Home Posts tagged Wilbraham Monson Academy

Project Will Restore WMA Chapel, Make It a Gathering Place

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The historic chapel, seen above in an archival photo, will be restored to its former glory and given a new role as a dining facility, as seen in the architect’s rendering below.
Education

Turning Back the Clock

 

The historic chapel, seen above in an archival photo, will be restored to its former glory and given a new role as a dining facility, as seen in the architect’s rendering below.

The historic chapel, seen above in an archival photo, will be restored to its former glory and given a new role as a dining facility, as seen in the architect’s rendering below.

architect’s rendering

Brian Easler calls it “an inflection point … a seismic shift in the academy’s upward trajectory.”

He was referring to a $20 million project to create a new kitchen and servery at Wilbraham & Monson Academy (WMA) and convert its historic chapel into a dining commons.

Those phrases ‘inflection point’ and ‘seismic shift’ refer to several aspects of this project and cover a lot of ground. Indeed, they reference everything from the magnitude of the upgrade in dining facilities — from fairly nondescript quarters to the fully restored chapel, with its vaulted ceilings and stained-glass windows, what students are calling the ‘Harry Potter dining hall’ — to the way this project will shift still more of the activity at WMA to the east side of Main Street, thus reducing traffic crossing the busy street.

“This will move the center of the campus from the west side of Main Street to the east side,” said Easler. “And that will generate a 70% reduction in student Main Street crossings, which is just one big impact.”

Meanwhile ‘inflection point’ also refers to the way this project galvanized the WMA community and especially its alumni base, from which the vast majority of the funds for the project were raised.

“This was not one of those fund-raising efforts where you put the ask out to everyone in the community … 7,000 alumni and everyone chips in,” Easler explained. “This was a handful of donors already close to the school, already close to me.

“We went out to them with personal appeals from the school to see if they were interested in the project,” he went on. “We were fortunate in that they were all interested in the project, and they were almost all able to help us with it; that’s how we were able to make it happen relatively quicky.”

“This space will serve as a unifying gathering place for our community. The dining commons will become the heart and soul of our campus, and a central part of the student experience.”

Elaborating, he said there were two lead gifts — from donors he was not ready to name — that generated much-needed momentum for the initiative, one for $7 million, the other for $5 million. “Several other people picked up on that momentum, and that enabled us to get to $20 million.”

Groundbreaking ceremonies were staged on April 25. Work is slated to commence soon, and the plan is to have the facility ready for the start of the 2026-27 school year.

Easler said the initiative represents the next phase in the school’s master plan for its campus, one with several components, including the construction of a new athenaeum, completed in 2020, which is connected to the chapel and will be connected to the new kitchen and server area, with the current dining hall to be converted to a state-of-the-art large-capacity theater and performance and meeting space.

The past and present will come together — literally, and in powerful ways, said Easler, noting that the rough-hewn brownstone exterior chapel will become the servery’s interior wall.

“During the day, the skylights will illuminate the servery with natural light,” said Easler, “highlighting the beauty of the original brownstone exterior and creating a stunning backdrop for a modern country-kitchen style.”

But while the project has many aspects to it, in many respects, the chapel is the primary focus. Completed in 1870, it has been used sparingly in recent years — for school meetings once a week, said Easler. It’s transformation into a dining hall will make it a much larger part of the school’s identity and its daily activity.

“This space will serve as a unifying gathering place for our community,” said Easler. “The dining commons will become the heart and soul of our campus, and a central part of the student experience.”

And the project will turn back the clock and restore the chapel to its original elegance and architectural allure.

“We have photos of the chapel when it was first constructed; it was magnificent on the inside, with exposed beams and stained-glass dormers,” said Easler. All of that is still up there, but it was covered with sheet rock somewhere along the line, probably to minimize the cubic yards that had to be cooled or heated. We have other ways to mitigate that now, so we’ll be opening it back up to its original beauty, and it will be a stunning dining room.”

