Harker athletics stood tall Friday evening, prior to the Homecoming game, when it opened its Athletic Hall of Fame, inducting three Harker athletes and one super fan.
Harker’s inaugural Hall of Famers are Adam Vucurevich ’02, Jason Martin ’07 and Tanya Schmidt ’08, along with Phyllis Carley (“Mrs. Carley” to everyone), Harker’s first super fan. Mrs. Carley’s award was presented posthumously; she died in 2009. All three athletes attended with family and Mrs. Carley’s grandson, Dale Kent Johnson ’80, attended to represent his grandmother.
Harker’s Athletic Hall of Fame honors those who have made outstanding contributions to its athletic program. Candidates for selection have exemplified desirable character traits and have distinguished themselves in competition representing Harker, their college, or at the professional level. They can also be non-graduates who, through long service to Harker, have distinguished themselves in the field of athletics.
Nominees are eligible five years after Harker graduation or after 10 years of service to the school or under special circumstances. Nominees may be former athletes, coaches, teams, members of the athletic staff, or supporters of Harker athletics. Up to five individuals may be inducted into the Hall of Fame in a given year. Names are inscribed and displayed on a wall in the athletic center with short photo-biographies running on a central monitor. In addition Harker has created a permanent web page to celebrate our Hall of Famers.
Johnson said it was great to see his grandmother’s name permanently enshrined in the Hall of Fame. “This school was her life. Up until the day she died she was still doing stuff here,” he said. Once he heard Harker was creating a hall of fame, he wasn’t surprised to hear his grandmother was being inducted as a super fan. “She used to come watch me in sports and even after I left in 1980, that was her thing, she would watch anything and everything she could,” Johnson said. “With the new gym, for her to be part of it, for her to have this award in there for everybody to see, and as time goes on, hopefully there is enough of a legacy with people hearing stories, that they will continue to remember her.”
“This award is quite an honor and very special to me,” said Vucurevich. “I was very surprised when I heard about it, but it is not just my reward, it is really a testament to the selflessness of our athletic teams at Harker as a result of the great coaches we had. Our coaches knew how to pull a young inexperienced group together, train us, inspire us, and encourage us to put our individual goals aside and work as a team. This is an award that the teams and the coaches all truly share in.
“The plaque is a special recognition for our first graduating Class of 2002 as pioneers for future Harker classes. I think of it as a tribute to Mr. and Mrs. Nichols for their vision to make a great school even greater. Their efforts and achievements affected so many families and ultimately enriched so many lives. I am very grateful and proud to be a Harker alumnus and part of Harker’s history.
“I have so many awesome memories from Harker, teachers, coaches and friends. I truly enjoyed playing sports, being with the coaches and my teammates. I really liked that no one cared about individual glory; they cared about the team’s success, and our goal was to give our best to the team. We had one purpose and it was very unifying. That is how we were coached and that is what made the team so great,” Vucurevich finished.
“I was very excited to hear I was being inducted into the Hall of Fame!” said Martin. “Dan Molin and CJ Cali were the first two people I talked to about it and I appreciate their love and support! It was an honor to be inducted with such great company as Adam, Tanya and Phyllis Carley, and to see my name on the plaque and be a part of Harker history! I can’t thank my family, coaches and teammates enough for all the support!”
Martin noted three things that helped his athletic career for which he will be forever grateful: “My dad selling his restaurant in Boston, buying a RV and driving across country to put his family in a better situation and his kids in a great school; Mr. and Mrs. Nichols for having a dream and making it a reality that affects so many people in a positive way; Coach Thorpe teaching us about hard work, perseverance and determination,” he finished.
Schmidt said she first learned about the Hall of Fame recognition just prior to delivering the keynote address to the the Class of 2018 at graduation this past spring. “I remember what an exhilarating feeling it was both to be the first Harker graduate to return to speak to some of the smartest students in the country and now to be honored in Harker’s Athletic Hall of Fame!” she said. “I feel both gratitude and responsibility when receiving this Hall of Fame recognition. I appreciate the opportunities and mentorship that I’ve had thus far, and I feel a sense of obligation to continue this success with Harker and to be a role model for others in the future.
“I will always remember the camaraderie of a team effort working to achieve something exceptional against great odds. Some special moments include beating our rival Castilleja with my older sister Sylvia Schmidt ‘06 (now Sylvia Carle); winning NorCals in Sacramento with several buses of Harker students, faculty and staff cheering for us on a school night; and playing in the state championships!”
Our inductees
Phyllis Carley (1920-2009, at Harker from 1952-2009) Phyllis Gwynn Carley, much beloved member of the Harker community, was a staunch supporter of Harker athletics for more than 50 years. Mrs. Carley, as she was known to so many, was an institution and an irreplaceable tie to our past. As a student in the Central Valley, she played polo, basketball and softball, and noted once that being involved with Harker allowed her to relive her childhood. For the duration of her life, she was one of Harker athletics’ biggest fans, attending many, many home games. It didn’t matter what sport, she just enjoyed seeing kids active. “I love watching students of all ages coming together and having fun,” she said in a Winged Post article.
