This article originally appeared in the summer 2014 Harker Quarterly.
Spring break was especially memorable for The Harker School Orchestra, which traveled to Chicago to perform at the Chicago International Music Festival – and came home with a Gold Award. Earlier this year, the orchestra was chosen to premiere a new piece by composer Jeremy Van Buskirk. The piece, titled “… such as I am you will be,” was one of three performed by the orchestra at the festival, along with Arturo Marquez’s “Danzon No. 2” and the fourth movement of “Symphony No. 5” by Dmitri Shostakovich.
The orchestra’s performance earned high praise from Deborah Gibbs, president and CEO of World Projects, the production company behind the festival, who declared The Harker School Orchestra was the best high school orchestra she had ever heard. Chris Florio, upper school music teacher and director of the orchestra, was similarly enthused. “We have been preparing all year long for this event and I could not be more proud of how our students performed,” he said.
This article originally appeared in the summer 2014 Harker Quarterly.
Bradley Stoll, mathematics department chair, received an Inspirational Teacher Award from MIT in late March. Lorraine Wong ’13 nominated Stoll for the award, saying, “I am immensely grateful that you believed in me in math, and more importantly, in life, and that you are not afraid to share your belief that being a kind human is more important than getting the best grades in a class.”
Stoll expressed gratitude at being nominated and said he was honored by Wong’s sentiments. “Lorraine’s nomination will be a constant reminder to me that I need to see and treat each student as an individual and not compartmentalize them by their grades, that I need to be compassionate, that sometimes I need to be their teacher, [and] sometimes I need to be their friend.”
This article originally appeared in the summer 2014 Harker Quarterly.
In March, the Columbia Scholastic Press Association (CSPA) recognized upper school journalism teacher Ellen Austin with a Gold Key Award for excellence in journalism at the CSPA conference, held at Columbia University in New York City. The Gold Key, which dates back to 1929, is the CSPA’s highest honor. “The joy in watching a developing young journalist find his or her voice and being a part of helping him or her find a stance in the world is an incredible experience,” said Austin upon receiving the award.