Dave Fontaine Jr., CEO with Fontaine Bros., the general contractor for the project, as well as the athenaeum, agreed, noting that this project falls into several categories, everything from new construction to what would be considered historic renovation.

“It’s a very cool project,” he told BusinessWest. “There’s a lot of history in the chapel, it’s a really cool building, and I think this will be a gem of a project when it’s completed.”

— George O’Brien

Wilbraham & Monson Academy to Host Women in Business Event

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Daily News

WILBRAHAM — The Wilbraham & Monson Academy (WMA) Center for Entrepreneurship, Economics & Finance (CEEF) will host a Women in Business panel on Sunday, Oct. 22 at 10 a.m.

Students and families who are interested in hearing from WMA alumnae about their experiences in the world of business and finance and want to learn more about WMA’s CEEF program are encouraged to attend.

Attendees will hear from Allie Collins-Anderson ’16, Rayna Ferris ’22, and Madaket “Maddie” Stoltz ’23.

Collins-Anderson is a WMA Cora Pease Chandler Award winner (one of the highest awards given to a graduating senior at the academy). She holds a bachelor’s degree in economics and music from Wellesley College and is a juris doctor candidate at Suffolk University Law School. She serves as a Client Services associate at Kathleen Collins Wealth Management.

Ferris is a student in the Western New England University 3+3 Law dual-degree program. She was a WMA Pieria Prize winner as a senior and was an active member of the academy’s Finance, Entrepreneurship and Business (FEB) Society. She is currently serving as a bank teller at Luso Credit Union while attending WNEU.

Stoltz is attending Babson College and will declare her major in entrepreneurship. She is a student-athlete, participating in women’s track & field, and is a member of the Babson Blank Scholars Program. While at WMA, she was a Global Scholar, the class of 2023 commencement speaker, and the recipient of WMA’s Stephen D. Luckraft Memorial Award. She was also a member of the all-female team that placed second in the high-school division of the 2023 Massachusetts Personal Finance Challenge

The event is free and open to the public and will take place in the Academy’s Mark R. Shenkman Trading Center, located in Mattern Hall on the WMA campus. To learn more and reserve a spot, visit www.wma.us/womeninbiz.

Wilbraham & Monson Academy Names Annie Kandel Head Girls Lacrosse Coach

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Daily News

WILBRAHAM — Wilbraham & Monson Academy has named former prep and collegiate standout and renowned coach Annie Kandel as head coach of its girls lacrosse team. Kandel will take the helm of the program at the start of the 2022-23 school year.

“We are so very excited for Coach Annie Kandel to join our team at WMA,” Head of School Brian Easler said. “Her broad experience as a lacrosse player and coach will infuse our girls varsity lax program with heightened energy, and her expertise in the sport of lacrosse and in coaching female student-athletes will be an investment in our commitment to young women. We have some really talented players who have been very well-coached already, and now Coach Kandel will help us bring the program to the next level.”

Kandel will also assume the role of director of Parent Programs for the Academy and will coordinate advancement and development efforts with parents, alumni parents, and grandparents. She brings an array of experience in admissions, athletics, and student life from within the boarding school world to WMA.

“I am thrilled to be joining WMA, a community characterized by a notable spirit and positive values,” Kandel said. “It is clearly a special place and one which has welcomed me with open arms. I am excited to have the opportunity to coach lacrosse in such a respected athletic program and look forward to working with students, parents, and colleagues this fall. Go Titans!”

Kandel joins WMA after successful coaching stints at Groton School, Stuart Country Day School, Tabor Academy, Cheshire Academy, Stoneleigh-Burnham School, and the University of Colorado. She has led her teams to multiple state and New England championships as well as an undefeated, untied season. She also coaches for the Baystate Bullets Lacrosse Club.

She is a product of independent schools, having been a standout athlete in field hockey, basketball, and lacrosse at Governor’s Academy before excelling in both field hockey and lacrosse at Lehigh University. She earned league, regional, and All-American honors in lacrosse and was named the Lehigh University Outstanding Athlete her senior year. She was also honored as a member of the Patriot League All-Decade team and played for the U.S. Women’s National Team in 1992-93.