She opened her Harker career in 1952 in Palo Alto as a driver, shuttling local students to and from school. She progressed by virtue of her wonderful disposition and hard work to become secretary first to Donald Nichols and then to Howard Nichols, and remained in that role for many years, though her contribution to campus life went far beyond her desk in the administration building. She passed away in 2009, but will be long remembered at Harker. Read her full biography in Harker News.
Adam Vucurevich ‘02
Vucurevich nearly earned his plaudits at another school, but Harker opened its upper school in the nick of time. “When I finally reached the eighth grade, it was sadly time to move on to high school. St. Francis was my choice, but then, in the eleventh hour, Mr. and Mrs. Nichols decided they would extend Harker to include high school, one year at a time, [so] we would be seniors for four years. That was interesting, but I was not yet convinced to stay until Mr. Nichols decided Harker would have [its] first high school football team, and then I was in,” he said.
Vucurevich took full advantage of Harker’s athletic program, playing football, baseball and wrestling, making him Harker’s first three-sport athlete. He was team captain for football in both his sophomore and junior years, and was MVP and got an honorable mention in the All-CCS team that year. He also captained the baseball and wrestling teams. Read his full biography.
Jason Martin ‘07
While playing baseball at Harker, Martin was named to the Varsity Second All-League Team in his freshman year and to the First Team for the next three years. He was runner up his junior year for CCS MVP, hitting .629 for the year. Martin played varsity football for three years and, in the 2006 Homecoming game, became the only player in Harker history to run for a touchdown, throw for a touchdown and catch a touchdown in the same game.
Martin noted a number of coaches at Harker have had a huge impact on his life. Coach K (Karriem Stinson) was his middle school flag football and junior varsity football coach. Martin said that Stinson instilled toughness and a work ethic in him at a young age, and those traits have been at the foundation of his character ever since. C.J. Cali was Martin’s middle school P.E. coach and is still a life mentor for him – an example of how Harker really is “K through Life,” Martin said. Dan Molin has always followed and supported Martin’s baseball career, and has been a constant resource for Martin in life after Harker as well. Martin played semi-pro baseball for two years after college. Read his full biography.
Tanya Schmidt ‘08
A four-year starter on Harker’s varsity girls volleyball team, Schmidt was named a four-time All-West Bay Athletic League First Team honoree and a two-time West Bay Athletic League MVP. Her junior year, Schmidt was named a Top 50 Junior Recruit in the nation. By her senior year, Schmidt was an unstoppable force on the Harker team.
During her senior season in 2007, Schmidt led the girls volleyball team into Harker history with a series of firsts for the school. As the first Harker team to compete in the Central Coast Section championship final, the team continued to make history by winning the Division IV NorCal Championship in Sacramento. In December 2007, the team played in the state championships in front of a home crowd of more than 1,500 Harker fans at San Jose State University, where Schmidt was named California Division IV State MVP. Schmidt went on to play pro volleyball in Europe for two years. Read her full biography.
Tanya Schmidt entered Harker in third grade. By the time she graduated from Harker’s upper school in 2008, she had left a lasting impression on her teachers and, as a passionate student and athlete, a legacy for Harker. Throughout her life, Schmidt has exhibited a love for academics, while balancing the drive to excel in competitive team sports and give back to the community. On Oct. 5, 2018, Schmidt was named an inaugural member of the Harker Athletic Hall of Fame.
A four-year starter on Harker’s varsity girls volleyball team, Schmidt was named a four-time All-West Bay Athletic League First Team honoree and a two-time West Bay Athletic League MVP. Her junior year, Schmidt was named a Top 50 Junior Recruit in the nation. By her senior year, Schmidt was an unstoppable force on the Harker volleyball team.
During her senior season in 2007, Schmidt led the girls volleyball team into Harker history with a series of firsts for the school. As the first Harker team to compete in the Central Coast Section championship final, the team continued to make history by winning the Division IV NorCal Championship in Sacramento. In December 2007, the team played in the state championships in front of a home crowd of more than 1,500 Harker fans at San Jose State University, where Schmidt was named California Division IV State MVP.
Earlier, in November 2007, Schmidt became the first Harker student-athlete ever to sign a national letter of intent to play National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I sports. Schmidt paid homage to head coach Theresa Smith: “Coach Smitty was very influential over all four years in my development as an athlete and as a leader. Even though I’ve received a lot of personal recognition, our team couldn’t have achieved what we did without her.”
Also in December 2007, Schmidt was named to the San Jose Mercury News First Team for girls volleyball, with a season total of 643 kills, 94 blocks, 428 digs and 52 aces, leading the Harker team to a season record of 39-5. Her season total of 643 kills was more than 200 kills higher than the next attacker named to the seven-person all-star team from other Bay Area high schools. After the school season ended, Schmidt played on the Vision Volleyball 18 Gold club team and won the bronze medal in the open division of the 2008 Junior Olympics.
