Matt McCambridge ’94 commits his creativity, time, and training to making a difference in the lives of people in need. Since graduating from Stanford with a degree in engineering, Matt has designed and manufactured mobility technology for people with disabilities in the United States and in less-resourced settings around the world.

In Hall on 9 January, Matt gave an illustrated presentation that described his 20-year path, beginning with the idea to redesign the basic wheelchair (fundamentally unchanged since the 1930s) to function outdoors and over rough terrain, where the disabled in developing countries are most likely to require mobility. More significantly, he considered ways to empower the disabled by designing a chair they could manufacture and repair themselves. Customizing chairs for different abilities and engaging the local workforce to build them, Matt has changed lives in villages all over the world.

“You often hear people use the phrase ‘confined to a wheelchair’, but the truth is that when you’re faced with a physical disability in a developing area, you’re confined if you don’t have a wheelchair,” Matt began. “People’s livelihood depends on their mobility, and these individuals have so much talent and creativity and dedication that they can’t use without the simple ability to get around.”

While in Mexico as a volunteer, Matt invented effective and low-cost sewing machine adaptations so women with disabilities could use the machines without using their legs. More than ten years later, the women are still using the same adaptation.

Developing countries represent a challenging physical environment in which to use wheelchairs. Matt works to create high-performance mobility technology and embraces the additional challenge of distributing, using, and maintaining this technology in very low-resourced environment.

Matt has worked on teams creating sophisticated technologies (like the iBOT self-balancing wheelchair) and simple, robust ones (like Whirlwind Wheelchair’s RoughRider). He teaches courses in mobility and design in MIT’s D-Lab, and he works as a research engineer developing and carrying out innovative tests of wheelchairs in developing countries.

After Hall, Matt met with students in classes throughout the day, including boys studying physics and engineering, as well as students enrolled in Class IV Math-Science Investigations (MSI) and in AP Economics.

An exhibit of Matt’s work and creations, Making Ideas Real: Service in the Global Commonwealth, is currently on display in the Great Hall through 6 February, when it will conclude with a closing reception.See photos here.

The Installation of Philip R. Kokotailo as the first Deane Family Dean of Faculty marked the Opening of Winter Term in Hall on 3 January.

In his opening remarks, Headmaster Kerry Brennan expressed gratitude for Carol and Disque Deane—parents of Carl, R.L. Class of 2010—“who endowed a permanent fund to support RL’s Dean of Faculty in his charge to help create a coherent and comprehensive trajectory of educational experiences, with and for our faculty, that will both inform their work with students and contribute to their growth as educators.” The Headmaster then presented Dr. Kokotailo with a framed citation, which commended his passion for literature and commitment to the English Department; his stewardship of faculty; his service as admission officer, debate team supporter, public speaking coach, and advisor; and his fidelity to the school.

In his address, Dr. Kokotailo focused on the concept of mastery, and described his own “department store theory of education” as an illustration of the process of mastery:

“In urban environments like Philadelphia, department stores stood by themselves, and stand they did, reaching upward for many floors. To get from one to the next, you took the escalator… Often, you had to go searching for it. That’s what education felt like to me. For a long time I would have to wander on a level floor of courses, observing the subject matter all around me. Sometimes I would get distracted, or confused, or lost, and have to double back to material I knew for sure. Eventually, I would stumble upon the escalator, the key topic or assignment that would lift me to the next level of understanding. Wandering the floor was time-consuming and often tedious, but finding the escalator was exhilarating. It gave me a sense of relief; it allowed me to look back over what I had just explored; it gave me a moment to relax before tackling the next floor.… I learned to have faith that the escalator was out there somewhere, and I began to keep an eye out for it at all times. More importantly, I realized that the time spent exploring each floor was necessary, so my anxiety decreased. As it did so, I became not only more attentive to my surroundings, but also more appreciative of them.” Dr. Kokotailo referenced author George Leonard, who said that these upward surges are “the inevitable spurts of progress and the fruits of accomplishment” that come from learning to love the plateau, and that “all significant learning” is measured “not in a straight line but in stages: brief spurts of progress separated by periods during which you seemed to be getting nowhere.”

