Be Open to the Possibilities

This is always a bittersweet time of year at an independent school – for students, for parents, and, yes, for faculty, staff, and administration. We are in full swing with breakfasts, dinners, awards ceremonies, and finally graduation itself. It’s hard to believe that we are sending off another group of kids, some of whom have been here for seven years, more than a third of their lives. They are full of such hope and promise for the future and can’t begin to imagine all the possibilities that lie ahead of them in the next four years, and beyond.
 
What makes it easier to send them on their way is knowing they are heading into the world well equipped to face its challenges. We can say that because we continue to see the “possibilities” that have become “realities” for our own young alumni who are now graduating from college or have been out in the world for a few years.

Jillian Dempsey ’09 is returning to speak to our athletes during our varsity award evening. She has just graduated from Harvard where she was a classics major and their top female hockey player. She was chosen for the All-Ivy and All-ECAC teams, was 12^th in the nation for goals per game, and will be training this summer to try out for the U.S. Olympic team. What an inspiration to our kids who are always trying to find a balance in their busy lives.
 
Another college grad this year, Ian Brownstein ’09, just garnered a fistful of top awards at Brown – magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa, Outstanding Senior Award in Mechanical Engineering, membership in the Engineering, Scientific, and Humanities and Social Sciences Honors Societies. His honors thesis combined his love for archeology (which he honed during a dig in Egypt this winter) and mechanical engineering (which he’ll pursue in Caltech’s PhD program in the fall). Talk about seeing the possibilities and making them realities.

I’ve talked with dozens of other young alums at campus events during the spring and have been so impressed by their myriad pursuits and accomplishments across every field – non-profit, financial, entrepreneurial, legal, educational, medical. We even have a brain surgeon-in-training! We can’t help but be proud of the role we’ve played in shaping their lives.

My hope for our seniors is that they will keep their eyes open, embrace the “possibilities,” and believe that they, like the hundreds of Rivers alumni before them, will create a fulfilling “reality” for themselves.