Gallery Entrance Construction is Underway

By Cathy Zhou

While students were taking classes and attending Prize Day remotely through Zoom, a new construction project began on St. Mark’s campus. This project will refurbish the Gallery Entrance, an area next to the dining hall kitchen. 

According to Ms. Sarah Duran, this construction will bring a new look to the East Gallery Entry and the Theriot Quad. It will “provide enhanced accessibility, functionality, and expansion” of the area, according to Ms. Duran. Specifically, it will rebuild the existing entrance, which includes the staircases and the small porch leading to the dining hall kitchen, into a two-storied extension of the original building. In addition, it will add new landscape features next to the Gallery Entrance and install a new elevator.

The visitor parking lot will also be expanded. There will be 11 parking spaces located between the Main Circle and the Chapel, including two slots for the handicapped. “This new parking area will enhance our visitor's experience upon their arrival and departure from our campus and will provide ease of use for those with physical challenges,” Ms. Duran commented.

The need for the new Gallery Entrance emerged from the planning of the new residence halls. Once the new dormitories open, more students and faculty will enter the Main Building from the backside. “We recognized that we needed to construct a new pedestrian path and an entrance that could accommodate the additional foot traffic,” said Ms. Duran.

The construction was originally scheduled on another date. However, when the administration made the decision to extend remote learning, they decided to begin the project earlier. The new construction dates are aimed to lessen the impact on the new school year schedule. Currently, the project is scheduled to end on October 29, 2020. Therefore, students and faculty could expect to use the new facility next year if school resume.

St. Markers Say Goodbye to Departing Faculty

By Elise Gobron’21

The caring, devoted, and thoughtful faculty here at St. Mark’s are what help make our community so special. After a successful academic year, we will sadly be saying goodbye to a few beloved faculty members. Loris Adams, Kim Berndt, Liz Cavanaugh, Marion Donovan, Matt Eddy, Patricia Gilbert, Jean Lindsey-Dwyer, Michele Nieves, Chris Roche, Carol Smith-Nichols, Rick Umiker and Showjean Wu have all been influential members of this community. They have helped us learn, grow, and succeed as both students and people. They have challenged us to become the best versions of ourselves that we can be. 

St. Mark’s is so thankful to have had all of these faculty members as part of our community. Although they will be missed, we wish them each all the best next year and for their future endeavors. These faculty members will always have a special place here at St. Mark’s and we hope that they come back to visit often! Here is a video of a tribute the monitors presented at the end of year Academic Showcase. 

We  interviewed some of these faculty about their favorite memories at St. Mark’s.

( Articles for Mr. and Mrs. Umiker, Ms. Donovan and Ms. Berndt can be found in the Humans of St. Marks section).

Loris Adams: Director of Community & Equity Affairs, Religion Department Faculty.

Ms. Adams leaves St. Mark’s after four years to become Director of equity and community life at the Hewitt School in New York City . We thank her for all the work she has done, creating affinity groups and giving student Pathways leadership an established voice in our community.

Liz Cavanaugh: Senior Associate Director of Admission

Ms. Cavanaugh enjoyed her roles as admissions officer, dorm parent, and coach for the girls’ crew team and will miss all the St. Markers: “Thank you for the friendship and mentorship of many Faculty/Staff colleagues, and most importantly, thank you to the many students over the last 12 years who have allowed me to teach them, learn from them, grow with them, and have fun! George and I will miss St. Mark’s and look forward to visiting Southborough and Lake Quinsigamond often!” 

Matt Eddy: Science Department Faculty

Mr. Eddy taught Biology at St. Mark’s and helped run the Fab Lab. We wish him well next year.

Patricia Gilbert: Modern Languages Department Chair, Modern Languages Department Faculty

Ms. Gilbert loved her interactions with students in class: “I loved playing Loup Garou with my French students. I don’t know if they realized that it was just my sneaky way to get them to speak French freely without getting all hung up on grammar and pronunciation, but we certainly had lots of fun!”

Jean Lindsey-Dwyer: Science Department Faculty

Ms. Lindsey-Dwyer will miss all of her wonderful students, especially Julia's one minute dances! She says that she will miss St.Mark's and all things that make it great, and leaves us with an original quote: "Remember Chemistry is all about energy and stability."

