be, “How did they do that?!”

Summer 2008

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A Picture’s Worth...

M

iddle School Discovery Week was far flung and diverse, with students encountering the previously-unknown from the Grand Canyon all the way to Green Bank, West Virginia, where they became radio astronomers for a day at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, assigned and trained to operate a 40-foot diameter radio telescope with which they investigated both known and “mystery” cosmic objects.

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nd if you don’t know what this event is, you have been away from campus WAAAY too long. Athenians took the day this year, in events that included the traditional races, games, relays and tugs-of-war, as well as some sit-down mental challenges at mid-day—puzzles, word games, math quests, and such.

Summer 2008

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Lower School Closing Exercises

Top, Preston Mulford, Emma Tyeryar, and Rosie Hutchison. Above, Daniel Lizarraga (front) and Scott Abeel. Right, Shelby Sipes and Matthew Steensma.

The criteria for the Citizenship Award were written by 4th and 5th grade students and Mrs. Mulligan. The following are the attributes the students selected: does his or her personal best in academics, is enthusiastically engaged in school activities, tries hard to do his or her physical best on the athletic field, has pride in self and Wakefield, subscribes to the Wakefield courtesies and virtues program, is ethically upright, encourages excellence in friends, accepts constructive criticism, shows respect to others, our school, and our nation, and shows the character traits of kindness, patience, modesty, courage, faith, honesty, and dependability.

In the 5th grade: Shelby Sipes and Matthew Steensma

The Leadership Award is given to two members of the 5th grade class who have consistently demonstrated strength of character and an ability to make mature decisions, even when they could have chosen otherwise. By making such wise choices, these students, by their word and example, have enriched the lives and experiences of the entire class.

Christian Ferrante and Rachel Tyeryar

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Middle School Closing Exercises Best Scholar/Athlete Kristen Marie Swedberg Sean Mitchem Plummer Service Gustav Oskar Ohrstrom Bryson Anthony Mingione Best New Student

Trevor Robert Newman

Virtus Award Erin McCarthy Callahan Sapientia Award

Carter Dale is congratulated by his visibly proud grandmother

Isabelle Sophia Byers

“Some of us may think ‘fun’ is not the word we should use when we talk about school. School is supposed to be hard and demanding...But the truth is that Wakefield IS fun because, while it is hard and demanding, we have worked hard together and become great friends in the process...that’s precisely what allows us to look back at our years at Wakefield and realize that with all the lessons we have learned, and all the virtues we have worked hard to own, we have grown and stretched—and, yes, we have had fun.”

—Isabelle Byers, 8th grade graduate “Each of us is beginning to know who we are and where we want to go. But, we’re just beginning to know. It’s still early and all around is nothing but possibility. As we move into high school and continue to learn who we are individually, we have another mission.

That mission is to discover what we can accomplish as a group, when we come together in our strengths. Yes, there is power in One. But the power of many is even greater. If we decide now, as a class, to do and dream great things, our high school years can be remarkable.

Even extraordinary.”

—Carter Dale, 8th grade graduate Isabelle Byers

Robbie Bohn (emoting) and Mrs. Tucker (tolerating) Summer 2008

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Commencement Upper School Awards Academic Excellence

Erica Eickhoff

Student Gov’t Vice-Presidentelect Chelsea Fischer and President-elect Catherine Farr

Michael Heim shares the love with Chris McElaney

Dartmouth Book Award

Victoria Gravett Sewanee Book Award

Brenton Lewis College of William & Mary Leadership Award

Catherine Farr Outstanding Senior Thesis

Matthew Bohn

Dominika Kruszewska

Christopher McElaney

Alexandra Parva New Student

Marcin Ostrowski Most Improved

Anna Clem Good Manners

Dominika Kruszewska Robert F. Roberts, Jr. Citizenship Award

Ian Martin Sportsmanship

Lillian Withers

Ross Ozburn Scholar-Athlete

Ashley Marchi

Eric Wilson United States Marine Corps Leadership Award

Catherine Farr Barbara Myatt Award

Lillian Withers Arthur Zoebelein Award

Ross Ozburn Headmaster’s Award

Alexandra Parva Chairman’s Award

Hunter Bayliss

Morgan Vandermast, Erica Eickhoff, Michelle Hytner, and Caroline Oldfield 8

Epistula

Dominika Kruszewska, Co-Valedictorian:

Erica Eickhoff

Dominika Kruszewska

Erica Eickhoff, Co-Valedictorian: “…we are not meant to be static creatures. Life is not like senior thesis. We should not scramble to meet deadlines and work toward a final draft, set on a shelf to collect dust—we must keep rewriting who we are. Ulysses did not grow old, a wrinkled ghost of a former hero, but sought to continue to shape who he was through his experience. In [Tennyson’s] poem, [Ulysses] says, “I am a part of all that I have met.” He embraces the nature of his life, making the most of a difficult journey…Was it easy for him to push off from the shore, his small boat rocking on the sea? I don’t think it was, but he knew that he would never be satisfied if he did not continue to redefine himself. When we leave here today, we do not begin anew, but continue the process of self-revision.”

“Are we ready? I think we are. I think we will realize, just like I did two years ago, that making friends is like riding a bike - you can’t forget how to do it. It may take time and effort to go up the hill, but then you get to enjoy the effortless ride that follows. I think all of us will meet people that inspire, challenge, and support us. I met more of them here than I could ever dream of: teachers, parents, and peers. Encouragement and the opportunities to grow come sometimes from the least expected sources. Plans don’t always turn out the way they initially seem to - I was supposed to experience America for a year, have fun, learn, and leave.

And here I am, graduating and ready to move on to a college in the United States. I am positive that there are surprising twists like that waiting for each and every one of us.”

Well, sure, it’s for the kids...but it’s also for the parents.

The Cushmans and Mr. Barrett take in that Kodak/ Nikon/Pentax moment.

Summer 2008

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Commencement Class of 2008 College Matriculations

Wakefield’s Class of 2008 will matriculate at the following colleges and universities in Fall, 2008: Adrian College Cabrini College Colby College Colorado State University Guilford College James Madison University (4) Lynchburg College (2) Montana State University, Bozeman Northern Virginia Community College (2) Saint Michael’s College Sarah Lawrence College Savannah College of Art and Design

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Swarthmore College The University of Alabama (2) University of Connecticut University of Mary Washington (4) University of Plymouth (UK) University of Rochester University of South Carolina University of Virginia (3) Ursinus College (2) Virginia Tech (2) Washington and Lee University Washington University in St. Louis

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2008 Educators of the Year

Lynette Bates, Lower School: Chris Guyotte, Middle School: Carolyn Wyrsch, Upper School: “Grins and groans. As 4th and 5th graders “Chris Guyotte has always been an easy “Carolyn has given more of herself person-

move in and out of my classroom on their way to and from Mrs. Bates, I hear about every experiment, from Van de Graaf generators to chicken hearts to bean sprouts.

I also hear about every assignment, from finding the Big Idea, to creating planetary travel brochures, to designing three-dimensional models of molecules. Mrs. Bates has high expectations (hence the groans), and she knows how to help them succeed (thus the grins). She’s a great teacher!”

—Katie Hutchison

and creative colleague to work with. What has always impressed me the most is his fairness toward his students. Every student that auditions for a play has an equal and fair chance to get a part. Oftentimes Mr. Guyotte will guide actors toward roles that they might have thought were not within their realm of experience. Those discoveries are my favorite--when Mr. G. gets a student to realize potential well beyond his or her own expectations.”

2008 Above & Beyond Awards

—Nancy Hutcheson

ally, day in day out, year in year out, than anyone else I can think of in my years at Wakefield. Obviously, she truly knows history deeply—and she left people 20 years her junior gasping in her dust as she took to our new technologies!—but beyond that, her extraordinary kindness and sense of service make her the best example our students could have, and a colleague and friend beyond compare .”

—Tutt Stapp-Harris

The school also presents “Above & Beyond” Awards to members of the administration and/or staff who in the opinion of the community have given extraordinarily of themselves for the good of the entire school and its students.

This year’s recipients were Judy Lawrence (left), a stealth nomination, as she is both a faculty member, as a beloved P.E. teacher, and a staff member, as volleyball coach, so really two awards in one!; Carol Weeks (bottom left), the cheerful “voice of Wakefield” who pinch-hits as nurse, administrative assistant, and everyone’s confidante; and the unsinkable and inimitable Georgiana Watt, who as Mr. Quinn’s administrative assistant boasts a job description that expands to cover virtually anything requiring a level head, quick wits, and a sense of humor.

Summer 2008

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Kudos Regional History Day Winners Excel at State Level Ninth grader Mina Pirasteh advances to Nationals

A long but exciting day at George Mason University’s Regional History Day Competition yielded outstanding results for Wakefield. Seventeen students represented the school that day.

The following projects placed FIRST in their categories at regionals, and went on to the State competition in Williamsburg in April: • Junior Group Documentary: The Missouri Compromise: Clay, Calhoun and Webster, by Ava Martin and Samantha McClaugherty • Junior Group Exhibit: Loudoun County Compromise, by Lauren Revere and Stephanie Schulze • Senior Individual Exhibit: Partition of Iraq: Viable Compromise or Promise of Conflict, by Mina Pirasteh

• ..--, .. ·..'-=::; I ...•

The following projects placed THIRD at regionals: • Senior Historical Paper: Medieval Knights of Freedom in the Modern Era: Casimir Pulaski and Tadeusz Kosciuszko, by Marcin Ostrowski [Marcin also received a medal from the Sons of the American Revolution for his research on these two Revolutionary War heroes.]

• Senior Individual Performance: Eleanor Roosevelt and Civil Rights, by Gracie Morrison Of the five students who attended the State competition, three received special recognition: • Mina Pirasteh placed 2nd in Senior Individual Exhibit, earning a berth at the National History Day Competition.

• Ava Marvin and Samantha McClaugherty received 3 rd place in Junior Group Documentary.

Lauren Revere and Stephanie Schulze did not place, “but also represented themselves and Wakefield admirably,” said Mrs. Wyrsch. “What a great day for them and Wakefield!”

Top, Samantha McClaugherty and Ava Martin with Mrs. Wyrsch at the “Transformational Technology” event, where they demonstrated their prizewinning Power Point. Above, Mina Pirasteh’s project, which advanced to the National level, was already attracting attention at Wakefield’s History Day.

