On Wednesday, November 30, 45 students traveled to the middle school campus as ambassadors promoting the Upper School athletic program to current seventh and eight graders.

Along with several coaches, Upper School students sat among the younger students for a large-scale luncheon set up in the Blackford Gym.

“I thought it was a cool idea, emphasizing the importance of starting sports in middle school to strengthen the high school program,” Andrew Zhu (10) said.

Upper School Athletic Director Dan Molin, Lower and Middle School Athletic Director Theresa Smith, and Strength and Conditioning Coach Ron Forbes spoke about the variety of sports opportunities offered in high school. Senior David Fang also made a speech about the benefits of participating in the athletic program.

“I would have liked to have that when I was in middle school,” Lucy Xu (12) said. “But it was clear that not everybody was interested. It’s unproductive when the people you’re sitting with aren’t involved.”

Many of the Upper School students at the event felt similarly about the event.

“The middle schoolers were messing around and talking the whole time. I’m pretty sure that if it were more organized it would have been effective,” Rahul Madduluri (12) said.

Hannah Bollar (9) thought that “if it was a bigger, more interactive presentation, they would have paid attention.”

Molin felt that in general the luncheon was a success, however, he saw that there was room for improvement.

“Upper School and Middle School students were interacting, and I heard some pretty engaging conversations going on,” said Dan Molin, Upper School Athletic Director. “We encountered some difficulties with the sounds, so we would definitely fix that for a future luncheon.”

Though there were problems with low sound levels on the microphones and overall feeling of chaos, Molin and students on the trip felt that the goal of getting middle school students involved was achieved.