Senior’s passion for literacy, community, earns Gold Award
April 15, 2021
Congratulations to Ellie McMahon ’21 for earning the Girl Scouts of America’s prestigious Gold Award. The Gold Award is the highest accolade conferred by the Girl Scouts, awarded to fewer than seven percent of Girl Scouts after completing a minimum of 80 hours of service on projects that make a sustainable change in their communities and around the world.
McMahon—who serves as the leader of DELTA Service Club’s Children’s and Education Committee—is a strong proponent of early childhood literacy having learned of its immeasurable impact. Associated with the development of critical thinking skills and with fostering a lifelong love of learning, early childhood literacy often translates to a profoundly better quality of life. Despite its importance, however, youth in lower-income communities often lack easy access to books and reading opportunities.
“As a kid, I read so much; it was so critical to who I have become. There are people who just don’t have the same chance I had to read but would if they could. I wanted to share with these underserved communities something that was so important to me growing up. The impact of reading grows so much over time, so starting early is really important,” beams McMahon.
When it came time to choose the way her Gold Award project would support the community, it seemed only natural to focus on literacy. McMahon devised a program to collect books from the community to provide reading materials and reading opportunities for children served by Learning Together and WAKE Up and Read, two Triangle-area organizations that provide high-quality, equitable, and inclusive educational opportunities for young children and adolescents.
Beginning in November 2019, McMahon organized a series of donation drives asking for gently-used books for preschool-aged readers. That first book drivecollected more than 300 books from the Cary Academy community. Had things gone according to plan, McMahon would have visited the students at Learning Together in the early part of 2020 to distribute books and read with the children, but the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic dashed such hopes. Not wanting to let the children down, Ellie quickly rethought her project to ensure that the children would still benefit from reading with her, but from a safe distance.
“I was only about halfway through the project when the pandemic hit. At first, I didn’t know what to do – I hadn’t completed any of the goals I set out to do. So, I ended up making a YouTube channel where I would read the books. In addition to Learning Together, I shared the channel with a bunch of other daycares and preschools so that even though they’re dealing with COVID, they can have this resource,” McMahon shares.
Admitting that adapting to COVID was the most challenging part of the project, McMahon credits the challenge of adapting to the pandemic with helping her broaden her outreach. When Cary Academy shifted to virtual learning, McMahon began reaching out to her neighbors via NextDoor, asking her local community to set books on their doorsteps for her to pick up. “I was surprised at how helpful people were. People are so willing to donate their time and their resources to you. My neighbors not only donated so many books, but they would also write a little note on the top of the box, ‘I hope that everything goes well; let me know if you need anything else,’ I thought that was sweet. I’ve collected nearly 700 books to this point; seeing this huge audience come together in support of this project was cool.”
McMahon’s hard work has made a difference. Kathy Peterson, Former Executive Director of Learning Together, was effusive in her praise, not only for her effort but her ability to recruit others to engage in service: “Ellie has been wonderful. Her multiple book drives have helped not only our kids but their siblings as well. She also recruited a group of friends to help with wrapping for our Holiday Hopes. They were a huge help — we had fewer volunteers due to COVID. When we had items for two families come in late, Ellie and her friends stepped in, and we were able to distribute everything on schedule.”
After McMahon graduates this spring, her project will live on, as part of DELTA Service Club’s commitment to the community, under the guidance of Service Learning Director Maggie Grant and the Center for Community Engagement. As an alum, McMahon plans to mentor the next group of DELTA leaders in serving young people across the Triangle, which Ms. Grant credits to both McMahon’s character and the values instilled by her time in Girl Scouts: “Ellie is committed to making a difference, especially in the lives of children in our community. She embodies Girl Scout values by her willingness to always lend a hand, and I am confident she will continue to make Cary Academy, as well as the Girl Scouts, proud as she moves into her next chapter.”
Congratulations, Ellie!
Written by Dan Smith, Digital Content Producer and Social Media Manager
CA Junior wins NC Poetry Society’s student contest
March 31, 2021
Earlier this month, Christina Polge (’22) was named the winner of the North Carolina Poetry Society’s Sherry Pruitt Award, earning the top prize statewide amongst high school and undergraduate college students for her poem manifest destiny.