Among other accolades, Schmidt was honored as a 2007 Cal-Hi Sports Scholar Athlete, a PrepVolleyball.com All-American and Academic All-American. At Harker, she was the 2007-08 Athlete of the Year, Scholar-Athlete of the Year, and recipient of the Head of School Award.
During her time at Harker, in addition to sports, Schmidt actively participated in many of the rich academic and community programs. She was named a National Merit Finalist and an AP Scholar with Honor and was inducted into the Spanish National Honor Society. Schmidt served as president of a service club and section editor for the monthly newspaper, among other activities. She was also named Homecoming Queen.
Having attracted numerous offers of college scholarships from programs across the country, Schmidt selected Santa Clara University primarily because it offered a combination of her principal interests: academics, a demanding sports regime and plenty of community service opportunities.
On the volleyball court, Schmidt was a key player and a four-year starter as a middle blocker on a full NCAA Division 1 athletic scholarship. The story can be told in the many accolades she received at SCU:
2008: Her first season at SCU, Schmidt started in every match and was named to the West Coast Conference All-Freshman Team. She tied her season-high 12 kills against then-No. 16 Kansas State, contributing to her team’s upset win in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.
2009: Schmidt was team leader in hits with a season average of .329 and led in total blocks at 97. In a match against Cal Poly, Schmidt scored nine kills to earn a season-high .818 hitting percentage.
2010: Schmidt was named to the All-West Coast Conference First Team and voted Offensive MVP for SCU, carrying the team’s highest hitting percentage for a season average of .338. Against Idaho, she hit .516, earning 17 kills, four blocks, and five digs. She hit .750 tallying 12 kills with three blocks and two digs against CSU Bakersfield.
2010 and 2011: Schmidt was named to the WCC All-Academic team, carrying the highest GPA in the whole conference. In 2010 and 2011, Schmidt was also named to the ESPN.com CoSIDA Academic All-District Team, the only player from the West Coast Conference to make the list two years in a row.
2011: Schmidt was team captain and voted Most Inspirational Player by her teammates. She set her season high record of hitting .727 with 17 kills and four blocks in the match vs. Utah Valley. She was one of 30 volleyball players selected across the nation for the Lowe’s Senior CLASS awardfor excellence in competition, classroom, character and community.
Schmidt served as the women’s volleyball representative for Santa Clara University’s Student-Athlete Advisory Committee and also as Santa Clara University’s female student-athlete representative for the West Coast Conference Student-Athlete Advisory Committee.
Volleyball was only one piece of Schmidt’s life at SCU. She thrived in academia and, in 2011, was named a regional finalist to interview for a Rhodes Scholarship. Schmidt participated in the Santa Clara University Honors Program all four years, was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa as a junior, and graduated SCU summa cum laude with a 3.97 GPA, earning a Bachelor of Arts in English with minors in Classical Studies and Religious Studies.
For each of these fields of study, Schmidt was inducted into their respective honor societies: Sigma Tau Delta (International English Honor Society), Eta Sigma Phi (National Classical Honor Society) and Theta Alpha Kappa (National Honor Society of Religious Studies and Theology). She served for two years as president of the Sigma Tau Delta chapter at Santa Clara University, and she also served as vice president of the SCU chapter of Alpha Sigma Nu (Honors Society of Jesuit schools). Schmidt was SCU’s selected female representative invited to take part in the Path to Peace Foundation’s annual weeklong conference co-sponsored by the United Nations. She taught English in Peru as a Jean Donovan Fellow and won the Doelger Scholar Grant and Canterbury Fellowship to support her work on various research projects.
In 2012, she won the Phi Beta Kappa David Logothetti Award for academic excellence and also the Carroll Williams Award, given to the one senior who “best defines what it means to be a Santa Clara student-athlete” on the court, in the classroom and in the community. The NCAA also noted Tanya’s well-rounded athleticism, leadership and character, honoring her as one of the Top 30 Finalists for the Woman of the Year award, selected from a total of 150,000 graduating female student-athletes from all three NCAA divisions in the country.
Schmidt was selected to address her graduating class at SCU’s 2012 Commencement Liturgy. On graduation day, she was awarded the Saint Clare Medal, which recognizes a student who embodies the university’s ideals of “competence, conscience and compassion,” “given to the female graduate judged outstanding in academic performance, personal character, school activities and constructive contribution to the university by the faculty and the provost.”
For the next two years, Schmidt played professional volleyball in Europe. She played her first season for Oxyjeunes Sodraep Farciennes in Belgium. She helped her team achieve an undefeated record of 14-0 in the matches played after her arrival. A translator helped a local television network to interview Schmidt after several home games, but by the end of the season, Schmidt achieved her goal of giving a post-game interview by herself in French, which she was learning while living there. Her team won the 2013 championship title of the N1 League.