Wharton Grad and Founder/CEO of GenHERationⓇ to Speak at  WMA Commencement  

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Daily News

WILBRAHAM — Katlyn Grasso, Founder and CEO of GenHERation®, a network where young women and companies connect, will be the 2022 Commencement speaker at Wilbraham & Monson Academy on Saturday on the WMA campus at 11 a.m. The 2022 graduating class at WMA consists of 99 graduates, all of whom will be attending college. 

In her role as CEO, Grasso has created GenHERation® Discovery Days, hosted the GenHERation® Summer Leadership Series, developed original GenHERation® webisodes, launched The GenHERation® Collection product line, and has grown the GenHERation® community to reach more than 500,000 young women. 

Grasso is a graduate of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania where she received a B.S. in Economics with concentrations in finance and strategic globalization. She is one of the inaugural recipients of the Penn President’s Engagement Prize, which provides Penn students with $150,000 to develop ventures that have the potential to change the world. 

Grasso speaks internationally about entrepreneurship, technology, leadership and the advancement of women, and has been a featured speaker at more than 200 events. She is a frequent radio and television contributor and her work has been featured across national media outlets, including CNBC, NBC, Fast Company, Forbes, The Huffington Post, CBS, Yahoo! Finance, Seventeen Magazine and SiriusXM. 

“Katlyn Grasso is such an enterprising young entrepreneur and supporter of young women in leadership, and we are proud to have her joining us for Commencement 2022,” said Head of School Brian P. Easler. “We were excited back in 2020, when Katlyn was originally scheduled to speak at commencement, so we were thrilled when she agreed to reschedule with us for this year. Katlyn has already been engaging with some of our students, and we look forward to her insights this Saturday.” 

Grasso is a member of the Penn Fund Executive Board, the Penn Nursing Center for Global Women’s Health Advisory Board, the TCU Neeley Institute for Entrepreneurship and Innovation Board of Directors, and is the tri-chair of Momentum: The Power of Penn Women. She was named to the Forbes “30 Under 30” list in 2022 as one of the most influential leaders in education. 

Sara Ugalde Named Head Girls’ Hockey Coach at Wilbraham & Monson Academy

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Daily News

WILBRAHAM — Following a national search, Wilbraham & Monson Academy (WMA) named former prep and collegiate standout Sara Ugalde head coach of its inaugural girls’ ice hockey team. Ugalde will take the helm of the program beginning July 1.

“We are extremely excited to have Sara Ugalde joining WMA to launch our girls’ hockey program,” Head of School Brian Easler said. “We feel incredibly fortunate to have found Sara. With her depth of playing and coaching experience in youth leagues, prep-school hockey, collegiate and professional hockey, combined with her passion to build this program and grow the sport for girls, we look forward to Sara’s impact as the founding head coach of this new program for female WMA scholar-athletes.”

A hockey MVP as a player at Westminster School, Ugalde helped lead Middlebury College to NESCAC championships in 2011 and 2012. Her experience with collegiate hockey coaching includes assistant women’s ice hockey coach at Trinity College, Williams College, and Colby College. She was director and coach of the Connecticut Junior Rangers and assistant coach for the NWHL Connecticut Whale, and has helped run multiple hockey camps throughout the country.

“I am extremely excited to join the Wilbraham & Monson Academy community,” Ugalde said. “I am thankful and honored for the opportunity to build the girls’ hockey program. Throughout the entire interview process, I was moved by the unified vision and support displayed by members of WMA. After years working at the collegiate level, I am delighted to rejoin the prep-school sphere. I am looking forward to finding players that add to the already-established excellence at WMA and helping them reach their athletic aspirations.”

Wilbraham Monson Academy

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Brian Easler says Wilbraham Monson Academy
Coronavirus

At This School, Pandemic Has Been a Real Learning Experience

Brian Easler says Wilbraham Monson Academy

Brian Easler says Wilbraham Monson Academy was perhaps better prepared for the pandemic than some other institutions, but pivoting to online learning was still a stern challenge.