Michele Nieves: Mathematics Department Faculty

For Ms. Nieves, her funny memory is in her first couple of weeks at St. Mark's she could only find things in relation to the dining hall. So if she wanted to go from STEM to the library she would go from STEM to the dining hall, and then from the dining hall to the library. “It was incredibly inefficient!”

She says that St. Mark's students, faculty, and staff challenged her to be a better teacher, a better athlete, and a better human being. She will always remember the abundance of kindness and "Age Quod Agis" will stick with her forever.

Chris Roche: Science Department Faculty

Mr Roche says that he has many fond memories and will miss many people!  He will particularly miss the robotics team of SM--“Memories--WOW! --especially in the last few years--watching our robotics team (Gone Fishin’) have some great successes after a lot of hard work -- seeing the Great Wall of China on the Faculty Asia trip, going bowling with my advisees.   I will always be grateful to John Warren for letting me buy computer parts so my initial CS I class could build their own computers --- That really set the tone for how we build and explore in STEM!”

Carol Smith-Nichols: Science Department Faculty

Dr. Smith-Nichols says that for her, St. Mark's has been a rich environment filled with an array of viewpoints, ideas, and voices. She also says that it has been her greatest pleasure to be part of the Pine Oak duty team this past year. “I will greatly miss the check-ins and conversations from worries over too much homework, to triumphs, to questions, to just sharing a little bit of everyone's day. Love you all, Dr SN”

Showjean Wu: Modern Language Department Faculty

Ms. Wu also says that working with students in Chinese is certainly one of the best memories at St Mark's.

Prize Day Speakers: The Rt. Rev. J. Clark Grew’58 and valedictorian Jack Griffin’21

By Cathy Zhou’ 21

The Rt. Rev. J. Clark Grew’58 and valedictorian Jack Griffin’21 will speak at this year’s Prize Day. Both speakers will give farewell addresses to the Class of 2020, and Bishop Grew will read the names of graduates when presenting diplomas. 

Bishop Grew was born in New York City, and he graduated from St. Mark’s in 1958. While at St. Mark’s, he was a key member of the School's undefeated football team in the fall of 1956. He went to Harvard College and then served on active duty in the U.S. Navy for five years, including commanding the U.S.S. Constitution from 1965 to 1967. After his duty, he taught at Groton before returning to St. Mark’s as a faculty member. He severed as both Director of Admission and Assistant Headmaster at St. Mark's. He also coached the varsity basketball team to two championship seasons. Later, he received divinity degrees from Episcopal Theological School in Cambridge, MA, and served in churches in Massachusetts and Illinois. In 1993, he was elected Bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Ohio. After over ten years of ministry, he retired in 2004. He served on many non-profit and educational boards and is currently a trustee of St. Mark’s. His granddaughter is current SM V Former Bannon Jones '21.

The valedictorian this year, as elected by his peers, is Jack Griffin. He is “unbelievably excited” to give an address at the Prize Day ceremony. “This moment means a lot to my classmates and the school, especially given the recent events due to COVID-19. I’m hoping to make it really special for them.” Jack is an outstanding member of the Class of 2020. He loves to participate in everything that St. Marks has to offer: he was a member of both the STEM and History Fellowship, he ran cross country and played basketball, and he founded the student-run improv group at St. Mark’s. Most importantly, he loved to play soccer in the cage and Catan with his friends. In an interview with him, he said “I’ll miss the people most at St. Marks and being on campus around such a brilliant, hard-working, and caring community. I was really overwhelmed walking down the main hallway when I had to clean out my dorm room. Even with no people and a mask covering my face I wanted to smile and stop by Mr. Vachris’ office to say hi.” He will be attending Harvard College next year, which is also the alma mater of Bishop Grew.

Oh The Places You'll Go...

Congratulations, St.Mark’s Class of 2020!