For her second season, Schmidt chose to sign a contract with Volleyball Club Offenburg in Germany, where she was a starter for the entire nine-month long season. She was named the team’s MVP at five out of the eight matches where the award was given. After a win against a Frankfurt-based team, the Offenburger Tageblatt newspaper reported, “Out of a strong Offenburg team, one very special player stands out: the 22-year old U.S.-American Tanya Schmidt, who became the best player in the VCO-jersey and gives the team a lot of security with her sovereignty and vision in her attacks, especially in tight moments.” During her free time, Schmidt learned German and was an assistant English teacherat a college preparatory high school.
Schmidt then moved to New York, where she earned a master’s degree in English and American Literature from New York University. Schmidt received numerous postgraduate scholarships, including the West Coast Conference Postgraduate Scholarship, the NCAA Postgraduate Scholarship, a MENSA Scholarship and prestigious NYU awards from the Graduate School of Arts and Science and from the English department, including the Charles Wickham Moore Scholarship. She has spoken at multiple scholarly conferences and has received research funding from various scholarly organizations, including the Northeast Modern Language Association and the Folger Institute, to name a few.
In New York, Schmidt also has served as the president of the New York chapter of the Santa Clara University Alumni Association and, as of April 2015, was the youngest alum invited to become an SCU Illuminate Blog Thought Leader. Awarded a MacCracken Doctoral Fellowship, Schmidt has entered NYU’s Ph.D. program in English. In 2016 Schmidt wrote and delivered an oration in Latin to welcome the inauguration of NYU’s 16th university president, and in 2018, Schmidt became the first upper school graduate invited to give the keynote speech at Harker’s graduation. She advised the graduates not to be afraid of unexpected changes: “Have the courage to be curious, and make space to listen to yourself!”
Jason Martin ’07, inaugural inductee to Harker’s Athletic Hall of Fame on Oct. 5, 2018, had a great career at Harker, excelling in baseball and football. He began at Harker in junior kindergarten and started playing baseball in Quito Little League, Campbell Little League and, eventually, San Jose Pacific Pony Baseball.
While playing baseball at Harker, Martin was named to the Varsity Second All-League Team in his freshman year and to the First Team for the next three years. He was runner up his junior year for CCS MVP, hitting .629 for the year. Martin played varsity football for three years and, in the 2006 homecoming game, became the only player in Harker history to run for a touchdown, throw for a touchdown and catch a touchdown in the same game.
Martin noted a number of coaches at Harker have had a huge impact on his life. Coach K (Karriem Stinson) was his middle school flag football and junior varsity football coach. Martin said that Stinson instilled toughness and a work ethic in him at a young age, and those traits have been at the foundation of his character ever since. C.J. Cali was Martin’s middle school P.E. coach and is still a life mentor for him, and example of how Harker really is K through life, Martin said. Dan Molin has always followed and supported Martin’s baseball career, and he helped Martin get his first job at Harker after college. Molin has constantly been a resource for Martin in life after Harker as well.
James Brack, head coach during Martin’s junior year at Harker, was instrumental in directing him to San Jose State University, Martin noted in an interview for the Spartan’s website. “He was a really good coach. He ended up coming to San Jose State as a volunteer. He told Coach Piraro about me, so I came out for one of the camps. I played a little shortstop, second base, outfield, just had them take a look at me. I guess they liked what they saw. They offered me a recruited walk-on spot.” He ended up breaking a number of SJSU records.
In 2008, his freshman year at SJSU, Martin was noted in the online recap of the San Jose State University baseball team vs. Spartan Alumni game, on Nov. 2: “Offensively, sophomore center fielder Jason Martin reached base in all five of his plate appearances from the lead off position, finishing 2-for-3 with two hit-by-pitches, his trademark. He also reached [base] on one of six alumni errors, in the third inning. The San Jose native scored three times and drove in a pair. His final hit was a two-run triple in the big eighth inning, with Martin coming all the way around to score on a throwing miscue.”
In January 2009, Martin was recognized at the annual Santa Clara County Hot Stove Banquet for his standout performance on the diamond. He was named a winner of the annual Loyd Christopher Award, given to a single member of the San Jose State, Stanford and Santa Clara University baseball programs. Martin also earned a $500 scholarship for being nominated to receive the award.
In April 2010, Martin was written up in the San Jose Mercury News by Dennis Knight in his Movin’ On Up column, where he noted, “The former Harker standout started his career as a walk-on, but he has developed into the Spartans’ top offensive player as a junior. In the past four games, the outfielder went seven for 16 with a double, a home run and four RBIs. Batting third in his most recent games, Martin leads the Spartans with a .403 batting average. He has 56 hits, 23 runs, eight doubles, a triple, one home run, 19 RBIs and five stolen bases. He has a .462 on-base percentage.”
In May 2010, Martin was one of two players on the SJSU baseball team to land a spot on the College Sports Information Directors of America (CoSIDA)/ESPN The Magazine Academic All-District VIII Baseball First Team for his 3.34 GPA. He was one of only five student athletes in the Western Athletic Conference to be honored for his achievements both in the classroom and on the diamond. At this point, Martin had a college career batting average of .348, ranking 12th all-time in the Spartan baseball record book, despite having broken his hand earlier in the season.