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Epistula

Photography Students Sweep the Field at Congressional Art Show Nine students overall recognized in five media Clare Rodenberg’s prizewinning self-portrait

Nine Wakefield students made a winning showing this year at the annual Congressional Art Show. The huge competition solicits work from all public and private high schools in the 10th Congressional District: Drawing: John Patton, 3rd Digital: Alex Lamb, HM Mixed Media: Chelsea Fischer, HM Painting: Chelsea Fischer, 3rd

Spencer Sherwood, HM Photography:

Clare Rodenberg, 1st

Alex Parva, 2nd

Karis Reventas, 3rd

Demetria Genther, HM

Liza Wood, HM Clare and Alex also took 1st and 2nd respectively at The Plains Art Show, with Anna Clem receiving an Honorable Mention in Ceramics.

Activities Complete a Year of Gains

Ever challenging to orchestrate, Activity Period continues to offer up new things to do

Under the direction of Activities Director Seth Obed, the activity season wrapped up this spring with a number of notable events. WSTV [Wakefield School T.V.] put on “Premiere Night” with four sketches acted and produced by the WSTV crew. The Poetry Café continued writing and sharing poetry while the Ping Pong Club found innovative ways of playing games with 10 or more people at the same time.

The Cooking Club made and sampled recipes. Model UN held a proceeding on the resolution to recognize Kosovo as an independent state.

Thanks to the Booster Club, the Red and White Program rewarded over 100 upper school students who earned a place in the Red and White Army with their extensive participation in school athletics, arts, and enrichment/service.

Nineteen students earned the title “General” (Strategoi) for earning the highest number of Red and White merit

Kendra Riddleberger has her say at a Citizen Series gathering.

points. The Citizen Series, discussions/ debates/lectures on topics important to being a responsible citizen, finished with forums with outside speakers on topics of Religion in America, Personal Liberties, and Financial Security.

In the Middle School, Junior Stewards made environmental presentations at Hill School while Speech and Debate concluded their meetings with

a debate between Iran and the United States on building nuclear weapons.

The Recycling/Service students continued to do a tremendous job taking care of the school’s recycling and the Rocketry Club got to shoot off their models high over the upper field to end the season.

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Kudos Four Wakefield Actors Take Center Stage

Acting awards and a Governor’s School admission reward thespians

According to theatre teacher Chris Guyotte, he had forgotten all about the awards program for which Wayside Theatre, a professional theatre company in Middletown, Virginia, had sent representatives to see Wakefield’s production of You Can’t Take It With You last fall. The folks from Wayside, however, did not forget what they had seen, and this spring Gracie Morrison, Chris Stone, and Hunter Morrison were informed that they had each been awarded a T. Carter Fussell Award for acting excellence.

The award would surprise no one at Wakefield who had seen any of the shows in which the three have performed together, notably the demanding A Man for All Seasons last spring.

A separate honor came to another Wakefield actor this year, Rachel Christian, who after a demanding audition/ interview/application process was accepted into the prestigious performing arts division of the Virginia Governor’s School Summer Institute.

Rachel, who received a perfect score on her audition (comprised of two improvisations and her prepared audition piece, the monologue from Shaw’s Saint Joan), was a natural choice for the program, according to her acting

teacher Mr. Guyotte and Arts Department Chair Chris Mulligan.

“Rachel is someone who mines every last grain of usefulness out of everything she does,” Mrs. Mulligan says.

According to Mr. Guyotte, he selected the Saint Joan monologue and several others for Rachel in her acting class. He confesses that one of the frequent and necessary end results in acting class is that students cry in their monologue.

“I have to take them to a place where their character is at the breaking point,” he says. When Rachel did her

monologue for class, he reports, she was actually crying, not just “acting” as if she were crying, adding, “She has enormous innate skills waiting to be developed.”

Asked if she thought Governor’s School would be significant for her future as a theatre major and a professional, Rachel says, “Very. The more experiences you have, the better able you are to develop characters. Acting is the only profession where you have to go in front of a group and just say, ‘Here’s me! Here are my emotions.

Please accept them.’ The more experiences you have, the more confidence you will have.”

Rachel Christian was accepted into the Virginia Governor’s School Summer Institute for the performing arts.

Gracie Morrison and Chris Stone, left, along with Hunter Morrison, far right, each received a T. Carter Fussell Award from Wayside Theatre.

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“Marigot Madness,” Indeed!

Great food, great dancing, and great fund raising at the annual auction gala

By the time the auction arrived, everyone who was anyone knew that the motto of this year’s co-chairs, Pat Daly, Celeste Vella, and Cindy Valk, was, “Less is more!” The three were determined to make the auction earn even more money for the school by costing less to produce, and with no compromises on food, festivity, or fun.

Well—mission accomplished.

This year’s auction, the Caribbean-themed “Marigot Madness,” featured realistic gangplanks on which to “come aboard,” a convincing ship’s facade at the gym door, wave-riding craft aloft above the silent auction, dining decorations within which it was nearly impossible to believe you were not at a cabana on the very beach itself, rather than in the Upper Gym,

and glorious food provided through the combined talents of Ezie Junkala and Donna Stone.

Spotting where they conserved would be impossible, but conserve they did, as the auction netted a remarkable $105,000 for Wakefield while still providing a lovely evening of community for all. Kudos!!

Tucker and Mary Ann Withers

The drama of a bidding war is easy to recognize, and is part of the fun of the live auction.

Summer 2008

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Kudos Video Conferencing Comes to Wakefield

“Transformational Technology” event, showcasing recent advances made possible by annual giving, yields a remarkable gift from Polycom, Inc.

Long a staple in the corporate world, video conferencing, or as it is now called, data collaboration, is an exciting new trend in education—and thanks to a generous gift from Polycom, Inc., Wakefield is now joining the ranks of those fortunate schools that can participate in the latest applications of this technology.

Wakefield parent Barry Morris (Blake ’08), Vice-President for Federal Systems at Polycom, announced the gift at the conclusion of his keynote address at the “Transformational Technology” event held at Wakefield on April 27.

In 2007-2008, thanks to the vision and support of outgoing Technology Integration Director Michael Zeigler and support from Peter Quinn, the Board, a generous local philanthropist, and especially the Leadership Council and Archwood Circle members who chose to fund the initiative, many Wakefield classrooms have undergone a transformation, with new technological tools fueling the creativity of faculty and students alike.

Data collaboration will take the school one step further, allowing our faculty and students to have access to a database of possibilities already set up for distance learning, virtual field trips, and face-to-face meetings with people around the globe. “Although the network is just in its beginning stages, the opportunities will grow over time and Wakefield students will be the fortunate recipients beginning as early as next academic year,” says Ann-Charlotte Robinson, organizer of the “Transformational Technology” event.

In addition to Mr.. Morris’s address and his exciting announcement, the day featured a wonderful variety of demonstrations by students and faculty on current “upgrades” to their capabilities that the school’s recent technological growth has made possible.

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Wakefield parent Barry Morris, of Polycom, Inc., announces the gift of a Data Collaboration system, a.k.a. video conferencing

Devin Kennedy was among the students who demonstrated uses they have made of Wakefield’s new technologies introduced in 20072008.

Dr.. Root demonstrates the document camera for parents.

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Capital Campaign: Library, Science & Technology Phase Completed!

The capital campaign for the new Library, Science and Technology building and the accompanying retrofits for the Dining Room and the Lower School Library has been completed.

We are grateful to all who made this possible through their generous gifts – current and past parents, grandparents, alumni, friends and foundations.

This is the largest and most successful campaign that Wakefield has conducted to date and was the first phase of the Soaring to New Heights capital campaign–a phased campaign to complete the Master Plan for building out the campus over the next decade.

Gary and Ellen Squire hosted a wonderful celebration of the completion of this phase of the capital campaign at their home on May 10th. All people who had contributed to the campaign were invited, and it was a lovely event that was well attended by our enthusiastic supporters. Gary, who just retired from the Board of

Trustees after serving as trustee for 10 years, served in a leadership role in a number of significant areas throughout the campaign as a member of the Campaign Steering Committee. Gary and Ellen’s two daughters are both graduates of Wakefield: Rachel Squire ’06 and Alison Squire Sowers ’00.

Donors to the capital campaign who made gifts and pledges of $1,000 or more are recognized on the master plaque next to the doors leading in to the new Library in the Library, Science and Technology building. The list of donors will also appear in an upcoming publication this fall.

We are currently addressing the infrastructure needs of the campus through traffic and parking improvements before determining what the next construction project will be and when it might take place. Selection of new capital projects is driven by the needs of the curriculum and conforms to the Master Plan for the campus.

On May 29th, family and friends of Henry and Jennifer Koch gathered with Headmaster Peter Quinn on the entry terrace of the Science and Technology building for the dedication ceremony to name this terrace in memory of Jennifer Koch. Henry’s mother, Jane Koch, made a generous donation to the capital campaign in Jennifer’s memory, and a bronze plaque has been mounted in this space as a remembrance of Jennifer. It was a beautiful, sunny day, providing a clear view of the mountains as everyone remembered a person who did so much for the Lower School faculty and their students. She was deeply appreciated by Wakefield School as a caring, involved parent in our community.

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Spring Athletics

Reigning Champs in Two Conferences, and a 1st trip to States No word but “Wow!” captures the spring that Boys’ Tennis served up

by Ryan Cook, Coach

The Wakefield Varsity Boys’ Tennis Team won the DAC Tournament on Saturday, May 10, with a 4-3 victory over the Tandem Friends Badgers. The championship was not decided until the final doubles match, where Carter Dale and Brian Mascatello clinched the title for the Fighting Owls. With the victory, Wakefield improved to 14-1 on the season, and advanced to the state play-offs for the first time in team history.

Among the team’s (and some individual’s) highlights on the year…

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CAC Champions for the first time in boys’ tennis history.

DAC regular season champions for the first time in boys’ tennis history.

DAC Tournament champions for the first time in boys’ tennis history.

First boys’ team in history of Wakefield athletics to win all three in the same season.

2 victories over Highland School, the first victories against Wakefield’s arch rival for a boys’ varsity sport in nearly a decade, and the first victories over the Hawks in the history of the boys’ tennis program.

6 victories over 5 teams ranked top12 in the state of Virginia.

A 14-2 overall record, with the only losses coming to Maryland powerhouse St. James, and the #1 seeded team in the VISAA state play-offs, Hampton Roads Academy.

Undefeated against teams from Virginia during the regular season.

Every member of the team won at least one match.