American University

Amherst College (2)

Assumption College

Babson College (2)

Barnard College

Boston University

Bowdoin College

Brown University

Bucknell University

Case Western Reserve University

Colby College (2)

Colgate University

College of the Holy Cross (2)

Columbia University in the City of New York

Connecticut College

Cornell University (3)

Dartmouth College

Davidson College

Elon University

Georgetown University (2)

Harvard College

Kenyon College

Lafayette College

Lehigh University (3)

Macalester College

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Middlebury College

New York University (4)

Northeastern University (2)

Purdue University-Main Campus

Santa Clara University

Southern Methodist University (2)

St Lawrence University

Stanford University

Swarthmore College

Texas Christian University

The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2)

Trinity College (2)

Trinity University

Tufts University (2)

University of California-Berkeley

University of Chicago

University of Colorado Boulder

University of Connecticut (2)

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (2)

University of Massachusetts-Amherst (3)

University of Pennsylvania

University of Vermont (2)

University of Wisconsin-Madison

Vanderbilt University

Virginia Tech

Wake Forest University

Washington and Lee University

Wentworth Institute of Technology

Wesleyan University

Williams College

Worcester Polytechnic Institute

Yale University

Classics Banquet Celebrates a Mosaic of Student Achievement

By Dr. Harwood

On Tuesday June 2, the Classics Department hosted their annual banquet online.

As is tradition, the entertainment was provided by the Latin I  students who made a video of a song that told the story of their journey of learning Latin over the course of the year. 

Eight students took the National Latin Exam in March. Amanda Wang and Oliver Tian in Latin II and Tate Frederick in Honors Latin III earned Magna Cum Laude; Ingrid Kai Yi Yeung and Julie He in Latin I received the award of  Maxima Cum Laude  and Summa Cum Laude went to Sam Wang in Honors Latin III and Michael Ferlisi in Latin II. 

The Classical Diploma students presented their Capstone Project, a collection of mosaics that sought to answer the driving question of how Classical literature and culture are still relevant in the 21st century. 

Finally Departmental Book Prizes for the best sight translation of a passage of Greek or Latin were awarded to Ingrid Kai Yi Yeung in Latin I, Michael Ferlisi in Latin II, Sam Wang in Latin III, Illia Rebechar in Advanced Latin, Chirstos Papaioannou in Greek I and Lora Xie in Greek II.

Congratulations to all of the award winners, to the Classical Diploma Scholars and to everyone in Classics who worked hard all year!

Valete! ( Be well!)

Student-led SM Leads

By Cathy Zhou ‘21

The past few SM Leads sessions featured student-led discussions on sustainability and abusive relationships. These initiative sessions introduced a new format of student leadership training for St. Markers: they adopted a discussion-based approach and incorporated innovations such as engaging situational simulations and distributing bracelets for participants

SM Leads was started in 2018 as a Friday-night discussion session for training current and prospective student leaders. These events explore topics such as substance use, the boundaries and consent in daily life, public speaking, and mental health, aiming to inform better decisions among student leaders for themselves and for the community. Since they set the tone for the school, SM Leads influences the broader community by shaping the actions and voice of the leaders

The Students for Sustainability club (S4S) hosted an SM Leads discussing the role of student leaders in promoting sustainability at St. Mark’s. The session started with a memorable video of Greta Thunberg, a young climate change activist, continued with a recycle relay, and ended with a situational simulation that initiated discussions on how student leaders should react to unsustainable actions around them. According to Clara Hua’21, S4S’s innovative approaches made the event a unique experience: “By incorporating a waste sorting team competition as well as a Kahoot, the SMLeads session was very engaging. We were able to learn and have fun at the same time!” 

Alie Hyland ’20, leader of S4S, explains that the idea of organizing an SM Leads session came up in a discussion with the club’s faculty advisor, Ms. Lohwater. She describes that the planning for this event was a group effort: “We brainstormed what lessons we wanted to share with the school and what information was most important to share with the leaders of St. Mark's. We split into different groups and each group was responsible for planning a specific part of the SM Leads. Everyone in S4S was so helpful and enthusiastic about the SM Leads session!”

On February 21st, a similar student-lead SMLeads was organized by six formers Catherine Pellini and Paige LaMalva who led a discussion on relational aggression and bullying. The session was a part of the project with a grant from St. Mark’s. LaMalva and Pellini’s session was planned differently than that of S4S. “We actually planned it by the minute,” said LaMalva. Sitting down at the end of the winter break, they went through their notes to outline the presentation.  “After gathering all of our information, we decided that the best way to deliver our information was to the SM community,” said LaMalva. 

During the session, students discussed the spectrum of healthy and unhealthy relationships, brainstormed possible actions towards hypothetical scenarios, and learned about the cycle of abuse. In the end, LaMalva and Pellini gave out purple bracelets, which is the color that symbolizes domestic abuse awareness. Lina Zhang’21 thought that this was especially innovative: “the bracelets could serve as a visual reminder for us.”