Martin spent his junior year summer playing for the Chatham Anglers in the Cape Cod league, a league known for the high level of summer baseball for college players.
In February 2011, collegesplits.com, a college athletics analysis website, named Martin a preseason defensive All-American and one of the players who will “provide the most value in 2011” with his glove. In April 2011, Martin was again noted in the San Jose Mercury News’ Movin’ On Up column for having broken the first of many records as a member of the San Jose State University baseball team. His 227 hits put him in the record books.
Prior to graduation in 2012, Martin was recognized for his contributions to the San Jose State University baseball team at its annual Senior Day. He is one of the most successful players in SJSU’s history and has been recognized many times for both his on-field prowess and his dedication to his studies. Martin finished as the Spartan’s all-time leader in hits (227), runs scored (174), games played (236), at-bat appearances (832) and hit by pitches (65). Martin, who majored in psychology and minored in kinesiology, graduated as a three-time San Jose State Scholar-Athlete and two time Academic All-Western Athletic Conference athlete, a testament to his efforts in the classroom.
Martin is the first player out of Harker to play Division I baseball. Following graduation, he headed out to try his hand at semi pro ball. Martin played with the Abilene Prairie Dogs in the United League for a year and the Amarillo Sox Baseball Club in the American League for just over three years, including a 100-game season with all the rigors of bus rides lasting up to 16 hours through six states in about 100 days. During the same period, he coached at Clovis West Baseball in Fresno where he led a group of 20 players and three coaches in developing their baseball and real-world skills.
Fast forward to December 2016, when Martin bought Sal’s Pizza in Campbell, renamed it Lefty’s: A Taste of Boston in honor of his grandfather, and started sponsoring Little League teams. In early 2018, Martin’s fellow graduates from the Class of 2007 packed his restaurant to celebrate their 10-year reunion. Faculty members Bradley Stoll and Dan Molin, and Martin’s father, Harker chef Steve Martin, joined the fun while ’07’s very own DJ Anton Sepetov provided the musical ambience for the evening’s festivities. Lefty’s remains a family business, but Martin is now working for Cushman & Wakefield on site at LinkedIn as a MAC coordinator (Moves, Adds, Changes), putting even more of his education to work.
Martin began his career with a mindset to work hard and earn his spot on the roster every day. He said he learned his work-hard mentality from his parents and that he plays 100 percent whenever he’s on the field. In an interview with the SJSU newspaper, Martin said, “In my mind that is how the game should be played … with maximum effort. If I come home from practice and I’m not really that tired, it bothers me. If I am spending time out there, practicing or playing in a game, I want to get something done.” It is this mentality that enabled Martin to achieve so much while playing for the Spartans and that led Harker to make him an inaugural member of the Harker Athletic Hall of Fame.
Adam Vucurevich was in Harker’s first high school class, the Class of 2002, and he set the pace for Harker athletes to come, scoring Harker’s first touchdown and hitting Harker’s first home run. On Oct. 5, 2018, Vucurevich was inducted as an inaugural member of Harker’s Athletic Hall of Fame.
The Vucurevich family moved to San Jose when Adam was in fourth grade and brother Matt was in second grade. They looked at many, many schools, but Harker was unanimously the family favorite, Vucurevich noted. “It proved to be a great choice. It was a good mix of academics and sports, but what I noticed most was that everyone gave their best effort whether in sports or academics, and that really impressed me.”
Vucurevich nearly earned his plaudits at another school, but Harker opened its high school in the nick of time. “When I finally reached the eighth grade, it was sadly time to move on to high school. St. Francis was my choice, but then, in the eleventh hour, Mr. and Mrs. Nichols decided they would extend Harker to include high school, one year at a time, [so] we would be seniors for four years. That was interesting, but I was not yet convinced to stay until Mr. Nichols decided Harker would have [its] first high school football team, and then I was in,” he said.
Vucurevich took full advantage of Harker’s athletic program, playing football, baseball and wrestling, making him Harker’s first three-sport athlete. He was team captain for football in both his sophomore and junior years, and was MVP and got an honorable mention in the All-CCS team that year. He also captained the baseball and wrestling teams.
“Being a member of Harker’s first graduating class and being seniors for four years had been a unique and challenging experience,” Vucurevich said. “We had no senior classmates to set the pace or to look up to. Instead we had the pressure of being the leaders and setting the example for the lower classmen to follow. It was interesting being the first Homecoming King, since I had no idea what to expect or to do, so I just smiled.”
Reflecting on those first years of the high school, he noted, “Academically, Harker was very challenging. They offered a wide selection of classes, but we had no feedback on what courses to take because we were the first. We had no feedback on the teachers’ personalities either, but they equally gave copious amounts of homework. I challenged myself by taking the top math classes Harker offered (Honors Multivariate Calculus, Differential Equations, AP Statistics and AP Physics C). They were tough, but I stayed with it and I did not quit.”