In addition to serving as the Deane Family Dean of Faculty, Dr. Kokotailo is chairman of the English Department. In that role he has led the steady evolution of his department including re-imagining senior electives (offering his own “American in Paris” course complemented by an instructive March Break trip to Paris), and taught sixies, freshmen, juniors, seniors. Dr. Kokotailo did his undergraduate work at Penn, his doctoral work at McGill, and subsequently taught at Trent University, Université Laval, and McGill—all Canadian institutions. In the US he also taught at Blair Academy and University School before joining the RL faculty in 2007. 

See photos from Hall here.

How do you detect irony in someone’s voice? What part of a plant is best for vegetative propagation? What effect does a combination of alcohol and sleeping pills have on water fleas? This time of year, the Honors Biology students in Dr. Peter Hyde’s class are answering these questions and more, with help from medical professionals and research scientists.

For the fifth year, Honors Bio students are diving into Independent Research Projects (IRP). Posing questions of their own scientific interest, the boys develop experiment proposals and turn to the professionals for real-time feedback, honing their approaches all the while. Before the winter break, the students met with their IRP mentors—RL parents and alumni who are also research scientists, pediatricians, surgeons, oncologists—in person or over Skype. With the feedback from those sessions, the boys will refine their experimental plans, and in January and February they will collect their data. The IRP mentors will then meet with their mentees again to discuss the data and findings, and work with the students on developing compelling presentations.

Other questions the students are asking relate to the effects of music on reaction time and memory; the effects that the pH level in soil has on plants; and whether bacteria will evolve a resistance to UV light.

Special thanks to our generous mentors, who include:

Dr. Sandip Bose, Research Scientist, Schlumberger

Dr. Margaret Crawford, Framingham Pediatrics

Dr. Sirisha Emani, Boston Children’s Hospital, Department of Surgery

Dr. Andrew Eyre, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Department of Emergency Medicine

Dr. Leonor Fernandez, BIDMC Department of General Medicine

Dr. Ephraim Hochberg, Massachusetts General Hospital, Departments of Oncology and Hematology

Mr. Tim Poterba, Research Scientist, The Broad Institute

Dr. Merrill Weitzel, Boston Children’s Hospital, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology

Dr. Scot Wolfe, UMASS Medical School, Department of Molecular, Cell and Cancer Biology

Kalyan Palepu II and Robert Cunningham I participated in the Umass Hackathon over the first weekend in November, and walked away with four prizes: Best Website, Best Use of Amazon Lex, Best Home-Automated Project, and Most Creative Healthcare-Related Project. 

Their winning project was a “smart” pill box and a corresponding website. As Robert explains it, many people have elderly relatives who are independent, but also need to take medication—and making sure that they remember to take the medication is often a source of friction. The smart pill box indicates with lights which pills should be taken and when, and it reports to the website if they’ve been taken and how many are left. Caretakers can keep track by checking the website. There’s also voice integration, so non-computer-savvy elderly can just ask it when they need refills and when they’re next due to take their medicine.

Paired with two college students, Kalyan and Robert were part of the top prize-winning team. Of the 200+ teams, only 14 won any prizes at all.

The first thing the audience hears is: “Brick!” The first thing they see is a blue soccer ball sailing from one wing to the other. This verbal-visual riddle sets the tone for Dogg’s Hamlet—a play in which preeminent post-World War II dramatist Tom Stoppard attempts to teach the audience the language of the play as the play unfolds. Until Easy, a deliveryman, arrives, everyone in “the world” of Act One speaks only “Dogg”, a kind of English gibberish (Stoppard is clearly referencing doggerel). Abel, Baker, and Charlie are students at a school whose headmaster is named “Dogg”; they are preparing a severely abridged—and extremely average—production of Hamlet, to be performed immediately following an awards ceremony. So, for them, Shakespeare’s English is a second language. As Easy is trying to make his delivery of “planks, slabs, cubes, and blocks,” he is gradually, and hilariously, learning the language.

