Four Years in Review

Graduation. We’ve made it. Congrats to my fellow members of the Class of 2016! For the past term, as I’m sure that many of you have been doing too, I’ve been reflecting on my four years at Exeter. It’s so hard to believe that my Exeter experience is coming to an end and that we’re all now alumni of the Academy. It feels as if just yesterday I was an overeager prep moving into Bancroft Hall, experiencing high school for the first time and life as a boarder. How time flies.

Here’s our four years in review.

PREP YEAR

Welcome to campus—it’s September 2012. Memories of Prep Posse, ethernet cables and Stillwells runs seem to punctuate my memory of Prep Fall. There was no pass/fail, and for many of us, our prep fall grades haunt us to this day. By the second month of school, Levon Brunson, Tony Ryou and Jacob Pressman had secured the highly esteemed position of Prep Rep, and Max Freedman ’13 served as our Student Council president. That year, we suffered through 11 Saturday classes, with a whopping seven Saturday classes in the fall term alone.

In October, the campus experienced a slight tremor due to a 4.0 magnitude earthquake centered in Maine. Just a week later, campus was hit by another weather anomaly—Hurricane Sandy. That month, faculty member Richard Parris passed away, and the annual Relay For Life cancer fundraiser that year was dedicated to the beloved math teacher, coach and friend. At the start of our first fall, President Obama was still in his first term, and won the election on Nov. 7. That day, Maggie Hassan, wife of our past principal Tom Hassan, won the election for New Hampshire governor. Orange Leaf, a frozen yogurt chain, opened a location in Exeter that fall. However, the location unfortunately closed this spring; it looks like Orange Leaf ’s Exeter career lasted just as long as ours did. Big Red football beat the Smurfs 35-9 at E/a to secure the first five-year win streak since 1917.

That winter, the weather did anything but improve. The record-shattering Blizzard Nemo dumped over two feet of snow on campus in under two days. One of the greatest mysteries of prep winter was trying to figure out who stole that tub of butter from D-hall, and to this day the mystery is still unresolved. Addressing this issue, an actual News headline from the Jan. 31, 2013 issue of The Exonian read “Deans Target Banana Bandits, Dessert Thieves” believe it or not. Amidst the drag of winter the Academy introduced Exeter (Dis)Connect that term as a replacement for Blackboard, much to the dismay of the community.

Spring term had a shaky start with the Boston Marathon Bombings of April 15. Wentworth Hall suffered a somewhat severe bedbug outbreak that year, ultimately causing the administration to burn and discard the furniture stored in Dow Barn by students for the following school year. Lamont Health and Wellness Center started its major renovations that spring term.

Meanwhile, in the realm of Pop Culture, “Don’t Drop That Thun Thun Thun” was a major hit on campus, and who could ever forget that video of Jeff MacArthur dancing in DSL and teaching us what it meant to not drop that Thun Thun Thun. That year, twerking became mainstream, and Drake graced us with the term “YOLO,” which I hate to admit that most of us did not use ironically.

Snapchat also made its first appearance on campus that year and became a social necessity by our prep spring. The most popular dance was the Harlem Shake, and dorms and sports teams alike came together to choreograph their own Harlem Shakes, many of which can still be found on YouTube.

LOWER YEAR

WHY SO GENDERED?

Lower year was marked by a series of firsts: first year of the fall Ghana abroad program, first season of boys’ varsity volleyball, and first year of the newly renovated Lamont Health and Wellness Center. For the first time, we also began to have advisee meetings as a required appointment. The E-book recognized E-cigarettes as a banned substance for the first time at the start of Lower year. Alice Ju ’14 and Emily Lemmerman ’15 became the first female Student Council Pres./VP pair in Exeter history. Speaking of StuCo, Levon Brunson, Jun Park and Rex Tercek served as our Lower Reps that year.

It was also the year of Cosgrove’s infamous BBSAs. The most memorable was perhaps the administration’s official ban on dumpster diving at the Lindt Chocolate Factory, where Cosgrove signed off his email with “Don’t get arrested please.”

Lower year also held many surprises. Members of EAC and those passionate about divestment protested and picketed the Trustee Meetings. An Abbot senior ordered 1,500 live ladybugs to P.O. for his friend’s birthday. The boys’ cross country team performed a unique rendition of “Wrecking Ball” at the fall E/a pep rally. Over $1300 was stolen from the funds raised for Relay For Life, only for the community to rally together after the fundraiser and donate even more than the amount lost. We also had a memorable assembly that year about Red’s Best Fish and about how the Academy would now be serving fresh fish in the dining halls ... which prompted us to ask: What were we eating before?

Although Snapchat debuted prep year, social media seemed to take a turn for the worse with apps such as Tinder and Yik Yak rising to popularity in the fall and spring, respectively. Outside the Exeter bubble, that year Miley Cyrus debuted her wild side with her crazy performance on stage with Robin Thicke at the MTV Video Music Awards. “Frozen” the movie and “Alex from Target” were trending. Lil Jon’s “Turn Down For What” not only became one of the most played songs of the year, but it also popularized the phrase “turn up.” Nicki Minaj, meanwhile, released “Anaconda” and taught us about that boy toy named Troy who used to live in Detroit. That summer, our beloved classmate Preeya Sheth passed away. Rest in peace, Preeya, you were loved by all who knew you.