High school athletics were challenging with only one class – freshmen at that – to draw from. “Our athletic teams struggled without upperclassmen for the first two years because we were a very small, new school with only 100 students in our freshmen class,” Vucurevich reminisced. “With only 15 football players, it was difficult for us to find games with freshmen-only teams, so we found ourselves facing many much larger and more experienced JV teams, and a few varsity teams as well.
“Even though this was challenging, it was a great experience being on Harker’s first football team, first wrestling team and first baseball team. I made the first winning touchdown; the team was so happy, we were all screaming and yelling. It was always thrilling to hear Mr. Bither’s voice on the PA saying ‘Harker touchdown!’
“The same was true in baseball when I hit Harker’s first home run. One team member, in his excitement, ran out to retrieve the ball I just hit to give it to me as a keepsake as we were all screaming and yelling. High school years at Harker were definitely challenging, exciting and lots of fun.”
Vucurevich is grateful for all the guidance he got from both faculty and coaches. “My teachers taught me patience and persistence,” he said. “My coaches taught me what it takes to be part of a team. They taught me the team is as strong as the weakest link and you need to pick each other up and be supportive of each other, be selfless and sacrifice to help the team win, which translates to life, everyone takes a piece of the pie and helps out and we get it done, life is a team effort.
“The staff at Harker, Mr. [Howard] Nichols, Mr. [John] Near, Dr. [Cheryl] Cavanaugh, Mr. [John] Hawely, Mr. [Jack] Bither, Coach C.J. [Cali], Coach Karriem [Stinson], Smitty [Theresa Smith] are the nicest people and the best role models I have ever known,” he said. “They were not just role models, they were my friends; they helped me, encouraged me and were always very supportive.”
And then Vucurevich moved into college life and beyond. “With all this great background and education from Harker, I was accepted into University of California, Berkeley engineering department and graduated with a B.S. degree in mechanical engineering. I worked at a couple different tech companies in the valley, but I was not happy, it wasn’t me and I wanted to find my purpose and find something I would be happy doing.
“Harker instilled in me kindness and respect for others and challenged me to do and to be my best both academically and athletically,” Vucurevich said. “This drive to be my personal best and to do the best for others has led me to my current career of law enforcement in which I am most excited. I have truly found my passion. Helping others and dealing with all sorts of people, handling a variety of stressful situations with the right amount of tact, being creative and resourceful, showing good judgment in all types of situations, and having good teamwork skills is essential in my line of work.
“I have to work hard every day to make sure I am at my best I can never be below 100 percent no matter how much overtime I had to work the day before,” Vucurevich added. “I am proud to have been part of the Harker family who instilled these values of perseverance, being your best, determination, commitment and teamwork. I help others every day and I love the challenge. I greatly appreciate the sacrifice my parents made to send me to Harker, that was the best school for me, and I am very grateful for the teachers, coaches and staff at Harker for the experience, training and education.”
Phyllis Gwynn Carley, much beloved member of the Harker community, was a staunch supporter of Harker Athletics for over 50 years and is an inaugural member of Harker’s Athletic Hall of Fame, inducted Oct. 5, 2018.
Mrs. Carley, as she was known to so many, was an institution and an irreplaceable tie to our past. As a student in the Central Valley, she played polo, basketball and softball, and noted once that being involved with Harker allowed her to relive her childhood; for the duration of her life, she was one of Harker athletics’ biggest fans. “I love watching students of all ages coming together and having fun,” she said in a Winged Post article. She passed away in 2009, but will be long remembered at Harker.
Born 1920, Mrs. Carley came of age prior to World War II in the Salinas Valley where, in 1937, in one of her cherished moments, she was named Hostess of the California Rodeo in Salinas and awarded a pair of silver spurs she always treasured. She was a lifelong aficionado of rodeos – always pronounced “ro day’ o” – and returned to Salinas to attend the California Rodeo every year; she attended other rodeos in central and northern California as often as possible.
The Harker School was graced with Mrs. Carley’s presence in a number of valuable roles, culminating with her services as secretary to the board of trustees and as a private clipping service for Harker’s Office of Communication.
She opened her Harker career in 1952 in Palo Alto as a driver, shuttling local students to and from school. She progressed by virtue of her wonderful disposition and hard work to become secretary first to Donald Nichols, then to Howard Nichols and remained in that role for many years, though her contribution to campus life went far beyond her desk in the administration building.
Mike Bassoni, facilities director, who has been with Harker for more than 30 years, reminisced a bit. “Mrs. C loved horses, kids and dogs, in that order,” he said. “She wasn’t one for being fancy about much of anything, unless it was getting duded up for a rodeo. She personally knew famous cowboys, such as Gene Autry, but never spent much time bragging about it. She lived a simple life, didn’t need much and didn’t take gifts easily. She could run the front desk, do attendance, answer the phone and keep Howard’s professional life organized all at the same time. She gave of her time endlessly to the school. She was first in the door and many times last to leave. She believed in the joy of watching young people develop, but also hoped they would learn manners along the way. She is dearly missed.”