The poem, which resulted from Polge’s independent research in the history portion of the Upper School Leadership During Crisis program, paints a vivid and often heartbreaking portrait of the United States’ westward expansion, describing pivotal moments, key policies, and the historical figures who drove them. Co-teachers Dr. Michael McElreath and Palmer Seeley challenged the class to dive deeply into a specific topic and then compellingly and succinctly teach it to their classmates. Polge’s manifest destiny viscerally confronts the reader with the sorrowful turmoil of the Trail of Tears, the bloody reality of the Spanish American War, and the fraying promise of the American dream.
The judges from the Poetry Society were effusive in their praise, favorably comparing Polge’s composition to legendary activist singer-songwriters like Pete Seeger, Woody Guthrie, and Joni Mitchell: “The poet successfully uses this poem as a vehicle to convey a human message; it’s as much a testament to what people could/should do right as it is a caveat of what we do wrong (entitlement, greed, war, want), with dire consequences.”
manifest destiny represents a departure for Polge, who has been composing poetry since 6th grade. “My poetry is very personal; most of them are about my own experiences – an outlet in some sense. Writing this poem – using research — was a really interesting thing to explore because I love history, and I love writing. I love being able to express myself creatively in the classroom.”
It was a love of history and writing and a passion for activism that drew Polge to participate in CA’s Leadership During Crisis program in the first place. “As soon as I read the [program] description, it seemed right up my alley. It seems like we’re seeing a new national or global crisis almost daily. Things happen so quickly that they seem to get brushed under the rug after a few hours. I felt helpless to be able to do anything; As a teenager, I don’t have as many resources as adults do, and it’s harder for me to speak up and get people to take me seriously because of my age.”
During the year-long Leadership During Crisis course, students consider the many dimensions of leadership: what are the traits of a leader who responds effectively to a crisis, what are the hallmarks of a successful response to a crisis, and how do we inspire and instill these traits and skills in our next generation of leaders? Prompted by McElreath and Seeley, they engage in critical analyses of the successes and shortcomings of contemporary and historical American leaders, viewed through the lenses of modern analysis, socio-cultural movements, historical narrative fiction, and philosophy.
For Polge–who also chairs CA’s Gender and Sexuality Alliance and is a member of the North Carolina chapter of the youth climate activist group, Zero Hour– the program has offered an opportunity to better understand how the past has shaped the present. Perhaps most importantly, it has provided opportunities to put that knowledge to good work—to affect meaningful positive change in her communities.
“I really want to make the world better and want to be on the right side of history. But the difficult part is being able to make the most educated choices I can during a crisis.”
The Sherry Pruitt Award surprised Polge, who hopes to spend the summer attending creative writing workshops. “I feel really fortunate. I’m sure there were a lot of other talented writers who entered. It’s a very nice honor.”
Polge will receive a check of $60 for her first-place finish, an NC Poetry Society award certificate, and a copy of the Pinesong Anthology in which her poem will be published. The Sherry Pruitt Award will be officially presented to Polge in a virtual ceremony in early May.
Written by Dan Smith, Digital Content Producer and Social Media Manager
Athletics
Middle School track teams take CAMSC championship by storm
Cary Academy hosts COVID-19 vaccination clinic for Triangle-area educators and other front-line workers
March 10, 2021
On Friday, March 5, in partnership with Health Park Pharmacy, Cary Academy hosted a coronavirus vaccine clinic in the Center for Math and Science gym. In addition to CA faculty and staff, CA invited members of the Cary Police department, an RTP-based firm that manufactures syringes for vaccination, and faculty and staff from thirteen Triangle-area elementary and secondary schools: Bright Horizons, Cardinal Charter, Carter Community School, Central Park School, Cresset Christian, Dream Academy, LatinxEd, Mills Park Elementary, Neal Magnet Middle School, Reedy Creek Elementary, Research Triangle High School, The Raleigh School, and Wake Young Women’s Leadership Academy.
“The question of where to go and how to arrange a vaccination is made a lot easier when we’re able to offer vaccinations – not only to our own employees, but other educators and community members,” said Dr. Mike Ehrhardt. “And we’re really grateful to all the partners that helped make this happen.”