9 out of 10 members of the team won at least three matches.

Wakefield won 5 matches that were decided by only a single point, a

Brenton Lewis

David Muss, front, and Marcin Ostrowski

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testament to their performance in the clutch.

Senior Daniel Winters concludes his career with the following accolades: -4 year letter-winner -4 year member of the varsity tennis team -30 career match victories Co-captain Brenton Lewis went 13-1 in singles action (93% win-

• • • •

ning percentage).

Carter Dale went 15-1 in singles action (94% winning percentage).

Dale also went 8-1 in doubles.

Brian Mascatello went 13-1 in singles action (93% winning percentage).

Mascatello also went 5-1 in doubles.

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The Road to Richmond–Again

CAC Championship, State tournament semi-finals highlight Girls’ Soccer season

by Seth Obed, Assistant Coach

Wakefield Girls’ Varsity Soccer moved on to the state play-offs for the third consecutive year, after a strong season capped by taking the CAC championship.

Gracie Withers

Sky Cushman

Summer 2008

The Owls defeated Christchurch School in the VISAA State Quarterfinal match 4-2. The Fighting Owls split possession in the first half but let in 2 goals to fall behind 2-0 at halftime. Christchurch earned two other

opportunities which keeper Jenna Hamrick stopped, keeping the match within reach.

Wakefield came back in the second half with more offensive confidence and better purpose with the ball, getting one goal back when Gracie Withers finished a cross. Next, Savanna Booth-Enoch scored a left-footed shot to knot the match at 2. A well-played corner kick from Gracie Withers found the feet of Sky Cushman who put the Owls up 3-2 with 22 minutes left in the match.

The Wakefield back four continued to play a strong match, responding well to pressure and clearing balls from the defensive third. With under 10 minutes, Gracie Withers played a high ball that fell behind the keeper to bring the game to 4-2. The Owls withstood pressure for the remainder of the game and Jenna Hamrick made a number of key stops from corner kicks and crosses.

The Owls advanced to Richmond for the VISAA State Semifinals, where they took on The Covenant School in a rematch of last year’s State Semifinals.

Covenant School entered the match with an 18-1-1 record.

Wakefield played a strong first half, earning a handful of crosses early and keeping the score 0-0 at halftime.

Wakefield played intelligent and controlled defending while Goalkeeper Jenna Hamrick made a number of excellent saves. In the second half, Covenant’s speed and combination passing wore down Wakefield. Covenant earned a direct kick with 20 minutes left in the match and drove it in to take the lead. With less than 10 minutes left Covenant added another well-struck goal to go ahead 2-0. Wakefield played hard and well against Covenant, who went on to take the VISAA DII Championship on Saturday with a 6-0 victory.

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Spring Athletics

Girls’ Lacrosse Shows Its Mettle

After a thrilling semi-final win over Tandem, team is DAC runner-up in a solid final against Highland In a season of ups and downs, the Girls’ Lacrosse team finished strong.

After a long dry spell for the first half of the season, back-to-back wins in April against Tandem and Notre Dame marked a turning point, in two highscoring games that each finished at 1410. These wins were followed closely by twin victories against Mercersburg, the first of which came at home in the Archwood Tournament.

After a hard 10-17 loss to perennial powerhouse St. James in the MCAC semifinals, the Owls went on to face Tandem in the DAC semis. The game could not have been closer, and the 11-10 win spurred the team on to renewed confidence as it went on to face Highland in the DAC finals.

The confidence and momentum paid off. Whereas Highland had

Lilly Withers

Erica Eickhoff

rolled over the Owls 1-13 in their first meeting, this game was very different, and Hawks had to play hard to secure their eventual 8-13 victory, making the Owls’ runner-up finish something to

be proud of.

Strong leadership from seniors Erica Eickhoff, Lilly Withers, and Morgan Vandermast helped the season finish on the upbeat.

Four!

The small but intrepid golf team qualifies for the DAC Championships

Yes, there are just four of them.

But they sure can golf !

New coach Nancy Geeting says that amid far larger teams, Wakefield held its own time and again. The team acquired a score high enough to qualify them for the DAC Championships, finishing fourth out of the seven schools competing.

Stephanie Eybers was also named to the First Team for All-DAC Golf.

Coach Nancy Geeting, with golfers Nick Daniels, Stephanie Eybers, and Henry Longley. Not pictured: Kevin Nicolaisen.

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Epistula

True Grit

CAC Champions & DAC finalists, Boys’ Lacrosse returns to State tournament Finishing 11-6 on the season, with a conference championship, a conference finalist title, and a trip to the state tournament ranked at #6, the Boys’ Varsity Lacrosse team has much to be proud of, though in a season hit

hard by suspensions and injuries, the Owls were also left with some bittersweet unknowns about what might have been in a year that saw a record 11 seniors on the roster.

Significant DAC wins came

against Fredericksburg Academy, Massanutten, Randolph-Macon, and Tandem, while the Archwood Tournament showed victories against both Fork Union and Benedictine. Another hard-fought match was against Northern High of Calvert County, MD, with an exciting 13-12 battle.

The road to the CAC championships saw a semi-final 15-7 win over Blue Ridge, to whom they had lost earlier in the season 8-9, and a convincing win over Benedictine to clinch the title.

The Owls’ two regular season losses to Highland could not be avenged in the rivals’ scheduled meeting in the DAC finals, as persistent rain forced cancellation of the event.

But the 11 seniors finished the season proudly nevertheless, with plenty of evidence of what that amount of experience on the field can do.

Simon Fraser

The defense spares goalie Zach Power one save as St. James is robbed of a shot.

-----------------------~ ------------------------21 Summer 2008

Mutual Benefits

of

Scholar ship

The extensive application process that brings the Wakefield junior class its Polish Scholar each year seems to know its applicants and Wakefield very well indeed. In the program’s second year, both recipients so far have elected to remain at Wakefield for their senior years, and both have distinguished themselves academically in significant ways. What do these community members see at Wakefield from their international perspective?

A

ccording to her commencement address as Wakefield’s 2008 co-valedictorian, Dominika Kruszewska arrived in the U.S. feeling nothing at all like the confident young woman speaking before the large crowd.

“When I came to Wakefield two years ago, I had no idea what to expect,” she said. “I had never been outside of Europe; I had never even been on a plane before. I had flown 4000 miles to stay with a family I had not previously met and go to a school I knew hardly anything about. I wish I could say I was too excited to be nervous but honestly, I was terrified.”

Well, who wouldn’t be?

And yet the match worked. Dominika completed her

year as 2007 Polish Scholar and, at the eleventh hour, chose also to remain at Wakefield to graduate. At Commencement she was not only co-valedictorian, but received the “Outstanding Senior Thesis” designation, as well as the Good Manners award.

She has been in plays, and has had work published in Talisman for the last two years, serving as Prose Editor last year (yes, in her second language).

The mutual benefits of this exchange—that Wakefield served Dominika’s needs well enough for her to choose to return, and that she clearly brought to the Wakefield community a rich intellect and work ethic—is a tribute to the Washington Opportunities Group and its parent organization, the Lind-

-----~ -----22 Epistula

ner Scholarship Program. The five-stage application process conducted in Poland for the single Polish Scholar opening at Wakefield—which involves letters of intent in English, transcripts, recommendations, a trip to Warsaw to complete an interview and write more essays, and then selection from among three to five finalists by a committee made up of representatives from the Washington Opportunities Group, Wakefield School, and the host family—was clearly designed to ask the right questions on both sides of the equation. Nonetheless, throughout the process, being chosen as the winner seemed like a remote possibility to Dominika.

“When I found out I had been chosen, my grandparents told me, ‘You don’t have to do this just because you won!’ ” Dominika says. Her family had a variety of hesitations, including her older sister, who is 21 and studying law in Poland. “She was happy for me, but she told me I would come home as a brunette version of ‘Legally Blond,’ with a little pink hat and a little dog!” Dominika laughs. “She said I would get fat from eating fast food all the time!”

The examination of pre-existing stereotypes—both Dominika’s and America’s—was of course one of the most important and most challenging parts of the cultural exchange.

According to Dominika, despite having studied English for six years, most of her ideas about what the U.S. might actually be like had come from American movies about high school.

“My friends and I could only picture cheerleaders, and football,” she says. “Actually my friends were disappointed when I told them that Wakefield had neither of these!”

Dominika says she had also been warned in Poland that schools here would be behind Polish schools, and would not be challenging to her academically. While she admits that she thinks her old high school was more rigorous than Wakefield academically, she also says the two schools are simply different.

“Homework is higher here,” she says. “I am taking the same classes here that I would have been taking in Poland [her schedule last year included three AP classes and Honors senior thesis], but in Poland we do not write so much! You would write in your English class and in literature class, but here you write papers in every class, psychology, history, even science!”

Dominika also points to a different attitude at Wakefield towards extracurricular activities.

“I was amazed...Here they are a big commitment. Everyone tries to be as professional as possible, like with the Talisman, and with theatre productions. In Poland if we wanted to do a play we would just sort of put it together, come up with some kind of costumes—it was very informal. Here you build an entire set, and everyone works hard to be very professional.”

The seriousness with which sports teams are approached here is also very different from her previous school, and she enjoyed the pride her friends here took in their competitive teams.

Naturally, there had to be at least some apprehensions about America that rang true, and one of them was some Americans’ lack of knowledge about Poland and other countries. Dominika was asked some rather unfortunate questions by her new peers when she arrived. “ ‘Where is Poland?’ I was asked,” she says. “ ‘What language do they speak there? Have you ever eaten pizza before?

Have you heard of peanut butter? Are there pigs in Poland?’”

Thankfully for her and for us, though, Dominika’s more desirable experiences held sway. She will remain here to attend Washington and Lee University in the fall.

“European studies are very Europe-centric,” she says.

“The U.S. perspective is more global—the education is more open-minded, and you have more international opportunities open to you with a degree from an American university.”

And, she says, she hopes she can help to correct misconceptions about her country by being here as an ambassador of Poland. “My presence here makes a difference,” she says with smile.

M

arcin Ostrowski, 2008 Polish Scholar, came to the U.S. with some of the same pre-existing ideas as Dominika, but in one aspect his experience was quite different.

He agrees with her that his media-based impressions of America (his had come from YouTube) had been “totally wrong!” But he goes on to add that while he had expected to come here and meet people who cared about the U.S. and the U.S. perspective and not about other countries, this impression was “totally wrong as well. Students at Wakefield have broad knowledge of the world.” While this surprised him at first, he says that when he realized the kind of school Wakefield is, it seemed natural that students were well-informed.