Pat Walsh, who started at Harker as a summer camp counselor and spent 40 years at Harker, retiring in 2017, remembers Mrs. Carley well. “For years, early in my career, she would sit in the Saratoga gym as kids went through the lunch line. She was verifying that they were on the lunch list. It was amazing how many kids would wander over to her to say hello and check in with her. She was amazingly aware of what was going on with each of them. She always seemed to be on the lookout for the kid(s) who needed an extra dose of attention that day.”
Walsh continued, “There was no pecking order with Mrs. Carley. Every Harker kid was important to her, whether they be the top cadet or a new kid having serious difficulties adjusting to the school. In fact, I think she secretly had a fondness for the ones who weren’t getting as much attention at home or were struggling in the classroom. I have a memory of her taking an upset first grader by the hand and walking him around campus until they were able to find his lost sweater. She had been on her way to her car, and there were others who could have stepped in, but she was always in service to ‘her kids.’
“I owe much of my success as a teacher to the lessons I learned from Mrs. Carley, Howard Nichols and Captain Torcellini. When I come across former students who were at Harker during their years, they express the very same sentiments,” finished Walsh.
After retiring from Harker, Mrs. Carley continued to provide critical services to the school as secretary of the board of trustees. She was also a familiar face to current students and, as an avid sports fan, was seen at many home games. It didn’t matter what sport, she just enjoyed seeing kids active. Of no less value were her eight years of service to Harker’s Office of Communication. Her visits were a welcome moment as she passed from office to office in the hallway – and also across the campus – dropping off clippings, sports scores and stories.
In 2006, Mrs. Carley received the Harker Alumni Association (HAA) Service Award, which was immediately renamed the HAA Phyllis Carley Service Award in her honor. Chris Nikoloff, former head of school, noted, “Whether cheering our students at games or serving as secretary to the board of trustees, Phyllis Carley’s long career at The Harker School embodied the true spirit of service.”
The middle school campus was bustling with activity today as more than 3,400 Harker community members, including about 200 alumni and their families, came together for the 68th Harker Family & Alumni Picnic. This year’s theme, “Back to the Future,” celebrated Harker’s 125-year history and brought optimism for the future to the students, parents and faculty in attendance. The carnival games, food booths and attractions such as inflatable slides and laser tag remained popular, as did the annual lunchtime show, a time travel-themed production that featured performances by lower, middle and upper school performing arts groups. Here’s to the future!
Many thanks to the sponsors who helped make this event possible:
Gold Level:
All Natural Stone
Anonymous
Silver Level:
Stan and Lena Tomberg
Anonymous
Bronze Level:
Lijun Zhang and Chun Wang, V1 Group
And congratulations to this year’s raffle winners:
Nearly 1,000 community members visited the upper school tonight for the 2018 Homecoming celebration, where families, faculty and staff socialized, reminisced and cheered on their Harker Eagles.
The evening started with the grand opening of the Harker Athletic Hall of Fame in the new athletic center. Inaugural Hall of Famers are Adam Vucurevich ’02, Jason Martin ’07 and Tanya Schmidt ’08, along with Phyllis Carley, known as “Mrs. Carley” (1920-2009), Harker’s first super fan, represented by her nephew Dale Johnson ’80. Watch for the full story and bios soon.
Revelers began arriving at around 6 p.m. to partake of the food at Mrs. Carley’s Café and watch the teams warm up on Davis Field, while the Harker Pep Band took its place in the stands to provide the evening’s music. Attendees gathered in the bleachers just before kickoff to see the annual pregame traditions: a performance by the lower school’s junior cheer squad and the Eaglets Fly-By. Soon after, the Harker Eagles sprinted through the Gauntlet of Spirit to take the field for their game against the Lobos of Elsie Allen High School. Minutes prior to the start of the game, a brief memorial was held for former head of school Diana Nichols, to honor the tireless effort and depth of vision that was so crucial to making Harker what it is today.
The Eagles scored 21 points in the first quarter and were up 35-0 by halftime, during which the crowd witnessed the exciting finale of this year’s tug-of-war contest, in which the seniors triumphed over the juniors. The upper school cheer squad and varsity dance team performed to an enthusiastic response from the crowd, just before Dr. Teja Patil recieved Harker’s 2018 Distinguished Alumni Award, followed by the crowning of this year’s Homecoming Monarchs, seniors Kelsey Wu and Neil Ramaswamy. The Eagles won with a final score of 56-0.
Harker is pleased to announce that Dr. Teja Patil ’02 is the 2018 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient.
The Distinguished Alumni Award recognizes and honors a prominent alumna or alumnus who exemplifies the very best of Harker, whose contributions have led to extraordinary advances that benefit the greater good, who gives back to his or her community and to Harker, and who inspires others by his or her professional leadership and commitment.