Play for Haiti! Interview with the Haiti Partnership Committee

-Suha Choi ‘22

St. Mark’s held its annual Play for Haiti Day on Wednesday, February 4th. The Play for Haiti Day raises funds to benefit the partner school of St. Mark's in Haiti, St. Marguerite’s. Through the hard work of the Haiti Partnership Committee and every St. Marker's support, the Play for Haiti Day was a success. In honor of a successful Play for Haiti day this year, The St. Marker interviewed Payton Kober’20 and Ms. Morgan, who are the leaders of the committee along with Madeliene Wass’20 and Paige LaMalva’20. 

Play for Haiti

St. Marker: How was Play for Haiti Day first inspired?

Ms. Morgan: “The Play for Haiti Day was first inspired in the fall of 2018 by Kerrie Verbeek.  Kerrie traveled to Haiti to visit our partner school, St. Marguerite's, in January, 2017.  She was incredibly inspired by the trip and continued be very active in the partnership. Last year (2018-19) Kerrie was scheduled to travel to Haiti for a second time in January 2019 with the rest of the group from St. Mark's.  Kerrie came up with the idea of organizing a Play for Haiti Day in the fall of 2018. Her idea was to pick a day in the winter when the majority of the St. Mark's athletic teams had home games and use this afternoon as an opportunity to promote the work the Haiti Partnership was doing, raise money to support teacher salaries and the lunch program at St. Marguerite's, and collect school supplies to bring with us to St. Marguerite's when we went in January 2019.  We held our first Play for Hait Day on January 9, 2019, and planned to travel to St. Marguerite's the following week. Unfortunately, the trip was canceled due to the political unrest in Haiti. Haiti Partnership students sold t-shirts to promote the event and teams wore them during their warm-ups. The afternoon was a huge success.”

Boys Hockey 3v3 Play for Haiti Fundraiser

St. Marker: What was your favorite part about taking a part in the Haiti partnership at St. Mark’s?

Payton Kober’20: “One thing I love about the Haiti Partnership team is the sense of community of the whole team. The partnership is hugely team dependent and cannot function without the entire group’s support. In our partnership, we have all forms, ranging from fourth to sixth. I think that this allows the partnership to grow each year. As a whole, we meet biweekly to discuss various ways to raise money, political issues in Haiti, and St. Marguerites, our partnership school in Haiti. All members participate equally and bring amazing ideas to the group. So, in summary, one thing I wanted to encompass and share with you is just how great our whole team is, and without everyone's help, we would not be a successful partnership.”

Ms. Morgan: “As one of the faculty leaders of the Haiti Partnership, one of my favorite parts is learning about Haitian culture.  I have had the opportunity to travel to visit our partner school, St. Marguerite's, four times and I have had the chance to take an intensive Creole class at the Boston Language Institute.”

Boys Hockey 3v3 Play for Haiti Fundraiser

St. Marker: Any additional thoughts to share about the committee?

Ms. Morgan: “Join us!  We always love welcoming new members.”

SM Holds Its Own Primary Election

-Katie Park ‘21

On Friday, January 31st, the Advanced U.S Government class at St. Mark’s held a mock election. The purpose of this mock election was to compare the results with the national polls and results from the Primaries. They thought it would be a way to encourage more people to pay attention to politics and to spark interest in politics. For the Government class, this mock election was interesting because since they are mostly seniors, they will not be here for the general election, which takes place in November.

The Class chose the poll questions after having a discussion. Students went into groups and found something that can be compared to the national averages such as gun control, abortion, and constitutional issues. During the mock election, a lot of students participated, but the class hoped for a little more faculty and staff participation. Blake Gattuso ‘20 shared that although the lack of participation from the faculty members was unexpected, the whole purpose of the election was to encourage people to participate instead of forcing them. 

Overall, the mock election was a success, and the Government class was able to gain data and compare it to the national results. However, students reflected that there were still things that they could have done better. Blake Gattuso ‘20 stated, “We would like to redo the handgun question because what we wanted to know was whether people support gun control. We believe that overall, the school population is in favor of gun control, but since handgun can be seen as a form of personal defense, the question was a bit misleading.”

