Upper School Graduation 2009

Strolling along the banks of the Charles River late at night a few weeks before graduation, Philip Balboni ’09 felt a sense of urgency.

“I knew I was pursuing something important, and that I had little time left to discover it,” Balboni, 2009 class speaker, said to his fellow classmates during BB&N’s graduation ceremony held on June 3rd. “It did not occur until the end that what I was initially searching for and what ended as this speech, were in fact the same thing.”

As Balboni mentally reconstructed his past four years of high school, he said he was surprised at how often he looked outside of his time at BB&N to understand and define what it meant to him. Walking the path he has taken many times, he realized how outside influences—television shows and movies featuring teen angst, books, and stories carried down from previous graduating classes—had framed what he thought his time at BB&N “should” mean.

However, he recognized it is the memories and experiences shared between BB&N’s close-knit Class of 2009 that will truly illuminate the significance of the past four years.

“I want you all, after we leave here and enjoy ourselves in whatever ways we will tonight and the rest of this week, to spend time this summer collecting all the memories of this kind that we can, memories of meaning, whatever they are and wherever they may have transpired,” he said. “I believe that it is important to do so because it is through this process that we begin to realize that our youth here was just as impassioned and exciting and meaningful as anything that anyone could have conjured up.”

After urging his classmates to gather their thoughts and memories in a meaningful way, Balboni reminded them that that this next step in their journey is an important one—a transition into the responsibilities of adulthood.

“Soon we will be leaving home, going off to experience things and ideas in places and in ways that we never have before,” Balboni said. “And although our expectations may be different, we share in common the fact that we are leaving something behind: our youth.”

Remarks to the graduates this year were made by Dr. Marcia Browne, affectionately introduced by her son, Sam Clark ’09. Dr. Browne remarked on the graduates’ path to a limitless future, and offered advice on what to do when they stumble on that path—something each of them will inevitably do, she said.

To illustrate her point, Dr. Browne spoke of her friend Syphorn whom she met in 1975, who was swept into the horror of Pol Pot’s killing fields, separated from his family, and condemned to backbreaking work in the fields for up to 20 hours a day. When he tried to give food to a starving baby whose father had been killed for stealing food for this child, Syphorn was beaten and later imprisoned and tortured.

In the fall of 1981, after two years in refugee camps, Syphorn was granted a visa and arrived in Boston, graduating from Brookline High School at the age of 25. At age 31, Syphorn graduated from Georgetown  where he was awarded the university’s highest honor for character, the Catherine Croft Award, and received the Bernard M. Wagner Medal for his essay about life under Pol Pot, entitled “How to Cook Rice Without a Pot.”  Two years ago, Syphorn, at age 48, earned his PhD. 

“Yesterday, his youngest son, Darrith ’15, graduated from BBN’s lower school, from Mr. D.B.’s [Denny-Brown] class; he will join his older brother, Bunnard ’14, in the Middle School next year,” Dr. Browne said.  “Syphorn knew never to give in.”

Dr. Browne urged seniors to act with grace when they stumble, and offered words of wisdom from Winston Churchill along with a quote left by her mother on her computer screen many years ago that read: “Life if not about waiting for the storm to pass; life is about dancing in the rain.”

“And while I’ve given you my (and Winston Churchill’s) advice to never give in—to be undaunted by obstacles and to forge ahead toward your goals and dreams—I couldn’t rest easy without giving you the essential, companion advice: act with kindness and grace as you forge ahead on your path.”

After congratulating the many merits and accomplishments garnered by the class of 2009, Head of School Rebecca T. Upham spoke on what she feels this class has embodied the most: kindness and empathy.

“Everyone here knows about the scholarship of this Class, of the many measurable accomplishments of the Class of 2009 on BB&N’s many stages. But I come to testify about their kindness,” Upham said. “The moral seems to be that empathy is not merely the ability to imagine the world through another’s eyes. Rather, it gains its true power from how one uses the skill—from the wisdom, the willingness, and the courage that it takes to confront not only issues that are immediately in front of you, but also those that are worlds or years away from you.”

Upham recounted the ways the class has acted with kindness, from reaching out with environmental and political activism, caring for small children, visiting Alzheimer shut-ins, gathering funds to buy a bicycle for a student in Africa, building schools and orphanages in foreign countries, and providing laptops for children around the globe.

“Class of 2009, beyond all measurable accomplishments, your hallmark has been kindness—and your great gift to the School is that you have shown and taught us all about its power,” Upham said. “And my hope for you is that the motto of this great School will be one of the enduring influences in your life, something you think about years from now as you reflect on the forces that have shaped your life.”