Marcin also came here with a different intent: he planned to remain at Wakefield for his senior year all along, and he hopes to attend an American university, to pursue either a pre-med or a biology major before studying dentistry. “My mother is a dentist,” he says, “and I have wanted to be a dentist all of my life!”

Marcin’s academic experiences at Wakefield so far seem to indicate that the universities he is considering—Johns Hopkins, Duke—are well within reach. He received the Outstanding New Student award at commencement, and at the Regional History Day competition he received third place, as well as a medal from the Sons of the American Revolution, for his research paper on two Revolutionary War heroes, Medieval Knights of Freedom in the Modern Era: Casimir Pulaski and Tadeusz Kosciuszko.

Marcin says with pride that his former high school is one of the top schools in Poland, and characterized by small classes like Wakefield. The primary difference he observes is that of the relationship between students and teachers.

“At my old school teachers called us by our last names: ‘Mr. Ostrowski.’ If I just walked in to a room and said, ‘Hi!’ to a faculty member that would not be good on the older teachers—actually, it would not be good on the younger teachers!”

Here, he says, teachers are cheerful and smiling, and there is a friendly teacher/student relationship. While he enjoys the informality, he says that sometimes “students can push too hard,” and to Marcin the tone can interfere with academics in some classes. (“But Mrs. Wyrsch never allows this!” he adds. “I really appreciate that about her!”)

Despite this different approach, when asked how he would describe Wakefield at home, he replies, “Honestly, I would simply tell them it is just like my old school!...I learned, ‘These people are just like me.’ My stereotypes have been broken.”

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Summer 2008

23

The ambitions of Wakefield‘s Upper School Service Club have grown dramatically in recent years, with the group’s dedicated advisor, Carolyn Wyrsch, and dynamic president, Lilly Withers, driving numerous community initiatives. Yet as the service accomplishments of participating students have grown, the number of students in the Upper School Service Club has been shrinking.

Upcoming student leaders hope that a significant grant earned for a community project this year will help to broaden interest in this mission-compatible endeavor.

T

he Service Club’s project in support of the Fauquier County Food Distribution Coalition (FFC) began with a simple question, according to Carolyn Wyrsch: “What do you need?”

When Service Club members had gathered to assist at the group’s Thanksgiving food distribution in Warrenton, they saw that there was a need for some type of improvement to help them work faster and more efficiently, and the FFC was quick to reply: they needed a new computer.

When families or individuals come to the FFC on distribution days in need of food, they must sign in, and volunteers must collect information and check various records to determine the amount of food the person or family is eligible to receive. All of this takes precious time, when lines can form and volunteers can be stretched thin. A fast and efficient computer could cut this time dramatically and keep things moving, FFC volunteers told Mrs. Wyrsch.

Since Service Club president Lilly Withers was also on

the Board of Directors of the Student Philanthropy Project—a community-outreach project of the Piedmont Community Foundation in which a student Board reviews applications and recommends the funding of grant money to student organizations for worthy community projects—Lilly and Mrs. Wyrsch hatched the idea that helping the FFC get a computer would be a perfect grant project. They brought the idea back to the Wakefield Service Club members, and the group decided they would apply for a grant.

As the project and its grant application took shape, says Lilly, ideas for broadening their support of FFC came too: supplies would be needed for the new computer, and the right software for the task. Technology-saavy students could help train all of the group’s adult volunteers, so that they could get the most from their new tool. In addition to keeping the food distribution records, the computer could be used for administrative tasks such as logging volunteer hours.

In addition, the group had need for more carts for hauling

The Dollars—and Sense—of Service

-----~ -----24 Epistula

recipients’ food out to their cars. Wakefield’s Service Club had already provided the group with two carts, paid for with money from Candygram sales, but the students who helped with distribution regularly said that more carts were needed.

Finally, the plan for assistance would include that Wakefield students would provide increased manpower to assist the FFC in their Saturday distributions “With the economy the way it is right now, there has been much increase in the need for food for families,” says Lilly.

“This support will help [FFC] speed up the process” so they can meet more families’ needs.

The mechanics of philanthropy Lilly has been on the Board of the Student Philanthropy Project (SPP) for both years of its young existence. “The first year we had three applications for 2008, and funded two,” Lilly says. “This year we had seven applications for 2009, and funded four!” One of the four funded grants was Wakefield’s “Food for Thought” application in support of the FFC. The SPP is made up of two students from each public and private high school in Loudoun and Fauquier counties. An extensive process accompanies the consideration of each grant, and once funded, follow-up visits by the student Board insure that funded groups are meeting the guidelines of their grant and using the money correctly.

Lilly has enjoyed both the results of the various funded projects, and the interaction with area youth committed to service. Most of the youth, she says, are so excited about the projects and so dedicated to helping others.

Also, an important goal of the SPP is for students from a wide variety of schools to come together and work on a shared project for their shared communities. This year, in fact, when Wakefield’s “Food for Thought” grant came up for review by the Board, it was two students from Highland who ended up being the Board members assigned to do the interview for Wakefield’s application.

“They were great,” says Lilly. “And in their report they said that we were ‘so enthusiastic!’ ” Lilly says that the “Food for Thought” grant application took about three months to complete. Wakefield Service Club members working on the application had to include all the details of the intended project; the final application was eight pages long, Lilly says. When they had finished their calculations, they had determined that they would require $1500 to fully fund their plan, and so they applied for that amount, knowing that sometimes the SPP chose to recommend partial funding for a project.

When word came back that the grant had been awarded to Wakefield’s Service Club, it turned out that the project had been fully funded at the requested amount.

“What I like about the project is that it will involve the Upper School,” says Lilly, not just Service Club. Many hands FROM THE HEART Service Club advisor Carolyn Wyrsch, above, and long-time student leader Lilly Withers, right, know the joy of service and have seen its value at work in the community. Both are looking for ways to extend this experience to more students.

will be needed to meet the grant application’s commitment to assist in providing manpower for food distribution. Already, the sophomore class and the boys’ basketball team have agreed to be part of the work force.

Hopefully, that field of volunteers will grow, and the project and its satisfying nature become better known.

Growing pains The implementation of the “Food for Thought” grant in 2008-2009 will be taken up by two dedicated Service Club members, Clare Rodenberg and Liza Wood. It will be their task to make sure the computer is purchased and FFC volunteers are up to speed on its use, that new carts are purchased and delivered, that computer supplies are kept stocked, that Wakefield volunteers are available to help distribute food on a regular basis, and that the project stays within its budget.

Obviously, this is a huge commitment for two students.

Equally obviously, they will need a lot of help.

Where that help will come from is one of the only aspects of the “Food for Thought” project that is not under the careful control of the Service Club members—to grow its membership enough to meet the vast need for service in the school and community, the club must rely on the spirit of volunteerism of the Upper School. As Service Club numbers slide, that spirit can feel hard to come by.

It is hard for Lilly to understand. “I don’t know how I could not be involved in service!” she says with some exasperation. “As a school, we just need to become better at putting our words into actions. No matter how much homework and other things we have on our plates, we have to find the time to help out others. Service work relates to this Wakefield idea of ‘making a difference.’ We have so many opportunities to make a difference in the lives of others. Going out and finding a cause to support embodies the idea of ‘seeking the challenge.’ ”

•

-----~ ----~~25 Summer 2008

Fourth grade history teacher Katie Hutchison and fellow fourth grade home room teacher Cyndi Williams spend weeks of intensive work preparing for their students’ one-day immersion into the coming-to-America experience of everyone’s forebears. Students work for weeks as well, doing research, imagining characters, ferreting through their family trees and questioning relatives, making costumes, exploring international cuisines...

Why all the effort? Immigration Day’s results speak for themselves.

T

he Ellis Island experience of immigrants to the U.S. does not fall within the time frame of Katie Hutchison’s fourth grade history course. “But people coming here— and what they leave behind—is throughout history,” she says. “If you live here,” she reminds her students, “then unless you are a Native American, someone came from somewhere else. Everyone got off a boat.”

The remarkable learning experience of Immigration Day—”the most intense day of fourth grade,” says Cyndi Williams—is intended to connect students with that forebear who got off a boat, and what made him or her leave behind every known thing in order to find a new life. It is also intended to connect students with one another, since this is the level at which everyone’s pasts hit their least common denominator: if you are American, this is your story.

A final and essential goal is for students to gain appreciation for the true value of what their ancestors risked everything to seek. What they came for—freedom, opportunity, a better life for their children—has always been the best of what this nation of immigrants has to offer its citizens.

O

ne aspect of the genius of Immigration Day’s design, and a secret to its magical hold on students’ imaginations, is a devilishly clever balance between making the event exactly realistic enough that students experience true “temporary suspension of disbelief,” and yet self-conscious and funny enough that they can joke around and remember that they really are just pretending.

“Sail Away...”

26

Epistula

Because, let’s face it—immigration was, is, has always been, fundamentally terrifying. How could it not be? Mrs. Hutchison and Mrs. Williams have built in innumerable twists and turns to mimic this experience in a safe but utterly memorable way: The day itself is long, by design, and not all parts of it are easy. Long waits in line at check-stations such as health, literacy, banking needs, professional preparedness, are the norm.

Parents and faculty manning these stations adhere to strict guidelines, and it matters if you have your papers in order, the right amount of money, evidence that you can support yourself in the new world and not be a burden on society. And though the issuing of five-year visas is the norm, if, say, too many intended blacksmiths have passed through the station, then a parent can simply start issuing two-year visas instead.

The system is also capriciously unpredictable, and often—seemingly— uncaring. When student immigrants cannot advance to, say, their health inspection until they have passed through the banking check to verify that their currency is valid, the “bank” will suddenly close—no explanation, no plan for when it will re-open, no guidance on what to do next.

And some carefully-chosen parents mill through the day as tricksters determined to take advantage of the new immigrants. They offer to tell their fortunes and so rob them of their minimum required funds; they take unwatched bags, and give bad advice; they will move in on carelessly handled passports. (Student immigrants have been briefed on the perils of “travel,” and are prepared to outwit these parent pranksters!)

When, at then end of the day, all stations have been cleared, the literacy tests passed, and the final inspection completed, students take the actual Citizenship Oath—the same text that every immigrant says when becoming a U.S. citizen. It is a solemn and emotional moment. The text of the oath is the one thing the students have not been briefed on beforehand, and the impact of speaking the words, of realizing in the moment what it means to take on the mantle of citizenship, hits home with every single child.