Act Two (Cahoot’s Macbeth) opens in a different setting and a darker mood. Issues of the control of language, meaning, and power—treated comically in Act One—have now become politically charged. A group of dissident theatre artists, living in an unnamed dictatorship, are performing a clandestine production of Macbeth in a collaborator’s living room, with the furniture pushed to the side. The apartment is invaded mid-performance by a state police inspector who is intent on enforcing the laws of censorship that would prohibit just this kind of artistic expression and freedom of speech. Intent on defying the inspector’s threats and strong-arm tactics, the actors must find a way to save the performance by repurposing Shakespeare’s language in support of the political crisis of the moment. And then, Easy arrives (again), and it’s “Double double, toil and trouble…”. As the New York Times put it when the play opened on Broadway in 1979, “Lewis Carroll would have been at home.”

Dogg’s Hamlet and Cahoot’s Macbeth were among Stoppard’s four dissident comedies of the late 1970s and written to be performed together. Stoppard dedicated the second play to dissident Czech dramatist Pavel Kohout (hence “Cahoot”).

With a cast of 23—18 R.L. boys, four girls from Winsor, and one from Dana Hall—the production drew on a lot of talent. Marge Dunn oversaw the tech crew of eight boys including Conor Downey IV as stage manager. (By showtime Director Derek Nelson, having tied one costume bow tie too many, regretted not hiring Mr. Bettendorf as bow tie strategist!) The production was performed in the Smith Theater on the evenings of 17-18 November, with support from the Hugo van Itallie Endowment.See photo gallery here.

On Friday, 1 December, both sacred and secular songs filled a bedecked Rousmaniere Hall, kicking off a season of celebration. With more than 200 guests in attendance, the musical event began with a holiday concert by The Sly Voxes, an all-male a cappella group featuring talented Roxbury Latin alumni and parents, and directed by Headmaster Kerry Brennan. The group’s eclectic repertoire included songs ranging from Ave Maria to Soon and Very Soon, from Pat-a-Pan to Do You Hear What I Hear? The finale had The Sly Voxes donning cozy and crazy holiday scarves for a rousing performance of The Christmas Can Can. The concert delighted an audience that included members of the Roxbury Latin community as well as many neighbors from West Roxbury, Roslindale, and choral music-lovers from neighboring towns and around the city.  

After intermission, the audience became a dazzling chorus for the Christmas portion of Handel’s Messiah, one of the world’s most enduring choral masterpieces. Rearranging themselves by voice part, the audience was directed from the stage with gusto by Mr. Opdycke and Mr. Brennan, and accompanied on the organ by Brandon Santini, music director and organist from neighboring St. Theresa Church. Soloists Lindsay Conrad (soprano), Sarah Beth Shelton (mezzo-soprano), John Bitsas (bass-baritone), and David Rivera Bozon (tenor) anchored the performance, and together with the enthusiastic audience made for a moving choral experience, on the 275th anniversary of Handel’s beloved creation. The Parents’ Auxiliary hosted a reception for all singers and concert-goers in the Bernstein Tea Room following the performance.

View photos from the evening here.

On Monday, 20 November, Headmaster Kerry Brennan joined his colleagues and fellow heads of school Dr. Rick Melvoin from Belmont Hill School and Mr. Bill Burke from St. Sebastian’s School in a conversation on the values of a boys’ school education.  The program, hosted at Belmont Hill School, included a panel discussion on a range of topics, from competition and relationships, to academics and extracurriculars.  The three leaders elaborated on the dynamics within boys’ schools and the distinctive model of a single-sex educational environment.

The evening’s event broadened into an open conversation with those in attendance—people familiar with boys’ schools and those interested in learning more.  Questions about technology use, pedagogical practices, and character development directed the dialogue.  The evening was a rare opportunity to hear from three distinguished school leaders, each with decades of experience working in schools, and particularly, helping to lead boys’ schools.  The atmosphere was collegial and collaborative as these three heads reflected on their experiences, shared observations, and anticipated what lies ahead for boys’ schools across the country. 

On the last day of classes before the holiday break, Life Trustee Nancy Anthony—mother of Drew ’01 and Graham ’03—offered her thoughts on gratitude, as keynote speaker of the morning’s annual Thanksgiving exercises.