By the end of the day, 450 school staff and faculty, front-line workers, and at-risk individuals from Durham and Wake Counties received an injection of the Johnson & Johnson single-dose COVID-19 vaccine from the Health Park Pharmacy team and their volunteer vaccinators.
If you are a healthcare professional interested in volunteering to help distribute vaccines during future vaccination clinics in and around Wake County, contact Health Park Pharmacy nurse manager Lauren Crotty.
Written by Dan Smith, Digital Content Producer and Social Media Manager
The cast and crew of this year’s Upper School extracurricular theater production have been in rehearsals for just over a month and are looking forward to sharing a new musical theater piece with the CA community.
The Theory of Relativity by Drama Desk Award nominees Neil Bartram and Brian Hill is a song cycle inspired by the life experiences of college students and created with young performers in mind. Through songs and monologues, the characters experience “the joys and heartbreaks, the liaisons and losses, the inevitability and wonder of human connection.” [mitshows.com]
While there will be no live performances, the company will be recording the production over a series of Flex Days in April. Tickets to view the completed production online will go on sale at the end of April.
The sixteen-member cast includes Alex Lim ‘22, Arielle Curtis ‘21, Brandon Yi ‘21, Chioma Modilim ‘22, Claire Ferris ‘21, Clay Thornton ‘21, Eden Rosenbaum ‘21, Hannah Gordon ‘21, Jordan Miller ‘22, Kathryn Chao ‘21, Koen Chao ‘23, Kyle Murphy ‘21, Mickey Lewis ‘23, Samantha Hoffman ‘21, Sara Martin ‘21, and Vibhav Nandagiri ‘21.
Christina Polge ‘22, Frances Smyth ‘24, and Riley Moore ‘23 are Stage Managers. The Tech/Production crew includes Abby Smetana ‘23, Bella Huang ’24, Claire Moorhead ‘24, Hanorah Alapati ’24, Jay Sihm ‘23, Kendyl George ‘22, Laila Taylor ‘24, Nathan Rudy ‘23, Nikhil Jagannath ‘23, Renn Guard ‘22, Samantha Dorfman ‘23, and Vikram Kommareddi ‘23.
The orchestra features Gwynn Nowell ‘21, Joshua Kendall ‘23, Marvin Koonce ‘21, Oliver Wang ‘22, Phoebe Ellison ‘21, William Coley ‘22, and Xavier deSouza ’21.
Written by Dan Smith, Digital Content Producer and Social Media Manager
Some of the newest, most eye-catching student art at CA isn’t in Berger Hall; it’s in a math classroom (no, that’s not a typo).
The windows of classroom 128 in the Center for Math and Science—the last classroom in the math wing—are lined with transparent vinyl “stained-glass” suncatchers. When struck by sunlight, colorful railroad cars, peacocks, butterflies, lightning bolts, food pyramids, and abstract hearts throw their colors around the room to magical effect. Make no mistake—these aren’t just eye- (and sun-) catching artwork. Produced by Upper School Statculus students, they are the latest student-generated data visualizations to grace the Center for Math and Science—every element a deliberate choice to draw the viewer in, to convey a compelling story behind the numbers.
Led by Upper School math department chair Craig Lazarski, Upper School math teacher Kristi Ramey, and art and design teacher Cayce Lee, Statculus offers a deep dive into the connection between calculus and statistics, with a hefty dose of visual arts mixed in. In class, students engage with real-world data to conduct sophisticated analysis, tease out important conclusions, and depict them in compelling and beautiful visualizations.
Those beautiful suncatchers? They reflect student learning in sampling methodologies and complex data analysis. Each represents an opinion data set collected from peers and faculty and parsed using analytical tools that students learned from class. In an array of carefully calculated designs, they offer insights into our community’s preferences—from favorite colors to superhero movies, Hogwarts’ houses sorting to family relationships, sleep habits to dietary choices, and more.
“Your first impression may not be that these are numbers that you’re looking at, but once you think about what you’re seeing, it becomes what Kristi calls a ‘gut-punch’; it communicates something important in a powerful way,” says Lazarski.