Andrew Yang came in second, which is an expected result considering the Asian population at our school, and reflected identity voting, which is when people tend to vote for someone of their same race or background. There was also a portion of the poll in which no data was collected because some people misunderstood the instructions. So, hopefully, in the future, the instructions are more clear so that every data can be obtained.  

Andrew Yang, Former Democratic Presidential Candidate

Coronavirus: A Rising Epidemic

By Julie He and Ingrid Yeung

Chinese New Year or Spring Festival is the most celebrated holiday in China. Creating a harmonious atmosphere New Year traditions such as visiting relatives, attending lunar dinner, and going to the temples for good fortune bring everyone closer to each other to welcome the upcoming new year. During this time of the year, the roads are filled with parades of people celebrating. Likewise, the train stations and airports are flooded with people eager to return to their families.  However, in the spring of 2020, the streets and squares of China were vacant and abandoned. The reason? Coronavirus. As the name suggests, Coronavirus is a virus that has made headlines everywhere. It closed off places in China and caused numerous deaths. What started as a seemingly insignificant flu turned into an epidemic that has found its way around the world. 

(The New York Times, 27 February 2020)

The disease is highly infectious and spreads through human to human contact. Even contact such as touching a surface that another infected person touched could result in coronavirus. The virus can take up to two weeks before symptoms show up. Even then, they appear as common cold symptoms such as fevers, coughs, or breathing difficulties. If severe enough, the virus could cause pneumonia, kidney failure, or even death. This deadly disease originated from a city in China called Wuhan. When the virus first spread in Wuhan, people from the city did not realize the severity of the situation and flew to other places. It quickly spread and has already infected more than 80,000 people. There have been around 3,000 deaths worldwide, and most deaths are from China.

Even after the New Year Holiday, most people in China are not able to go back to work and to school. Most offices and companies stay functioning through online communication and working, but some have reopened recently. Schools have closed their campuses and class-room based learning due to the outbreak. They have also asked parents and students to fill out health forms to report their current health conditions and whether or not they have any symptoms of the coronavirus. In Shenzhen, some international schools and most public schools provide online-courses and long distance learning for the students starting from February. Through email and social media, the students are able to discuss with their peers and teachers outside the classroom. Thus, the students back in China have to adapt to a different approach of learning, and some have gotten used to the new learning environment quickly while others struggle to keep up with the workload.

QSI International School in China is one of the schools that have been utilizing the online learning method and long-distance classroom. Nana, a current Sophomore in QSI, says that online learning is not as easy as it sounds like. The workload for her has not gone down, but instead she has more work than if the school is opened. She also felt that although online learning is very convenient, there are many things that simply cannot be achieved through the internet, for example, hands-on project and group work. Many students have expressed that they would like to go back to school as soon as possible. However, that cannot happen if the virus outbreak persists. Currently, the schools are expected to resume in late March. However, as most school announcements say, the reopen date of school is still subject to change.

It seems like the epidemic is still distant to St. Mark’s, being an independent school in Massachusetts. However, the World Health Organization has already declared the coronavirus disease as an official epidemic. With increasing cases confirmed in the US, the government has started to take precautions and inform its citizens to be aware of the diseases.  There is little we can do, but the most we can do to fight against the coronavirus is to stay healthy. Washing our hands often and avoiding sharing water bottles and dining utensils are the two most basic and important things that we can do to help. Another thing that will be helpful to combat the virus is to eliminate the spread of fake and exaggerated information of the coronavirus disease outbreak. It is a severe and deadly disease and it originated from China. However, making fun of the students from an area of the outbreak or joking with the topic of coronavirus is not appropriate. At this time, support and encouragement is the most vital to the students who are worrying about their family and friends back at home.

Because of the outbreak, students are separated from families and are unable to visit them. Parents are concerned for their kids who are thousands of miles away. Here at St. Mark’s, we have many international students that are unable to fly back to see their families for the upcoming spring break. Students have to find last minute places to go for two weeks. Luckily, the school offers solutions such as the Boston trip or the Arizona trip. However, it does not offer the freedom that comes with going home and having a free schedule. Students are worried about their families who are at risk of contracting the disease. Likewise, parents are worried for their kids who they are unable to see and take care of. Everyone is worried for each other and hope it will be over soon.