Traditional song and dance from around the world follow, and the “Melting Pot Potluck” ends the day with a fabulous international feast.

P

reparation for this day includes assignments that could only be fun to do, and that most adults would enjoy: the making of a family tree for your family, and the creation of a personal family crest to display; the discovery of the (or a) country from which your actual forebears emigrated; the creation of a character from that country, and the keeping of a Time Traveler’s Journal of his or her life at home and journey to America; a letter home from that character to family or friends left behind, telling of why he or she left, what the hopes are for the future, and what the ship journey was like...and on and on.

On certain special days leading up to Immigration Day, students gather to read to one another from their Time Traveler’s Journals. These days are called Magic Carpet days; they actually sit on the floor on Oriental rugs, and Mrs. Hutchison sprinkles the young time travelers with glitter, a.k.a. fairy dust.

And even at a school not hesitant to ask much of its teachers, Mrs. Hutchison and Mrs. Williams describe their own

SERIOUS RESPONSIBILITY Each group of immigrants from each “ship” has a group leader, who holds all the group’s passports, guides them through the many stations of the process, and answers to the “authorities” if there are any “irregularities.” Above, Hunter Golian (top) and Maddie Dale step forward on behalf of their charges. In a Grandparents’ Day speech one year a student cited his selection as a group leader for Immigration Day as one of the most significant affirmations he received in his Lower School years. preparations for this day as “astronomical.” Of course, it could be done with less attention to detail; but it isn’t. Passports are created for each child, reflecting each character’s chosen biography. Luggage tags are made that rival museum-kept examples of the real thing. And then there are the books to be found and shared, on Ellis Island, and true accounts of immigrants, especially children, and movies on the immigration experience.

Bringing the story alive, over and over and over again.

“Empathy for history is hard to create,” says Mrs. Hutchison. “You have to make them live it.” And their classmates’ stories make it alive too, like the year it came out that two students’ great-grandmothers had come to America on the same ship—and in the last group of immigrants allowed out of Germany before Hitler closed the border.

“And the issue is contemporary, too,” she says, visibly moved. “At least they will get that the issue is complicated. I don’t know what the answers are. Sure, we can close the border—but then, that’s somebody’s grandmother.”

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Summer 2008

27

Sound Mind, Sound Body What does a successful athletics program look like at a school dedicated to academic excellence? This year Wakefield posted varsity results looking astonishingly similar to those of any other athletically-successful school.

Are we there yet?

“W

hy bother? This is a school. What is the point of sports at a school?”

No, these are not the words of a frustrated parent, emailed to Mr. Quinn late at night while watching his or her child nodding at the kitchen table over must-do homework after an away game. These are the words of Wakefield’s own Athletic Director, Paul Sipes.

Let’s modify that title just a bit: Athletic Director, coach of the historic 2008 Girls’ Varsity Basketball team, and the architect, along with Assistant AD Scott Barron, of the system that is bringing about a new day in Wakefield athletics.

Wakefield has certainly fielded successful teams in a variety of sports over the years, and had the honor of being represented by many amazing individual athletes. But what is new is the emergence—bit by bit, so gradually you could be surprised by it—of a uniformity of success, and of the expectation of success. Paul Sipes, it seems, has his sights set not on

today (when you look at the statistics box on the next page and say, “Woah! You sent nine teams to States?! Amazing!”) but on tomorrow (when the response to such a statistic will be, “So... what happened to the other five?”).

Mr. Sipes proposed the “Why bother?” question in his letter to the community that appeared in the sports programs last year. He went on to say, in part: ...The answer is because they provide a venue wherein a crucial set of lessons...may be learned. Though the lessons are many, the educational goals can be summarized: through athletics we seek to teach our students that dedication, determination, hard work, sacrifice and team work are the precursors to success in every facet of life.

At Wakefield we could easily argue that our students learn these lessons every day in the classroom. This is true to an extent, but the students’ exam scores are not published in the Fauquier Times-Democrat. The public and final outcome

-----~ -----28 Epistula

of your effort is what separates athletics from all other cooperative learning ventures. I am proud to have our department represented by young people who exhibit toughness, intelligence, and the work ethic that is such an integral part of the Wakefield experience.

2007-2008 POST-SEASON SNAPSHOT Varsity teams fielded in 2007-2008:

14 Teams that advanced in DAC playoffs:

8 Teams in the DAC finals:

6 DAC Championships:

3 CAC Championships:

5 Teams that qualified for State playoffs (or individual sports that sent qualifying athletes to state competition):

9 Teams that advanced in State playoffs:

3 State finalists: 1

T

hat learning and athletics, sports and the educational value of sports, cannot be separated from one another is indeed the bedrock of the Sipes and Barron program, and is the source of the uncompromising values.

“The [class of 2008] is the first group to have come through with three full years of standardized expectations,” says Mr. Sipes. “The only thing Scott and I have done is standardize expectations.”

This, of course, is not the only thing they have done.

Their initial report to the Board in September of 2005, when both had just arrived at Wakefield that summer, laid out what they called a “three-pronged approach” to “implementing a shift to a programmatic approach toward athletics”: assimilation, maximized resources, and maximized participation.

While the resources and participation prongs are selfexplanatory, “assimilation” is not. The idea, according to their 2005 report, “is to make the extra-curricular programs part of the normal experience of a Wakefield School day.”

Assimilation must extend to faculty as well, with more faculty coaching teams, giving teachers empathy for the athlete’s need to work late after games and, by travelling themselves with the teams and coming to class prepared, providing “an inspiration and a personification of practicing what one preaches.” Towards this end, the report concluded, coaching stipends had to be increased significantly.

Assimilation would also include taking advantage of the school’s K-12 structure, and provide a “seamless structure from grade 4 to grade 12,” with Middle School communicating with intramural coaches, and varsity with Middle School, about the skills, concepts and terms student athletes will need for success at the next level.

The final assessment, though, of the 2005 report to the Board is that “the single key to improving athletics at Wakefield is getting students to play.” Overall percentages are up significantly since 2005, though some teams are still not at target rosters.

There is any irony here, though, one that is not lost on Mr. Sipes and Mr. Barron, and that is that, initially at least, the aforementioned standardized expectations, those uncomSTRENGTH IN [SMALL] NUMBERS Despite several team rosters’ being under target numbers of players this year, “the teams we field have strengthened,” says AD Paul Sipes, seen at far left with his Girls’ Varsity Basketball team (all eight of them), which this year broke the school record (twice) for wins in a season with their 21-8 showing. Assistant AD Scott Barron, left, led the Boys’ Varsity squad of nine to the regular season DAC co-championship and the DAC tournament finals. Both girls’ and boys’ teams qualified for state playoffs for the first time in the program’s history: the girls advanced to the second round; the boys lost their first-round match by two slim points.

Summer 2008

29

promising values that underlie the new rules of the road in Wakefield athletics, are going to meet with some resistance, and some of that resistance will express itself—again, initially—in decreased participation.

“D

o the right thing,” one hears from both Mr. Sipes and Mr. Barron over and over, as they make the hard decisions called for by their big-picture commitment to making Wakefield athletics solid and strong. “Do the right thing for the long-term.” You always know, they say, what the right thing is, and every time you don’t do it, every time you take the easier path and let something slide, it ends up coming back to “bite you in the butt.”

Virtually every current Wakefield athlete would probably tell you that any experience that Coach Sipes or Coach Barron has ever had with letting something slide must have happened in the long-ago past.

It certainly hasn’t happened in the last three years at Wakefield.

And the decisions are hard. Suspensions, for one game or several, are tough to hand out, and agonizing for coaches to live with when big games are on the line. Sitting out a game on the bench because you were late to the warmup, and possibly having your team lose, is, some argue, a consequence that outstrips the offense. But Wakefield’s ADs have their eyes on the larger prize: not just winning teams in a sound program, but a sound educational experience for participating athletes. And a sound education begins, they believe firmly, with a consistent message.

Being inconsistent is “not pedagogically sound,” says Mr. Sipes. When he arrived, the idea that every single athlete on every team answered to the same expectations—attendance at every practice and game, for example, regardless of conflicts with other school activities or family plans outside of school— felt new to a number of athletes and their families. The idea that a key player could be dismissed from a team for ongoing lateness to practices was even more unfamiliar. But, say both Sipes and Barron, this is the necessary message. “No one is bigger than the program,” says Coach Barron, who has stood by this idea even when it was difficult to do so.

Basketball Commission; Seth Obed served on the State Soccer Commission. By hosting and traveling to high-profile tournaments, coaches and recruiters get to see Wakefield in action, which can bring desirable attention to both our players and our program. Mr. Sipes has also worked on creating more opportunities for coaches to participate in professional development.

He also cites the Boosters as having a huge impact on everyone’s experiences. “They support our community, provide financial help, make the banquets happen, organize team lunches...they make our staff of two look like a staff of many more.”

U

ltimately, though, says Mr. Sipes, the program will flourish when the athletes are invested. The evidence of that is pouring in. The flip-side of a few low rosters is that the athletes who are playing are passionate and committed.

One of the most significant developments is that an indefinable but unmistakable air of increased interdependence among team members is moving throughout the program. The logic behind why it is so essential that every athlete is at every practice and game is that the team literally cannot function with any player missing. The students clearly believe this to be so, and their sense of being indispensable parts of a larger whole is exciting and infectious. And with this comes the enormous and active support that is given to every team member by every other. It can be seen at practices, in the stands at games, and most especially on the playing fields themselves.

The program has begun to emphasize being part of a larger whole in a more subtle way as well—with the introduction of service/playing trips. For the last two years, the Boys’ Basketball team has traveled to a location where they could meet three wonderful goals at once: the visiting of a fun and historically-interesting destination (New Orleans, the Virgin Islands), the providing of service to a needy population, and the playing of some great competitive basketball. That each of these teams had become so functional as a working whole that they could come together to serve other goals than playing a sport, and have fun in the process, is a message of incalculable value.