Point of Origin
And that, of course, is precisely the point. The ability to work with, interrogate, and powerfully communicate data is particularly timely in a world awash in statistical claims. “The misunderstanding that people can ‘lie’ with statistics is one of the key reasons everyone should take statistics,” offers Ramey. “It’s not that the statistics are lying; it’s that you don’t know how to interpret the data or that the data is being visually misrepresented.”
Created by Ramey and Lazarski as the product of a 2018 Curriculum Innovation Grant, Statculus was conceived to expand CA’s statistics offerings to better meet the needs of our academically diverse student body.
“We had a wide spectrum of skill levels in a single statistics class—from students who were taking collegiate-level Calculus 3 to those who had recently completed Algebra 2,” explains Lazarski. “Rather than repeat material for students who had already taken calculus and try to bring students who hadn’t up to speed, we decided to offer a more specialized statistics for those students already versed in calculus.”
The result—Statculus—is something akin to a graduate-level statistics course, uniquely tailored to their students’ skills. (It doesn’t hurt that both Ramey and Lazarski are currently pursuing graduate degrees in statistics at NC State University and regularly incorporate material they encounter into their classes).
However, they are quick to point out that mathematics is only one part of the statistics puzzle; communication of the data is equally important. “Statistics is all about communicating. It’s what distinguishes statistics from its calculus lineage,” explains Ramey.
Getting an eye for visual learning
That’s why, in recent years, Statculus has evolved to include a significant and crucial data visualization component, courtesy of a collaboration with Upper School art and design teacher Cayce Lee, and facilitated by yet another professional development opportunity—this one from the North Carolina Museum of Art (NCMA).
The NCMA’s Fellowship for Collaborative Teaching pairs educators from various fields of study who are committed to using art to engage students in new ideas and deepen their problem-solving and critical thinking skills. On hearing of the opportunity, Lee immediately thought of partnering with Ramey, who had long expressed an interest in combining art and math in the classroom.
Selected for the fellowship, in the summer of 2019, Lee and Ramey joined ten fellow educators from across the state in a series of intensive seminars and workshops to design curricula that combined art with other disciplines in meaningful and engaging ways. As the first math-focused pair selected for the fellowship, Lee and Ramey broke new ground for the NCMA program, then in its fourth year, according to Jill Taylor, Director of School and Teacher Programs at NCMA.
For both, it was an eye-opening and fruitful experience, one that underscored not only the vital role of data visualization in statistics, but the importance of visual arts—of color and composition and narrative—in data visualization.
“With artful data visualization, statistics can achieve an emotional response from the audience,” offers Ramey. “Data visualization allows us to provide a point of view along with communicating data. Instead of ‘here’s a pie chart,’ it’s ‘oh my gosh, that was really impactful, and I now see it differently.’”
Clarity of vision
With the COVID-19 pandemic disrupting students’ opportunities to work together in large groups, Lazarski, Lee, and Ramey had to rethink the scope, scale, and purpose of this year’s Statculus data visualization project.
“Last year, we focused on developing students’ communication skills, and their grade was mostly derived from their presentations. Virtual and hybrid learning made that next to impossible, so this year, we leveraged a partner art project to provide that opportunity for them,” says Lazarski.
As the suncatcher project was conceived, students were granted control over the data they would collect and analyze, as well as the designs that their suncatcher would use to visualize their results. Students collected and analyzed the data outside of class and then used weekly Flex Days to collaborate and develop their data-driven artwork.
To prepare, Lee introduced students to artworks that incorporated data in thought-provoking ways, such as Timo Aho and Pekka Niittyvirta’s light-painted series on sea-level rise, Mike Knuepfel’s sculptural interpretation of keyboard letter usage, and Blake Fall-Conrony’s Minimum Wage Machine, which provides a tangible sense of how much work is required to earn so little.
It had an impact.
“Usually, when we ask students to take data and do something more with it, what results is a bigger bar graph,” smiles Lazarski. “But our students, inspired by what Cayce had shared, really ran with the suncatcher project. They put careful consideration into the questions they would ask and the best way to produce them as impactful visuals.”
