Major student events this week included the Global Empowerment Outreach (GEO) club week, senior nights for sports, and an east coast alumni update.
“When you talk about senior nights for athletics, the bonds between teammates and coaches illustrates how close and how meaningful an extra-curricular can be. That, to me, in the community is a very important thing.” said Upper School Division Head Butch Keller.
GEO week commenced on Friday October 14 with an assembly featuring guest speaker Tim Nielander from the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI). Throughout the past week, students had the opportunity to take a vow of silence and receive sponsorship from friends. Students received raffle tickets for every $20 they raised to be entered in a drawing for a prize of a plushie microbe. Additionally, GEO sold wristbands, sports bags, and GAVI grams, which students could send to their friends.
The varsity girls and boys water polo teams and the varsity girls tennis team held their senior nights to celebrate twelfth-grade players on Thursday, October 20. Water Polo honored seniors Tariq Jahshan, Jagdeesh Kottapalli, Cole Manaster, Akshay Ramachandran, Jason Yu, Simrun Bhagat, and Kaitlin Halloran, while tennis acknowledged Nicole Dalal, Aranshi Kumar, and Tanya Piskun. The football and cheerleading senior nights will be held on Friday, October 21.
From October 12 to October 16, Keller and his wife, Jane Keller, traveled to Washington D.C. on an alumni visit. They visited Keller’s former advisee Rishi Bhatia (‘11) at Georgetown, who gave them a tour of the campus. The couple also met up with Candace Silva-Martin, former varsity volleyball captain at the Upper School and a current junior at George Washington University. The Kellers are planning a Spring trip to visit alumni at Princeton, Harvard, MIT, and Wellesley.
More events to look forward to next week include the Gay Straight Alliance (GSA) assembly, the TEDx lecture series, and and the Upper School fall play You Can’t Take it with You.