Brian Easler still recalls the name of the briefing staged by the Centers for Disease Control in Washington, D.C. more than a decade ago: “The Impending Pandemic.”

Actually, what he remembers even more was the subtitle to the program: “It’s Not a Matter of If, It’s a Matter of When.”

He took the content to heart, and because of that, he believes Wilbraham Monson Academy (WMA), which he serves as head of school, was in some ways better able to handle the arrival of COVID-19 in mid-March.

“We had prepared pretty well for something like this, actually,” he told BusinessWest. “That was a three-day workshop I attended in Washington led by some of the country’s leading epidemiologists. I came back to the school with a lot of good information on how to prepare.”

Elaborating, he said that, because of that warning, the school was well-stocked with what everyone knows now as PPE, and there were plans already in writing for several different scenarios depending on when in the school year the pandemic actually hit.

Such preparation certainly didn’t make the closing of the campus to all but a few international students who simply couldn’t get home, or the transition to remote learning, easy. But it probably made it easier, said Easler, comparing what has transpired over the past several months to a military operation — and he should know, having served in the Army Airborne Rangers.

“You’re getting swept up in something bigger than yourself, where there’s risk involved and a degree of planning,” he explained. “And the decision making — the emergency decision-making process — is much different. During normal times, a decision might be very difficult to make; during an emergency, that decision becomes very easy. We wouldn’t normally turn our school meeting space into a second dining hall — that would be a big decision during normal times. But under these conditions, it was an easy decision to make.”

“We had prepared pretty well for something like this, actually.”

Flashing back to March — and then further back to what he heard all those years ago — Easler said the pandemic did not hit quite like those experts projected it would.

“What tripped up us a little bit is that the CDC was anticipating a pandemic that would be fast-moving,” he explained. “We were prepared for three weeks; that was fine when it came to PPE because all the students went home. But it didn’t help us with transition to an online education program; we had to literally make that up on the fly during spring break.

“In the end, it’s a good thing it wasn’t a fast-moving pandemic, because fast-moving also means really deadly,” he went on. “We were planning for a three- or four-week event, as opposed to a 12-month event, which is more like what we’re looking at. But as a school we saw the signs early, and we paid attention to the right things and the right information. When the students were getting ready for spring break, we told them to bring their laptops and books home with them and to be prepared in case we were not able to return for classes.”

Overall, that transition to remote learning went smoothly, he went on, because of the tight, close-knit nature of the WMA community and the hard work and dedication of staff and students. And these elements are also facilitating efforts to plan for the fall semester, which will start at its traditional time in early September and feature a hybrid model that mixes in-class and remote learning.

“We can simultaneously run classes on campus for the faculty and students who can be on campus, while students and faculty and who cannot be on campus can still synchronistically participate in the same program,” he explained. “It’s fluid, it’s very flexible, and, quite honestly, it’s the future of education anyway. We wish it didn’t take an event like this to move us in this direction, but we’re happy to be moving in this direction — it’s good teaching.”

Looking ahead to the fall, Easler said enrollment, which is traditionally roughly 400 students, remains steady, and, overall, the school may see its numbers rise due to uncertainty among parents about just what the public-school environment might look like come late August or September.

“We’re seeing a little bit of an uptick in local interest,” Easler noted. “I’m speculating, but I think the public-school systems are going to face some significant challenges, and they don’t necessarily have the space resources that we do — we’re structured much like a small college campus with multiple buildings, lots of outdoor space, and a number of spaces that, even though they’re not used as classrooms, can be used as socially distanced classrooms; we have a lot of advantages over public schools.”

Whether this interest locally translates into a bump in enrollment remains to be seen. But what is already clear is that early and effective planning has paid off for this venerable institution.

And it was necessary because the planners of that program in Washington all those years ago were right; it was a question of when, not if, a pandemic would arrive.

—George O’Brien