“Today, we pause amidst the busyness of our lives to do two things,” began Headmaster Kerry Brennan. “First, to remember what we like to call ‘the first Thanksgiving’—the circumstances, the hardships, the virtues, the rituals, the example of it. And second, to do a bit of thanks-giving ourselves… Gratitude becomes more authentic the more reflective we are—to the extent we take nothing for granted—and the more we practice it, feel it, express it, say thank you. The things for which I believe we ought to be most grateful are ones we receive thanks to Grace. Much of who we are—our intelligence, our physical strengths, our families—we have not earned, we are given.”

Ms. Anthony’s reflections and insight focused in part on the wonder of the senses at this time of year: the joys, both simple and profound, that they elicit, and the memories they constitute. She recalled the sounds and warmth of a lit fireplace, the smells and sights of turkeys cooked over the years—both successfully and less so. (“No one remembers the perfectly-cooked turkeys,” she joked, “only the ones that came out burnt or raw!”) She urged the boys in the audience to pay attention to the sensations, scents and sights that they will recall fondly in years to come.

She called upon the audience members to reflect with gratitude on those friends and family members around the table: “Take time this Thanksgiving to talk with the person in the room that you see the least, and with the oldest person at the table. Ask them questions until they’re exhausted by it! You will learn so much in those conversations.”

Finally, Ms. Anthony shared her gratitude for Roxbury Latin—where, she says, her two sons received an invaluable education, and where she and her husband, Bob, have directed immeasurable support, as Headmaster Brennan said, “in time, talent and treasure,” over the years.

This morning’s Hall exercises also included a special unveiling of Ms. Anthony’s portrait, commissioned by the School, to honor her commitment as “an irreplaceable member of the Roxbury Latin community, one of our School’s wisest advisors and stalwart supporters,” described Headmaster Brennan. This portrait is the first commissioned by Roxbury Latin of a female trustee and School leader.

Nancy Anthony is the President of Fernwood Advisors, which provides investment management, investment advisory, and financial planning services to its clients. She has served as a member of Roxbury Latin’s Board of Trustees since 2003, and was elected a Life Trustee in 2006, and Vice President of the Board soon after. In addition to her impactful volunteer leadership at R.L., Ms. Anthony has been active in several Boston-area medical, social service, public policy, and educational institutions, including Children’s Hospital, McLean Hospital, Massachusetts Historical Society, the Pioneer Institute for Public Policy Research, The Park School, and The Epiphany School. She has also been a devoted member of the Board at her own school, Hathaway Brown in Cleveland.

On Sunday, 19 November, 32 senior girls from The Winsor School joined 46 Class I boys at Roxbury Latin for a different kind of sister school mixer: a joint seminar on DACA—the “Dreamer” legislation.

The afternoon began with a presentation on Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) by immigration law attorney Rachel Casseus (Winsor Class of 2002). Deeply knowledgeable about DACA, Ms. Casseus outlined its history and the current Administration’s efforts to end DACA, and shared her insights on how all of this is impacting the “Dreamers” who are at the heart of DACA. After a Q&A, students broke into groups, each with a faculty facilitator, to discuss the topic. They were guided by several discussion questions and tasked with finding a more permanent solution and drafting new legislation for Congress, after which the students reconvened to share their results. The evening concluded with dinner in the Refectory.

The heads of both schools attended. Julian Braxton joined Winsor head Sarah Pelmas, and RL faculty members Elizabeth Carroll, Stewart Thomsen, Andrew Kinglsey, Kyle Layne-Allen, and Mike Pojman served as facilitators along with Headmaster Kerry Brennan. Mr. Brennan originally approached Ms. Carroll—herself a Winsor board member and alumna—with the idea for the seminar. “I wanted to explore other ways for students of the two schools to interact,” said Mr. Brennan. “By centering the event around an issue of civic import, something that taps into students’ intellectual curiosity and horsepower, we can broaden the kinds of joint engagement we offer to RL boys and Winsor girls.”

The two schools anticipate coordinating a similar event in the spring.