Patil embodies the Harker philosophy through her lifelong passion for learning, and commitment to civic responsibility in her work at the Palo Alto Veterans Administration (PAVA) and overseas. Her commitment to these tenets has created a highly individualized path in her quest, showing both compassion and leadership in her work. Harker honors her individuality, her leadership and her commitment to the human race to make the world a better place. She is truly a global citizen.
Patil was born in India, moved to the U.S. when she was 5 and began attending Harker in grade 5. Her passions at Harker were all things theater, French and biology.
In 2006, Patil earned a B.S. in biochemistry and cell biology (cum laude) from the University of California, San Diego, and also studied political science at the American University in Paris. Upon returning from France, she was not convinced that medicine was her calling. “I worried that being a physician was too narrow and would not satisfy my interest in the humanities and social sciences,” she said. Instead of medical school, she went to the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, to pursue a master’s in epidemiology and better understand the social determinants of health.
Patil was particularly interested in the interplay of genetics and environment in chronic disease. Her major works while at UM focused on the genetics of heart disease in the old order Amish as well as glaucoma in Peru. Her capstone project in Lima led to the discovery of a novel mutation in the myocilin gene, a previously unknown cause of hereditary glaucoma in indigenous populations.
Although she enjoyed public health research, the long hours of data analysis and paper writing did not feel quite right. “I knew I was making an impact but it felt very far removed. I boomeranged back to my original vision of becoming a physician. It’s ironic – I thought my ‘humanities’ side would not be adequately fed in the medical field; it turns out being a doctor, focusing on the individual patient, is what gave me the satisfaction I needed – that desire to feel more connected to the people around me.”
She received her M.D. with a concentration in global health from the University of California, San Francisco, in 2012. During that time, she spent a summer at an HIV/AIDS clinic in Mfangano, Kenya, and then went on to research the effects of malaria in pregnancy. She remained at UCSF for her internal medicine residency.
“UCSF is known as the birthplace of hospital medicine; I had so many inspirational, brilliant and kind mentors there and I learned that I did not have to be a subspecialist to be an excellent or expert physician. Working in Saipan, an island in the South Pacific with little access to subspecialty care, also cemented my decision to be a jack of all trades and remain in general internal medicine. However, I was aware that this can be a taxing occupation with high rates of burnout due to the pace and severity of illness. Therefore, I chose to combine my practice in hospital medicine with teaching, in order to build in a buffer to burnout. Having students makes it hard to lose your sense of wonder,” she said.
In 2015, Patil became an attending physician doing hospital medicine at the PAVA hospital and a clinical instructor of medicine at Stanford University School of Medicine. “Medicine is an apprenticeship model,” she noted. “Whenever I work in the hospital, I never take care of patients alone, it is always in conjunction with medical students, interns and residents.”
Her particular areas of focus at PAVA have been improving resident experience and the educational value of nighttime clinical rotations. Her current interest is how to prevent physician burnout by building self-reflective practice and emotional resilience. “I love geriatrics and end-of-life care because it is the perfect intersection of complex decision-making and building therapeutic alliance. I am so grateful to work at the VA where both my brain and my heart feel that they are challenged and growing.”
The Patil family is truly a Harker family. Brother DJ Patil has two children at Harker, Veyd, grade 7, and Samaara, grade 4, and Teja’s parents Suhas and Jayashree have been deeply involved with Harker. The Patil Theater in the new Rothschild Performing Arts Center bears their name.
Amy Jin ’18 has been named a 2018 Davidson Fellow Laureate in the technology category for her project on deep learning to help track surgical instruments using video. The application will help surgeons to improve surgical care by automatically assessing operative skill, “given that approximately half of all surgical complications are avoidable, many of which are attributed to poor individual and team performance,” according to the summary on the institute’s webpage. The summary continues: “Evaluating operative performance requires expert supervision and is a manual process that is time-consuming and subjective. Thus, Amy leveraged region-based convolutional neural networks to facilitate operative skill assessment, extracting visual assessment metrics such as tool usage timelines, motion heat maps, and tool trajectory maps. her summary notes.”
Davidson Scholarships are awarded to young scholars; each must be 18 or younger to receive the grant. Categories include science, technology, engineering, mathematics, music, literature, philosophy and Outside the Box. Projects must contribute a work recognized by experts in the field as an outstanding accomplishment that has the potential to benefit society.
The 2018 Davidson Fellows were honored at a reception in Washington, D.C., on Sept. 28. Rajiv Movva ’18 also received a Davidson Scholarship; read about his project in Harker News.
Great news for recent alumnus Rajiv Movva ’18! He is one of 20 students nationwide awarded a Davidson Fellows Scholarship for his project, “SNPpet: Deep Learning the Human Epigenome Reveals Regulatory Sequence Patterns and Genomic Mechanisms of Disease.” He is one of only 20 students across the country to receive this honor.
Former Harker football position coach Brennan Marion has been named offensive coordinator for Howard University prior to the 2017 season. His first coaching position was at West Valley College (Calif.) as a strength coach, and in 2012 he worked as a position coach at The Harker School.