“I have always thought that math is beautiful, but I was excited to present it beautifully!” reflects Shannon Jenkins ’21. “I think my favorite part of the project may have been measuring out the angles that my partner, Sanjana Chillarege, and I used. We had to constantly adapt our methods to make sure that our proportions were accurate.”
“When we first were assigned the project, I was a little overwhelmed—I had no idea how to approach it,” says Samantha Lattanze ’21. “Working through the project step-by-step helped me enjoy the process and provided me with a new lens on math.”
For the teachers, too, it was a rewarding experience. “It’s been fantastic to see students in a different context than the art studio,” offers Lee. “Getting to revisit a key lesson I teach during the ninth-grade art and design class—that visual communication is the most universal form of communication—with real-world applications is particularly rewarding.”
Beyond the classroom
And it is perhaps that real-world application that best prepares Statculus students for what comes next—helping them to better grasp the material by getting truly-hands on, encouraging them to delve into areas of knowledge that they might not have sought to explore, all while honing communications skills that will serve them long after their time at CA.
“Almost every field is about collecting information and analyzing it in today’s world,” says Ramey. “Either you’ll have to interpret data analytics or interpret data yourself. Those communication skills are key in a world increasingly driven by data analysis.”
Lazarski agrees, “Every year, I get emails from young alumni who say, ‘I’m so glad that I took statistics at CA; I use it so much in college, and I wouldn’t have gotten so far without taking it in high school.’”
Across campus, CA students are taking note of the increased visibility of statistics thanks to the installation of Statculus students’ data visualization pieces. “Students in other classes have been intrigued by the suncatchers,” says Lazarski.
“After taking part in the surveys, they have been fascinated by how the results were presented and the notion that meaningful data could be visualized in a non-traditional way. And that you can have fun and make an impact in the process.”
Data Art
This year’s sun catcher project is not the first data visualization project to adorn the Center for Math and Science. Through Lee and Ramey’s NCMA fellowship, last year’s Statculus students were invited to visit the North Carolina Museum of Art and leverage the museum’s collection as data points for a data visualization project.
Breaking into teams, students analyzed the museum’s vast collections based on artists’ gender, nationality, media used, and composition. With data sets in hand, and in consultation with RTI researcher and data visualization expert Simon King via Zoom (before it was the cornerstone of meetings in 2020), students worked with Lazarski, Lee, and Ramey to design an art installation that would shed light on the strengths and shortcomings of the museum’s holdings while engaging viewers to learn more.
Inspired by Florence Nightingale’s pioneering data visualization work, Diagrams of the Causes of Mortality, which used a coxcomb—a more sophisticated form of a pie chart in which the slices are subdivided and vary in radius in proportion to the data set—and utilizing the cutting-edge tools of the CMS Makerspace and know-how of design, programming, and robotics teacher Betsy MacDonald, the students created three-dimensional coxcomb spheres that are suspended in the Center for Math and Science’s atrium lobby.
Each sphere—crafted from a Wiffle ball, wedges of plexiglass, and transparent vinyl appliques—is mounted on spindles that allow them to rotate. Putting the data in motion seeks to engage viewers, allowing them to see the relationships between the complex layers of data in greater detail.
Written by Dan Smith, Digital Content Producer and Social Media Manager
I was walking through the Upper School office when a colleague motioned me over to her computer, her eyes wide. I glanced over her shoulder (while keeping a COVIDly safe distance). On the screen, throngs were rampaging into the Capitol.
“Well, that’s not good,” we both said. As we watched, it just kept getting worse.
Like most educators on the evening of January 6th, I functioned with a split brain: one side, horrified at the images, kept searching the Internet for more information, for a better understanding. The other side, horrified at the images, started thinking about how we were going to support our students the following day.
All of us were grappling with twin concerns: the insurrection at the Capitol, and the distinct differences in how the domestic terrorists were handled, versus how the anti-racist protestors were met this summer.
We all knew that we couldn’t (and can’t) ignore those issues, because they affect students and their well-being. How do students focus on a test when they once again witness blatant racism? How do students focus on that essay when in the back of their heads, they are thinking “will we have a government in the morning?”