And Scott Barron will still tell you that one of his proudaturally, there are other aspects to building the program est moments in this historic year for Boys’ Basketball was when than rigid discipline: “We have to give them a good his team went down in such stunning fashion to nationallyenough experience that this is where they want to be.” ranked Montrose Christian, and Wakefield’s players never for One part of providing that experience is providing consis- one moment quit or wavered in their efforts. tent coaching. Girls’ lacrosse, for example, has suffered constant “At the end of the day, if we do our jobs, the kids will feel coach turnover in recent years, which affects both their perforgood about what they have accomplished,” says Mr. Barron. mance and their loyalty to the team; this past year, only three of “Were we going to beat Montrose? No. But you can play as eight returning senior lacrosse girls elected to rejoin the team. though you can win.

Recent additions to the coaching staff include some “If we live with the school’s mission, then we must do coaches with deep experience and long lists of demonstrated this,” he says. “With any mission statement, it is easy to fall successes. Mr. Sipes has also worked to bring Wakefield and its into ‘word magic’—you say it’s so, so it must be so. We can’t do coaches into the fold of Virginia athletics: he serves as the vice- that.” If the proof is in the pudding, the mission is indeed being president of the DAC; both he and Mr. Barron are on the State lived in the Athletics Department, not just spoken.

“At the end of the day, if we do our jobs, the kids will feel good about what they have accomplished. Were we going to beat Montrose?

No. But you can play as though you can win.”

N

---------- ~ ----------.

30

Epistula

“I keep saying ‘joy’...”

The Senior Interview with Alex Parva Ask Alex what she might like to major in, and she will quickly narrow it down to three main areas of study: photography (well, the fine arts in general, really), and the sciences (chemistry is great, but any), and of course English and literature—she loves reading, and writing. Oh, and she wants to keep up her lacrosse in college.

And study abroad—she definitely thinks travel is important! But she also wants to take advantage of “those exotic courses,” the things you would never think of but that are such great opportunities...

In short: Alex loves to learn.

Period.

You came to Wakefield in 8th grade. What were your criteria in searching for a school for yourself?

At that age, I really wasn’t thinking about it that much!

I wanted my parents to be comfortable with the school, and I was glad that they seemed confident that this was a good choice. I think they wanted me to be well-rounded, and to be in a place where I could do lots of different things. My old school had no grammar or writing at all, and I was interested in literature and writing, so I think they wanted me to be able to write well.

How would you describe yourself as a student and learner? What do you value in a learning experience?

I’m very driven to do well. I’m not— I’m not— Well, some people call me a perfectionist…If something is given to me I have to get it done. I’m always wanting to stay ahead, and saying, “What can I do?”, and especially here with the workload, there is always something to do!

I love how in English and literature class we explore the whole realm. I have my opinions, but I love to learn about different beliefs and hear different perspectives—then I understand me more and the world more. I love that in class we get to experience something different that’s something that you never would have known.

The books we read—I am so glad that we read them, because almost all of them I would never have read, and I feel they open up doors. I get stuck in my old Alex ways and caught up in the same genres, but the books we read are all so different. At times I was like, “WHY is Mr. Zontine making us read this? I don’t like this at all!” but looking back it’s neat.

I never would have read One Hundred Years of Solitude! But books are a forum for ideas. You learn so much more than your little world.

And science: I had never liked science and had always dreaded science class until chemistry…and even this year with organic chem., there are times when you say, “This makes no

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sense!” but then when the light bulb goes off it’s just the best feeling. You feel all enlightened and semi-brilliant for about five minutes until Mrs. Bowen picks another topic!

In the winter of 2006-07, they were starting mission trips at my church, and I’d always wanted to do a mission trip…I really felt called to do this it this time…

Sometimes I still can’t believe I was really at this place You have been a wonderful writer for your whole career and I met these people…It was unlike anything I had expehere, and were clearly already a writer before your arrival here. rienced. Living here you get so caught up in your own little Did you write for fun on your own? It doesn’t sound like your world… previous school emphasized writing!

We spent most of our time outside of the capital [of No, not at all! I have always loved reading. I read conZambia], which is Lusaka. We were in a lot of orphanages, and stantly—honestly, I get to the point where I can read a book we walked through the compounds. You see these things on a day because I just get so sucked into it. And I journal a lot; TV but it’s so different actually walking through there, and you I have been journaling for years. I love having this record of see the kids playing in the waste on the side of the road, and the where I’ve been and where I am—and it’s huge for me to know smells, the people—it’s like, this is so real, and it’s so alive, and where I am going. it’s so sad.

I enjoyed writing, but I wasn’t very good at it so I wasn’t I took my 35mm camera with me. There’s that fine line up to where I should have been; I was just sort of doing it on of respect for the people, where you ask, so staying within the my own. But then when I came to Wakefield it was like the bounds of that, I got the opportunity to meet and talk to and floodgates just opened. When you finally learn how to do take pictures of these incredible people, and these children that something you just—I would come home after school and just are just so dear to my heart. let loose, poems, and even writing that was not just personal, After taking all of this in, we spent four or five days like fiction. When I wrote that story in 8th grade about the in Lusaka doing what would be the equivalent of a Vacation doves, Dr. Fontaine had assigned us a creative writing project, Bible School here…There were about 200 orphans who could and I remembered a picture I had been shown in 4th grade of attend. It was called Camp Hope—the youngest kids were 4 a window with curtains blowing and some doves just peeling or 5, and some teenagers, so a whole range. We worked with off the wallpaper, and I suddenly thought, “Now’s my chance to local Sunday School translators there, which was really neat. I write about that!” had never worked with a translator before. When you’re in a Wakefield encouraged you to write, and I enjoyed it. And I love all of the different types of writing we do. You have to do them, and it’s great, because you get all these different angles; you try something and you realize strengths. You realize, I can crank out this paper that would have been impossible before.

And the thesis—I just remember at orientation, one of the seniors got up and he was talking about his thesis, and they were talking about past theses, and I thought, “Oh, my gosh—I can’t do this.” I remember thinking, “I hope my parents pull me out of here before my senior year!” ...Now I look back on it and I think, “That was really very enjoyable! What was I thinking?” Once I got into it I really enjoyed the senior thesis process…I just really loved all the different writing stuff we do here. When you look back you take pride in your work. Last summer none of this [gesturing to her thesis] even existed, and you think, wow, all those months of hard work, to know that it paid off, and you see that you worked hard and it means something.

There are times in the year…I have a lot of friends who attend the public system, and they are always saying come on, let’s do this, and I say, no, I have to work on my thesis, I have to go to the library, I have to do research, and there comes a point where you say, “Where is my life?” But then you realize that you’ve had this special experience that so many other people never ever get to have. And honestly, I feel so much more prepared going into college…I feel like I can handle pretty much anything they can throw at me, because I’ve already come this far.

I read your senior thesis, and though I am sure you have had to tell the story so many times, I still have to ask you how you came to go to Africa and how your thesis took shape.

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country where you don’t speak one word of the language…you have to put your trust in this person, to know that what they say will convey what you mean and the emotion to the children around you. [I and another girl] had ten kids, 10-14 year olds, all girls and two boys…I loved them all so much, I think about them all the time!

For Camp Hope, the children actually stay at the church, which is this concrete building, and it has a concrete floor, which is really rare in Africa, a solid floor…so they covered the floor with mattresses, and by our standards they were just like nothing, I mean they probably weren’t even an inch thick, but to these kids it was really something. They got three meals a day, and most of these kids are malnourished, and don’t eat on a regular basis. They got a brand new tee shirt…

At home you just open your freezer and say, “What shall I eat today?” and there is just so much to choose from…and these kids are just so excited to get their meal—in fact lunch is a little chaotic! A really neat thing for me was that every single day, the whole entire trip, lunch and dinner, we had rice, and enchima, which is kind of like a cornmeal thing, and chicken and cabbage…I have never been a fan of cabbage, like never ever…but I loved it! I had that same meal for two weeks, and it never got old—it was really neat for me being in that situation.

I took one shower the whole time I was there, and I got the opportunity to rinse I think twice. It was amazing, because I was like, “You know—I just don’t care!” I mean, I really just did not care. The children were all I really cared about, and I know I am just going off but I just love to talk about it! Everything about it was so amazing.

When you come back you are just trying to make sense of everything. When you get back to America it is culture shock. Coming home from the airport it is like, wow, I’m in a car—and it is actually functioning! When we were there we had a vehicle about the size of a mini-van, and there were 18 of us and a translator in it. You come back and it’s just so much…

Before I left my mom asked me about doing Africa for my thesis, but I didn’t want the trip to be my “project.” I didn’t want to be there thinking “Oh, how can I make this project?”

I wanted to be there with these children, not make them my project; I didn’t want to exploit poverty. So there was this whole kind of inward battle…

But then I felt, I want to share my experience with other people. It’s just one more way for me to share what I’ve seen and the suffering of these people, to draw awareness to the whole AIDS situation….Here in The Plains, with nothing but beautiful mountains, it just seems so unreal, and if anything it just seems so far away…it seems detached from ourselves.

And the thesis is also a way for me to be able to make sense of it all, not just in a scientific sense [through research], but to mull through my thoughts in a productive manner—I could better understand myself and what I had seen.

Eventually I decided to do two completely separate pieces. For one, I would create my photo portfolio, and develop all of the pictures myself and create the whole thing. And it was very time-consuming, and very tedious. I’d spend hours and hours on just one image trying to get it right. Then you have to scan all the pictures, and correct any scratches or flaws in Pho-

toshop. Then I’d put them into the document and put the book together…That would be a stand-alone piece to complement my paper on the research I had done.

[For the paper,] I felt that AIDS and the epidemic have become such a numbers thing, and it has just become so devoid of humanness…I wanted to put the humanness back into it, and I told Dr. Perry, “I do not want to lose the people to the statistics.” I’ve been there, and I was not going to lose their heart and their struggle to numbers you read in Time magazine.

This was my opportunity to take my own experiences and put my heart in, not just more numbers.

I started going through my journal. I kept a journal every day, everything we did, the people that I met, the emotions that I struggled with…Being there was the hardest thing I have ever done, and there are so many emotions that just war inside you and you don’t know what you feel or why you feel it... I went back and picked some of the stories that I really wanted to share with people, knowing that I would use them somehow, but I wasn’t sure how I would intertwine it all.

Then of course I had all my research…and so then I just sort of said, I’m going to pour it all together and see what happens. It’s broken up in such a way that I could insert pieces from my journal…and then I decided to throw a few photos in, too, because I wanted people to see what I saw…

The paper ended up being 35 pages long. My favorite part was how it all came together, my research and my journal and my pictures. I didn’t want it to be too overwhelming—I thought if I could make it more personal people could be more connected to it, and not just, “Oh, I’m reading another report on the epidemic that everyone knows is happening anyway.”

