Student Profiles

Even though ninth grader Elliot Eton was voted by his Middle School teachers to be the class speaker for the Eighth Grade Closing Ceremonies last year, these days he is most proud of his ongoing conversations outside of class exploring ideas with other students. “I love to help when they ask me to. It’s not a burden. It’s a great way to connect with other kids.” (Elliot is a natural caretaker of his classmates. He brought all kinds of first aid supplies and administered them to his grateful squad while at Bivouac, the two-week-long wilderness program in September for all ninth graders.)

As much as Elliot helps others, he is the first to acknowledge how helpful his classmates have, in turn, been to him. He had been out sick for a few days, and when he returned, he found his honors biology class had moved way ahead in their study of prokaryotic and eukaryotic cell division. “I had been feeling more and more stressed the longer I was out, yet on my return the kids and Ms. King rallied around me to help explain the concepts I had missed. I was back in sync in no time.”

In fact, this biology class happens to be one of Elliot’s favorites. He lights up when he talks about the hands-on experiments and the importance of their applications in the real world. Recently working in teams, the class observed Wisconsin Fast Plants and the effect of acidity on their growth. They measured the width of cotyledons, which are leaves that feed the plant early in its growth cycle. They found that increased acidity stunted the cotyledon’s growth and shortened the life of the plant, a concept that clearly has important implications to the environment.

Elliot chose BB&N as a seventh grader because when he toured the school he was struck by the supportive, vibrant intellectual community. “I saw that the students were really engaged. I’m a really curious guy,” he says again with his characteristic beaming smile. “I knew this was the right place.”