Predictably, texts, emails, and Microsoft Teams chats mushroomed throughout the afternoon and evening of the 6th. Ms. Johnson-Webb, Director of Equity and Community Engagement, reached out to me, sharing information and observations from educators of color across the country. As well, Mrs. Maret Jones, our Upper School Government teacher and 11th-12th grade Dean, worked with Upper School History Department chair Mr. Lasseter and the other history teachers that evening to sketch out how we would engender fact-based conversations the next day, cutting through the misinformation and fear.
The following morning, a bevy of adults came together, crafting a plan that addressed short and long-term needs. We wanted to provide space for students to process fears, a structure for them to analyze causes and effects, an area where they could employ all those skills we have asked our students to develop over the years.
We shared that plan with the Upper School faculty at 8:30am, and then sent out an email to the students just as classes started, offering the following:
We opened a classroom and Zoom room for a day-long meeting, one staffed by the Upper School History Department. Students were invited to drop by at their convenience to discuss the historical and governmental intricacies of the history we were watching.
We invited students to reach out to specific individuals for one-on-one conversations should they feel the need, listing out those adults and making sure that they were available throughout the day.
We let teachers know that they were welcomed—and encouraged if comfortable—to acknowledge the terrorist actions in the Capitol during the first 15 minutes of class, but we also encouraged the faculty to bound the time; we wanted the students to know that we supported them in this anxious period, but we didn’t want to flog them with six hours of discussion on the same topic.
We reminded students of a discussion opportunity during Flex Day the coming week, one organized and led by the Community Engagement class. In that teach-in, students discussed issues around voting rights, misinformation, and fraudulent claims about the election.
We verified that there was a space for our Black students to meet, to process, to support each other.
The students handled the stress with their typical panache: some made use of the discussion rooms, some reached out to individuals, some started to tease apart the issues, some used classes and schoolwork and friends as a haven from the broadcast history. In those moments, our strategic mission of focusing on student wellness truly came alive—all because the faculty, staff, and students worked together, making sure that we all had the support we needed that day.
The images of nooses, of Confederate flags in the Capitol, of violent beatings, of malevolence against people and democracy streaming into our lives on January 6th typified the ugliness that some have always seen, and some only see now. No matter what, though, we couldn’t ignore it nationally or locally.
So, the actions at CA on January 7th—the discussions, the quiet words of encouragement, the open ears and hearts, both in person and virtually—provided a local, temporary balm to a national disgrace.
On that day, we couldn’t wipe away the historical ugliness, but we could continue to support each other. Together.
CA Curious blogs offer personal, behind-the-scenes insights and reflections from our leadership, faculty, and staff on the day-to-day implementation of our strategic vision.
After the first of four contests in the American Computer Science League (ACSL) Programming contest, Cary Academy’s student-led teams rank at the top of the leader boards, having scored 30/30 and 29/30, against some of the best programming teams in the U.S., Canada, Croatia, and Romania.
The written section of the contest consisted of five questions in 45 minutes involving logic and discrete mathematics that relate to how computers analyze information. The programing section involved reading a program statement and specifications in order to write a program within 72 hours to turn five inputs into five output, following the given rules and requirements.
The Middle School’s junior team scored 30/30 and the Upper School’s intermediate team scored 29/30. It’s hard to do much better than that!
Advised by Mr. Jon Noland in the Upper School and Mrs. Leslie Williams in the Middle School, the students practiced with both past programs and written questions during student-led club time and on their own in order to prepare for the contest.
CA’s teams will compete in three more regular-season contests, before the All-Star Contest in May 2021.
Written by Dan Smith, Digital Content Producer and Social Media Manager
Acclaimed scholar guides students through the lessons of Martin Luther King’s final years
January 13, 2021
On Wednesday, Cary Academy, in partnership with Durham Academy, proudly welcomed acclaimed scholar Dr. Eddie Glaude, Jr. as part of its Upper School Martin Luther King, Jr. Day Observance.