I do see the creation of the thesis as an extension of my mission work…the people I met blessed me more than what I did for them…you can’t keep an experience like that to yourself.

Sharing it becomes a bigger part of what I did, so it doesn’t end with my return, like you unpack your bags and do your laundry and you say, OK, that’s over. There was so much truth in it, and so much humanness.

You make reference in your thesis to your discovery of your commonality with Zambian people. Which do you value most in travel: the experiencing of what is different and unfamiliar, or the discovery of what is the same?

I just love the commonality that I’ve found…seeing that we’re all people! It sounds so simple, but I feel it’s overlooked.

In America…the world can seem so detached from us…In Africa, they have the same emotions and struggles and trials and joys and life experiences that we have…we all cry, we all laugh, we all experience the things that encourage those emotions in us…we all know how it feels to grieve a loss, and we all know what it’s like to celebrate the joy at new life, we celebrate milestones, even if the milestones are different in different cultures, there’s the same sense of joy—I don’t mean to keep saying “joy,” but there’s a difference in having a sense of joy—even though it seems that there is no hope for the kids there you can just see hope on their faces, and that they feel, “There is more to life than what I am suffering right now.” …But I appreciate the differences, too. There is so much to learn!

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A Closing Exercise

How to say goodbye to Karen Falcon and Tony Wilson after a combined 38 years? There is no easy way, especially when just two vacated spaces comprise those of master teachers, Department Chairs, advisors to students, and wise and trusted mentors to colleagues.

Epistula asks about their memories, their Departments, and their hopes.

Karen and Tony’s careers span 16 and 22 years at Wakefield, respectively, as well as either two or three campuses, respectively, and either three or five different Headmasters, respectively—one of whom was Tony Wilson himself. The story of how Wakefield came to exist first in Rappahannock County, then in a nursing home in Marshall, and finally in The Plains, and what happened along the way, is a proud history that space does not allow us to recount here. And yet, the capturing of even a glimpse of Tony’s and Karen’s experiences is essential to understanding where we have been, who we are, and where we are going as a school—as Peter Quinn has said, they helped to create the school we have today. So, while some references contained in these excerpts from our 90-minute interview may seem mysterious if you didn’t live Wakefield history along with these two individuals, we hope you will indulge us. Truly, you had to be there!! —Tutt Stapp-Harris

mission, our curriculum, our faculty, the students who choose to come here, our history…? Something else?

TW: The thing that held Wakefield together during those difficult years, and times of turmoil, was the dedication of the faculty and administration and their determination to make this journey successful. What made the school grow was the camaraderie we all had together. I would greet the buses every morning, and speak with every single child; the seniors and older students walked with the younger kids together; everyone came to events, athletic events, whatever was happening...we were a family, and we operated as a family, and we had a good educational product. As we have grown we have lost some of that. I don’t know if that is good or bad, but it has changed. As we have tried to become more balanced, with things such as Discovery Week and challenges and so forth, athletics, I think our academic mission may have shifted a bit. With the move When each of you first came to Wakefield, what did to the new campus there are always struggles when you are in a it seem to offer that prompted you to want to stay? Did you new place, but we have certainly been successful in getting the imagine at that time that you would stay for so long? numbers here that were needed to run the school. A difference TW: When I came to look at Wakefield the first thing here is that we have had good leadership, and we have been able that lured me was the academic standards. I knew that I could to put out there what we are—we are a school that seeks chalgo into a classroom and be successful because there would be lenge and makes a difference. eager minds, and students who wanted to apply themselves And [for the Wakefield memory,] I remember sitting out and get ahead. And that’s what has kept me here...Staying at in front of the school reading to the Kindergarteners when I Wakefield was the right decision. Things went as I had hoped was Acting Headmaster! and expected.

KF: I know the specific image will come to me later, KF: I remember walking into the nursing home [in but it would probably have something to do with two students Marshall, to look at the school for my daughter Sarah] and interacting at a really impressive level—either challenging each thinking, “This is a place where education is important,” because other to think through a problem, or helping each other...This there was nothing else there—just the teachers and the kids. happens, and it is the most amazing thing here. I just rememIt just made it really clear that the point of this school was to ber times of looking around and feeling so proud that this is the learn. And I knew from attending schools overseas that this environment we have built, where this can happen. could work; I attended lots of schools in temporary housing As to the center, I don’t know where the center is. I think where there was nothing, and some of my favorite schools were the center is shifting, and I’m not sure where it is shifting—and those in temporary facilities.

I’m not sure if that is all a negative statement. But [even if What is your most “This is Wakefield” image or memthere are shifts that happen,] the continuity is the faculty. You ory, something that captures what Wakefield is for you? To talk about living an extraordinary life: when you see what our each of you, where is the locus of Wakefield’s self—is it our faculty do [in their lives], it is amazing. The fact that Tony is

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Epistula

going on to a second career in the ministry is a testament to that—it is typical of the quality that people who teach here have. They have other components to their lives, and it is very powerful. I had taught with Carolyn Wyrsch for years before I realized the scope of the humanitarian work she is involved in every day of her life. It’s astonishing.

TW: And when students come back and tell about their experiences, and what Wakefield meant to them...This is what Wakefield is, too. It is the life of the school; it is what goes out with them, and what comes back to us.

I think that “a shift in our center” is something the school has to keep an eye on. In our attempts to balance some things that needed balancing, the development of athletics and so on, we step away from our center...Is that good or bad? Were we doing too much pure academics before, and now we are balanced to a center that is a better place to be? I don’t know.

KF: I think there’s the assumption that academics are so strong here that that won’t ever go away. I don’t know. There are too many things pulling in too many different directions.

We offer so much that faculty often don’t spend most of their time on their strengths. When that happens you might not get that crazy level of commitment that us old-timers have. Our students have been lucky to have teachers who love learning so much. And I think that we underestimate the number of people who want learning to be a big part of their life. We don’t say it and we don’t advertise it, partly because we don’t want to go back to the extremes [in academics] that we had in the past—but we have a lot of kids who love knowing a lot of big words that no one else knows, and a lot of teachers who are not only readers but who have reading as a big part of their life, and then also have an interest in science or some other field that they keep up.

In each of your disciplines, how do you see the changes of the last ten years—in what ways are you closer to your target ideas? Are there areas that resist change towards your target ideas?

TW: One of the biggest changes that I see comes from the students. The trend today is to want to get the job done as fast as possible, with as little energy as possible. They want instant gratification, and they want the answer. I had a student tell me this year I wasn’t teaching him because I wasn’t giving him the answer. I was trying to develop their deductive reasoning skills, trying to get them to see that each problem, though it has its basis in formulae that can be used to solve it, has its own little quirks to pay attention to. But they want the answer.

And they want technology. They don’t want me to go to the board and draw a nice diagram for finding the surface area of solids. They want it on a screen...Technology can be good, but I don’t want to see technology take over. I’ve seen kids get out their calculators to add 3 + 5!...I think their deductive reasoning skills are getting lost. And this is not just at Wakefield.

Teachers at other schools see the same thing.

Another shift I have seen [is from scheduling]. Math is a cumulative subject...and it must be studied every day—every day. So block scheduling interferes with development in mathematics.

KF: Well, the Language Department has changed a lot.

When I came French and Latin were the two languages—I guess Latin was king and French was queen! I am very pleased with where the Language Department has gone. I think that the compromise of requiring Latin in 6th grade was excellent.

I think we do have to make sure that there is always a one-year course available for the kids who come to the Upper School late. And the Department has been very steady—Latin teachers have come and gone but Jeannine [McKee] and I have been here [over ten years each].

On Tony’s comments on the block scheduling, I have mixed feelings. For Spanish 1 and 2, yes, every day would be nice, but in the upper levels it really doesn’t matter, so I think it’s maybe better if we just work with what we have.

On technology, it’s an interesting question. My personal project has been to try to do a split between traditional teaching and technology, so the kids get both...I think the more we remember what we’ve learned about how to teach content and then layer it in with technology, the better off we’ll be.

For example, my favorite class is to read a story, so there’s lots of new vocabulary—but then you can go online and find out about where that story took place...and you can buy a ticket to go there...There are so many different ways to reach into kids’ minds...There can be a map in the book, but I project it onto a screen and it comes alive!...Reading and writing and listening and culture are all things we need to be doing anyway, and there is so much access to what to listen to and so much access to culture online. ...I think we serve our ideals best by the fact that we know every single kid and know his or her potential, and are constantly striving to bring each kid up to that potential. I think that bringing in technology is the right approach, and now...we need the whole faculty to be so comfortable with it that...we can [take charge of using it as] a resource, not a toy. ...I have had wonderful classes this year—the kind of kids that make you want to stay in the classroom. Their response was all and more than could be expected.

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35

The Arts A Show for All Seasons

Upper School thespians deliver difficult material intact in A Man for All Seasons

“The entire room goes pitch black as the thud of an executioner’s ax is heard and the body slides to the floor. Two bright lights then shine on the executioner’s head as he says, ‘Behold the head of a traitor.’ He pulls off his hood to reveal himself as the traitor and makes a final speech comparing Sir Thomas More, who was willing to die for his beliefs, to himself, the Common Man, who worried more about saving his own life. The question left by Wakefield School’s dramatic performance is this: through how many seasons will we be true to our convictions?”

—CAPPIES critic Brianna Sonnefeld, Thomas A. Edison High School Hunter Morrison as the Common Man

Selected by Mr. Guyotte for the spring Cappies show at the suggestion of Ethics student and thespian Gracie Morrison, who had studied the play in Mr. Quinn’s class, A Man for All Seasons tells the wrenching and thought-provoking true story of Sir Thomas More, persecuted and eventually imprisoned and executed for refusing to comment on the legitimacy of King Henry VIII’s divorce from Catherine of Aragon.

Performed in the round and featuring ingenious staging whereby characters “entered” from their spots in the first row of seating and “exited” by returning to those seats and pulling diaphanous hoods over their heads, the play and its incredible cast drew the audience into the heart of More’s ethical battle. With Chris Stone in the monumental title role and effectively supported by every actor involved, the play set a new standard for dramatic depth and intensity in the season when many schools stage their musicals.

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Gracie Morrison and Chris Stone

Epistula

Rachel Christian

Michael Byrne

Chris Stone

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37

The Arts RATS!! : The Pied Piper of Hamlin, Bewitching as Ever Could the 3rd grade musical have been cuter? Probably not.

