Twenty become Cum Laude Society members

\"Excellence by some raises standards for all,\" Dr. Rick Stacy told an auditorium full of beaming parents, students, trustees, faculty and staff. \"It increases what is perceived as possible, and it improves society in a thousand ways.\" Stacy, a Hawken history teacher, brought the message that championed the need for more academic and personal greatness, in his key note address at this year`s Cum Laude Society induction ceremony. This year`s inductees join a 100-year-old organization that was founded to honor scholastic achievement in secondary schools. The society, guided by the princples of excellence, justice and honor, has 350 chapters that span the globe. \"We look for academic excellence in scholarship, a passion for learning and the highest standards of educational ethics and school citizenship,\" said Academic Dean David Gillespie, a 1989 graduate of Hawken, before formally accepting the students into the society. Stacy spent his time honoring the accomplishment of the students, highlighting the pursuit of being exemplary, uncovering the essential characteristics required to attain the status and dismissing what he called American attitudes that are \"corrosive to the development of excellence.\" This year`s inductees were juniors Samuel Abbott, Bryn Adams, Nathaniel Dickey-White, Louise Gliga, Jennifer Happ, Suzanne Murray, Angela Primbas, Kathleen Sadowski, Madeleine Strohl, Jennifer Wenz and Myron Zhang as well as seniors Caroline Callahan, Erica Dorfman, Richard Durance, Elizabeth McBean, John McNamara, Matthew Raskind, Zachary Rosskamm, Catherine Schirm and Adam Waxman. They join current Society members Harrison Adams, Gabriel Benghiat, Madeleine Bruml, Matthew Dahlhausen, Kenan Diab, Rebecca Maurer, Laura McCrystal, Cari Meisel, Hannah Recht and Hannah Whitehead, who were inducted last year as juniors. Click here to listen to Dr. Stacy`s address. Click here to read it.