UPPER YEAR

In the fall, Exonians returned to campus with the news that Principal Hassan would retire at the end of the year. Students were not glum for long, however, as the principal and the College Counseling Office surprised the campus with an ALS ice bucket challenge video in the first few weeks of school. At the end of the year, the community said goodbye to Principal Hassan through an organized flash mob on the Academy Lawn.

Students were also greeted by an outbreak of Hand-Foot-Mouth upon their return to school, which interestingly enough is a disease that primarily affects toddlers, not high school students. A year of renovations, upper year brought major changes to Webster Hall (R.I.P. Webster Pit), Elm Street Dining Hall, and the library periodicals room. Much to the dismay of the rising uppers, upperclassmen and lowerclassmen began to integrate in Elm Street dining halls with the removal of the central sandwich and pasta bar.

Upper year also seemed to be a year of increased social awareness. The Ferguson scandal brought much discussion to campus about race relations and police brutality in the United States, and in the fall the Academy hosted its first-ever Die-in protest, where students lay on the ground in silence in solidarity with slain teenager Michael Brown. Bryan Stevenson delivered a powerful talk on MLK day that year about his work as a defense lawyer for those wrongfully put on death row. Dean Salcedo inspired discussion within the community with her assembly on Microaggressions.

If lower year was marked with firsts, then upper year was marked with seconds, with Maggie Hassan winning the gubernatorial election to serve as Governor of New Hampshire for a second term. Also, that year the Academy in an unprecedented move celebrated its first Principal’s Day in the winter due to a major blizzard that brought back memories of Prep winter, and its second Principal’s Day in the spring.

It was an interesting year in Student Council. Benjamin Cohen served as our StuCo president, and Antonio Guanaes, David Larar and Jun Park served as our upper reps. Sean Taylor wowed the community with his convincing campaign for Student Council Dictator. Student Council also passed a gender-neutral dress code, spearheaded by Emily Lemmerman ’15.

That year, the terms “bae” and “on fleek” joined our slang lexicon. “Uptown Funk” by Mark Ronson, “Shake It Off” by Taylor Swift and “Take Me to Church” by Hozier were among the most popular songs of the school year. The Bill Cosby scandals rocked the nation when news emerged of his history of sexually assaulting young women. Kim Kardashian “broke the internet” with her NSFW photos for Paper Magazine. “The Dress” and whether it was blue or white became a major point of discussion amongst the student body. Snapchat geofilters were first introduced in the winter, although Exeter did not have a geofilter until the following fall.

SENIOR YEAR

To me, it seems like we just became seniors, and now it’s all coming to an end. At the start of the school year, Lisa MacFarlane assumed her role as the 15th principal of the Academy, and we were greeted with a newly renovated Downer Family Fitness Center in the gym. It was also announced that Evening Prayer would now be lit instead of being a pitch-black event, which sparked extreme backlash from current students and young alumni.

Senior year seemed to be a year marked by surprises and scandals. In the fall, Exeter Confesses, which now has over 1,000 followers, gained traction amidst concerns of the administration about cyberbullying. In the winter, the Academy recruited Fred Grandy ’66 to teach a seminar to seniors about politics and the media, but was later banned from teaching the course over the concern that he harbored islamophobic ideals. This spring brought about two sex scandals that rocked the community, one of which involved a current faculty member. A member of the Browning family requested this year to have his family’s name stripped from the dorm (Browning House) because the values of the Academy no longer reflected his own, particularly through the open recognition of same-sex relationships.

This year, particularly the winter term, was very political, with nearly all major presidential candidates stopping by the Exeter town hall to campaign for the New Hampshire primary. Students had the opportunity to attend (or protest) the rallies of Donald Trump, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Bernie Sanders. Many seniors also exercised their right to vote for the very first time, which was exciting! Speaking of politics, Rebecca Ju served as our Student Council President, along with Kevin Zhen as Senior Class President and Levon Brunson and Chudi Ikpeazu as vice presidents.

New to the curriculum this year was the requirement for seniors to take a one-term health class aimed to help smooth the transition from Exeter to college, which was met with mixed responses. A group of upperclassmen made an unprecedented spring break trip to Cuba this year. “SLUT: The Play” spurred continued discussion on sexual assault and rape culture amidst the faculty-student sex scandals.

MacFarlane announced Principal’s Day with the placement of 80 red Adirondack chairs around campus. Student Council passed a new Vs policy which allows students to have open door visitations with another student between the hours of 9 a.m. and 9 p.m. provided that the visitor sign-in, but prohibits any sort of closed door visitation, even from another member of the dorm. At the time I am writing this article, the faculty has yet to vote on this proposal.

This year in Pop Culture, Leonardo DiCaprio won his first Oscar, we learned what “Netflix and Chill” truly meant, and Caitlyn Jenner became the most famous transgender woman in the world. iLoveMemphis taught us to get down low and swing your arm in “Hit The Quan.” Over the summer, the Supreme Court passed a landmark decision to allow same-sex marriage in all 50 states. “Hotline Bling” by Drake, “Hello” by Adele and “What Do You Mean?” by Justin Bieber captured our hearts this year in music.

It’s been a good four years.