A shady, self-serving Mayor and her cabinet who burst into song, lilting happy townspeople and shopkeepers, including a dancing baker, and of course those pesky rats...but the piper saves the day . Kudos class, kudos, Mrs. Mulligan, and kudos Mrs. Hutcheson!

Anatoly Brevnov

Preston Mulford, Libby Rensin, Jakob Zontine, and Rosie Hutchison.

Dominique Davis, Juarate Reventas, Olivia Thornlow, William Robinson, and Ashley Gaines 38

Epistula

An All-School and Original “Ugly Duckling”

Chris Guyotte’s adaptation of the classic story says, “Find the swan inside of you!”

Ian Fontaine

Mother Duck Michael Byrne and ducklings Maddie Dale, Mary Clubb, and Eleanor Dunnigan

Chris Stone, Hunter Morrison, and Gracie Morrison

Gracie

Choosing an original musical to produce with an all-school cast, very near the end of the school year, in a space that must be shared with every other closing event in the community, seems like something that only—well, that only a crazy person might do. But the famously crazy Chris Guyotte, author of the adapted script, was up to the task, as was his cast of performers of all ages, many of whom were singing and

Gracie Morrison

dancing on stage for the first time. As Gracie Morrison’s belittled duckling character searched for her true beauty amid the taunts and false promises of her fellow creatures, everyone (audience and cast alike) searched for and found the celebration inherent in the text—and the full-cast finale was a wonder to behold. Why, someone should make Mr. Guyotte Educator of the Year! :)

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The Arts Splendid Spring Recitals

From boomwhackers to Beethoven to “The Lion Sleeps Tonight,” recitals from 1st grade, 2nd grade, and Middle School brim with energy and accomplishment

Pianos, solo and group, the everpopular boomwhackers, rhythm band instruments of all types, animal songs including “The Lion Sleeps Tonight”—it is hard to think where any more fun could have come from in the 1st and 2nd grade recital. And for the finale of the Middle School recital, the entire division performed “Ode to Joy” together, in an orchestration created by Jim Westerhouse just for them.

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Epistula

A Day for Art and Families

The Lower School Arts Festival celebrates its subject with both students and parents

When the Arts Festival began at around 3:00 in the Lower Gym, you would never have guessed that that morning it had been scheduled to be outdoors. By the time students arrived the room was ready to be a beehive of artistic endeavor, with even more events running concurrently up in the arts building. Weaving, origami, teeshirt printing, innumerable variations on painting, and many more activities were being enjoyed by parents and kids all over the crowded room, with Mrs.

Dunnigan, the amazingly calm maven of it all, watching it unfold according to plan (Plan B, that is).

All of these tables and activities were staffed by cheerful and capable Middle and Upper School students who had volunteered for the fun-butdemanding afternoon.

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The Larger World [Not] The Least of Our Brothers

Middle School science teacher Amanda Gonczi sets the standard for skill and compassion in reptile rehabilitation—and her students follow

Many teachers have skills or passions to which they give their time outside of school, and one of Amanda Gonczi’s is this: she is a reknowned expert on reptile rehabilitation. A variety of area organizations rely on her expertise when they come across ill, abused or neglected reptiles, and Ms. Gonczi—with a blend of both skill and compassion—returns them as near to health as their condition will permit.

Fortunately for Wakefield students, some of these creatures in need wind up in Ms. Gonczi’s classroom, both so that they can be kept watch on and so that students can observe and participate in the rehab process.

This was the case this spring.

The Fairfax County Animal Shelter had received three turtles in extremely poor condition, suffering massive fungal infections in their shells.

“The Fairfax Animal Shelter is quite grateful to Amanda, who also recently took a Glass Lizard from them (who lives in the classroom and looks like a mini-dinosaur),” says Dr. Daryanani, Wakefield’s Dean of Faculty and a resident of Fairfax County with ties to the animal shelter. “The shelter does not have any wildlife rehab specialists, and so must euthanize injured and sick wildlife that comes to the shelter.”

The turtles did indeed look bleak when they arrived. Their shells had a greyish coating, rather than looking wet and shiny, and had odd textures of various types, including one with bumps down the top ridge that looked like a spine grown too long for a body. One turtle appeared too fat for his shell.

According to Ms. Gonczi, their condition was typical of turtles kept incorrectly as pets. They often are kept away from sunlight and fed improperly, so their bodies grow, from the food, but their shells do not, from lack of sunlight. The stunted shells do

not shed old scales, called “scoots,” and they develop fungal infections on and under their shells.

Treatment for the three involved several steps: a diet; regular sunlight exposure; the pulling off of “scoots” on the outside edges of the shells; antifungal medication in their water; and regular scrubbing of their shells, to help them shed debris and fungus and grow healthy shells again.

Middle School reactions to the bathing and medicating of sometimesaggressive, often-indifferent wild turtles varied, but everyone was happy to help, regardless of natural affinity for the task. After one rehab session was over and students had been released to go wash up, several remained, gazing with satisfaction at the squeaky-clean turtles, now busy sunning themselves as if nothing had happened.

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Now You See It, Now You Don’t

Second grade student/teacher duo give it up—a lot of it—for Locks of Love

Second grader Molly Cesanek and her teacher Mrs. Monica Bess, with Molly sporting her new bob and Mrs. Bess displaying the braid that by press time was only a memory.

When Molly Cesanek is ready to do something, she is ready to do it—as in right now! When Epistula came to speak with her and her teacher, Mrs. Bess, about their recent and impending haircuts, respectively, Molly had begun the interview before Epistula had gotten out a pen and while she still had on her outdoor jacket. Likewise, once she had made the decision to donate her hair to Locks of Love—the group that receives donated hair to use in wigs for people with health-related hairloss, such as from chemotherapy—she wanted to do it pronto.

Her sister Christen was getting married on March 15, however, and Molly’s mom felt strongly that Molly’s hair should remain long for the wedding. “I thought it would be nice,” Molly says with a sigh, of the idea of having her hair cut for the wedding, but Mom prevailed, and Molly’s hair came off on March 16.

“You make 10 pigtails and then cut above them,” Molly explains about how the cut was done to Locks of Love’s specifications.

Mrs. Bess, who was to have her hair cut to donate this summer, says she read that one person’s donation can help five to six people. “I just thought it would be cool!” she says. This will be Mrs. Bess’ second time donating, the first one having been in 2006.

Molly was inspired to want to donate her hair by knowing someone personally who might have need of such a service. She plans to grow her hair out and do the process again, “but maybe not for about a year,” she says.

“I’m going to take my time. And I have to be able to make pigtails!”

Asked if she had any image of the person who might receive her hair, Mrs. Bess replied, “I always thought the person might be sort of like me—a girl with very long hair, who loves it!”

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43

The Larger World Junior Stewards—A Middle School Voice for the Piedmont New environmental club with focus on land preservation issues comes to complement the thriving Middle School recycling program

On Monday, March 3, the Junior Stewards Club members visited, ate with, and presented information about their activities and environmental concerns to the Tree Huggers Club at The Hill School in Middleburg, VA. “The Junior Stewards Club is an organization dedicated to promoting and protecting the Piedmont’s rural and natural scenery. We focus on upcoming events that may harm the Piedmont region, and strive to prevent them,” says president and 8th grader, Margaret Boozer. “The club is a school organization committed to educating middle school children about conservation and the happening environmental issues.”

Margaret greeted the members of The Hill School Tree Huggers Club and began the presentations with an overview of the club and the issues being addressed by the Wakefield Junior Stewards.

The Wakefield club members took turns presenting information and answering questions about several of the projects which the Club is addressing, namely, the 500-kV power line being proposed by Dominion Virginia Power, land protection by conservation easements, minimizing our environmental footprint by buying locally, and using “Smart Development” in Loudoun as well as Fauquier counties. After the discussions, the Wakefield club members presented the Hill School participants with T-shirts, Frisbees, and pencils, and encouraged them to continue with their Tree Hugger efforts as well as to become more involved with conservation.

Ms. Lois Johnson-Mead, faculty sponsor for The Hill School Tree Huggers Club, thanked the members of the Wakefield Junior Stewards for their presentations and encouraged them to return to share new developments and issues as they arise. Ms. Johnson-Mead

Allison Kennedy and Margaret Boozer

later said, “We thought your students were very comfortable speaking in front of a group. Tom Northrup, our Head, was very impressed that you travelled to Hill [School] to present your program.

We both spoke about it [at] a Board of Trustees meeting, and the other members of the Board were excited to hear about another local environmental student group!”

Margaret Boozer wrapped up the meeting reminding the participants of the slogan “Farm Land Lost is Farm Land Lost Forever.” She encouraged the participants to become more involved now and educate others about conservation.

In honor of Arbor Day, the Junior Stewards painted pots and filled them with gardening accessories and sold them at a booth in Middleburg. In addition, they raffled off a bird feeder with accessories and made $175.00 to contribute to the Piedmont Environmental Council. They also planned a bake sale at school to make additional money to send to PEC. At a June 1 gathering in Middleburg in memory of Eve Fout, former

President of the PEC, the Junior Stewards were introduced to the community by hostess Mrs. Mimi Abel-Smith, who highlighted the work they have done this year to create an awareness of land preservation for Middle Schoolers throughout Loudoun and Fauquier Counties. Margaret Boozer made a presentation and presented all of the money that they have made through fund raising this year to Chris Miller of PEC. And, active until the bitter end, the group did a road clean-up in The Plains that same weekend.

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All One World

Earth/Science Day continues its tradition of stewardship, learning, and fun

A combination of annual, occasional, and new events were featured at Earth/Science Day this year: the everpopular hot-air balloons project (left); a return of the “Birds of Prey” presentation from the Raptor Conservancy of Virginia (top left); and a new event, the making of beautiful handcrafted paper using Wakefield’s recycled paper reservoir as material (top right and above).

The papermaking was guided by artist Elizabeth Wyrsch, daughter of faculty member Carolyn Wyrsch.

Summer 2008

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Far Away, So Close Two treasured annual cultural celebrations highlight the global nature of learning: the African-American Read-In, in which students from all grades take turns throughout the day reading to one another from the works of AfricanAmerican writers; and Chinese New Year, celebrated in Kindergarten with the parade of a paper dragon, Chinese food, and—of course—chop sticks.

4439 Old Tavern Road Post Office Box 107 The Plains, Virginia 20198