In an inspiring and thought-provoking keynote address “Lessons from the Later Dr. King,” Dr. Glaude offered a complex and nuanced representation of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s life and work, ultimately issuing a call to action for us all to strive towards creating the Beloved Community– a society based on justice, equal opportunity, and love of one’s fellow human beings – that King envisioned.
Glaude argues that, for most Americans, the image of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is frozen in time. We easily think of him as the leader of the 1955 Montgomery bus boycott or as the passionate preacher delivering “I Have a Dream” in 1963. Dr. Glaude, however, offered students a look at another facet of the MLK story: Dr. King’s later and final years — when he was doubtful and felt that the country had turned its back on him.
Five years after “I Have a Dream,” King was grappling with despair and disillusionment over the country’s direction — a sentiment he shared with James Baldwin, one of the 20th century’s greatest writers and chroniclers of the Black experience. When the two men met a few months before Dr. King’s murder, both were desperately trying to re-narrate the civil rights movement and change the consciousness of America.
Dr. Glaude examines this critical juncture in the life of Martin Luther King Jr., and what we all must do to make America live up to its promise. “We long for a Dr. King or an Abe Lincoln, because we don’t see our own capabilities as being sufficient,” Glaude has said. “History converged in a way that called Dr. King forward, and he answered the call. That can happen with anybody. We don’t need another Martin Luther King. We need everyday, ordinary people. We are the leaders we’ve been looking for.”
Eddie S. Glaude, Jr. is the James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor and chair of the Department of African American Studies at Princeton University. His most well-known books, Democracy in Black: How Race Still Enslaves the American Soul, and In a Shade of Blue: Pragmatism and the Politics of Black America, take a wide look at black communities, the difficulties of race in the United States, and the challenges our democracy face. His most recent book, Begin Again: James Baldwin’s America and Its Urgent Lessons for Our Own, was released in June 2020. Glaude holds a bachelor’s degree from Morehouse College, a master’s degree in African American Studies from Temple University, and a Ph.D. in Religion from Princeton University. He is a columnist for Time Magazine, an MSNBC contributor, and regularly appears on Meet the Press.
This event was co-hosted by Cary Academy’s Director of Equity and Community Engagement, Danielle Johnson-Webb and Durham Academy’s Director of Diversity, Equity and Engagement, Kemi Nonez, and sponsored by Cary Academy’s PTAA.
Written by Dan Smith, Digital Content Producer and Social Media Manager
This fall, the Spector Family Fund was created at Cary Academy. Established in memory of Grey Spector (‘16), and in honor of the entire Spector family’s impact on CA, the Spector Family Fund is a merit-based award that will be given annually to an Upper School student who exemplifies Grey’s spirit—his individuality and unwavering commitment to the pursuit of passions. The award supports the recipient’s tuition for a year. Students are encouraged to apply annually, and faculty members may also nominate students for recognition.
This weekend the Cary Academy Speech and Debate team will virtually host the first annual Grey Matter Invitational in honor of Grey Spector. Seventeen schools will participate in Varsity and Novice Lincoln Douglas Debate, Varsity and Novice Public Forum Debate, Congressional Debate, and nine speech events (Declamation, Dramatic Interpretation, Extemporaneous Speaking, Humorous Interpretation, Impromptu Speaking, Informative Speaking, Oral Interpretation, Original Oratory, and Program of Oral Interpretation). A true community effort, the inaugural tournament was supported by 25 different CA families and will be judged by a network of nearly 20 CA alumni. Grey’s brother, Cade Spector (’20) will speak at the awards ceremony. All proceeds will benefit the Spector Family Fund.
A senior at Duke University at the time of his passing in 2020, Grey was the eldest of four Spector sons that attended Cary Academy for their Middle and Upper School careers. Even after graduating, Cary Academy remained an important part of Grey’s life. He credits Cary Academy with encouraging him to pursue his passions. He particularly treasured his time on the Speech and Debate team, where he explored different viewpoints and developed supportive and enduring friendships. After CA, Grey embarked on a successful collegiate career at Duke University, where he earned degrees in philosophy, public policy, and economics, and had recently been admitted to Duke University Law School.
Applications will be made available to Upper School students in winter of 2021, and the first recipient will be announced during the Upper School Awards Ceremony in May of 2021.
