MiddlesexFall 2011 Internet Innovator Kevin Systrom ’02 MIDDLESEX FALL 2011 i From the Head of School Transitions Every year, we are a slightly different school. opportunity. We are looking forward to Last June, as we said farewell to the Class of Heather Parker’s and George Noble’s leader- 2011 and our departing faculty members, we ship as they take the reins from Jim. also said special thanks to Jim Zimmerman, As we opened this school year, welcom- who, for the past 18 years, has served as our ing 98 new students and six new faculty director of development. There have been a members, we recommitted ourselves to the number of celebrated fundraising successes mission and work of being a school that seeks and great stories about travels during the —as Mr. Winsor said at the dedication of Campaign of a Century and Jim’s tenure, and Bryant-Paine House over a century ago— he has brought Middlesex all over the world, “to find the promise” in each of its students. strengthening the School by connecting This year’s student body hails from 33 states alumni and parents to us. A less well-known and 14 foreign countries and includes 31 side of Jim’s role is his work with students and international students. This year’s faculty families; his attention to people and his real includes 11 Middlesex graduates, from Ned interest in and engagement with students Herter ’73 to Sam Hoar ’07. I encourage you has made its mark on generations of students. to go to our new website, www.mxschool.edu, Over the course of his years here, Jim has to get the flavor of the School: take a look at cultivated friendships that have developed the master calendar for speakers and meet- authentic and independent strength of their ings; look at the athletics and arts write-ups Middlesex own, even if they started with Middlesex in to see what our students are doing; browse Fall 2011 common. Those friendships are lasting and our All-School Read materials, complete with Head of School valuable, and Jim can count on a lot of en- contributions from not only current students Kathleen Carroll Giles thusiastic support for him and his work as and faculty but also from some agile parents Director of Development Heather Parker he makes this next step forward as head of as well as others. And if you are an iPhone Director of Advancement institutional advancement at the Frances user, please take a look at the inside back George Noble Editor Parker School in San Diego, California. cover to see our first-of-its-kind “app” that Maria Lindberg We wish Jim, his wife Celia, and their son allows alumni who download it the opportu- Design Parker all the best. nity for direct connection with other alumni. NonprofitDesign.com Photography I am also grateful to Jim for developing a The Middlesex family likes to be together, Joel Haskell, Tim Morse, strong team, for bringing to Middlesex great and technology is quickly enhancing our Robert D. Perachio, Tony Rinaldo people who are deeply invested not only in capacity to do so. Letters to the Editor Letters to the fundraising success but in our students, their Happy reading! editor are welcome and may be edited for clarity and space. Please send your families, and their well-being. We ask a lot of letters to Editor, Middlesex Bulletin, our faculty members, and those in the Devel- 1400 Lowell Road, Concord, MA 01742, or e-mail [email protected]. opment Office have always committed them- Alumni News We welcome news from selves fully to school life as advisors, coaches, alumni, parents, and friends of Middle- sex School. Please send your news and and mentors. We have great confidence in labeled photographs to Alumni News, Middlesex School, 1400 Lowell Road, them, and, as is always the way at schools, Concord, MA 01742, or e-mail alumni@ mxschool.edu. even though change can be hard, it provides Address Corrections Please notify us of your change of address. Write to Middlesex School, 1400 Lowell Road, Concord, MA 01742 or e-mail alumni@ mxschool.edu. Parents of Alumni If this magazine is addressed to a son or daughter who no longer maintains a permanent address at your home, please advise us of his or her new address. Thank you! MIDDLESEX FALL 2011 Contents Mission Statement Features 16 Alumni Weekend Middlesex School is an independent, non-denominational, residential, Representing classes from the past 71 college-preparatory school that, for years, alumni returned to campus in force to over 100 years, has been committed reconnect, reminisce, and revel with friends to excellence in the intellectual, and faculty from their Middlesex years. ethical, creative, and physical devel- opment of young people. We honor 21 Graduation the ideal, articulated by our founding Head Master, of “finding the promise” The class of 2011 crossed the Circle, accepted in every student, and we work diplomas, and sang “Jerusalem” one last together in an atmosphere of mutual time together before setting off for summer trust and shared responsibility to adventures and collegiate life. help students bring their talents to fruition as knowledgeable, capable, 24 Middlesex Connections responsible, and moral citizens of the world. As a community, we By combining creative ideas with accessible respect the individual interests, technology, six Middlesex alumni are devel- strengths, and needs of each stu- oping business ventures that center on build- dent. We also value the rich diversity ing relationships and communities online. of belief and experience each of us brings to the School. We expect that each student will bring his or her best efforts to the Departments shared endeavor of learning and that the School, through its faculty, 2 Life 360 will engage and encourage each student’s growth, happiness, Time Travel Potential; Dateline Cambodia; and well-being. We aspire for all Development Office Transitions; The Middlesex students to develop Threepenny Opera; Internship Stipends Spur personal integrity, intellectual Young Alumni; All-School Read Examines vitality and discipline, and respect Internet Influence; New Speidel Chair for themselves and for others. Established We expect each student to engage energetically and cooperatively in 10 Middlesex People the life of the School, and we seek to inspire in all students the desire Tiya Miles ’88 Named MacArthur Fellow; to seek understanding of them- Ike Taylor ’56 Honored as Distinguished selves and the larger world, both Alumnus; Graduation Speaker Joe Kahn ’83; now and in their futures. New Trustee Kim GwinnLandry ’89 14 Team Highlights On the Cover All-American Honors for Track and Lacrosse Instagram Entrepreneur Kevin Systrom ’02. 30 Alumni Notes and News Photo by Drew Kelly. Class Notes; In Memoriam 44 Back Story Team Tradition MIDDLESEX FALL 2011 1 360° Life on the Circle quantum communications. But for this evening, Professor Lloyd turned instead to the idea of time travel, discussing a new theory that he and his colleagues have con- ceived and even tested at the elementary particle level using photons. Having reviewed many narratives in folklore, literature, and film, he contended that most time travel stories fall into two categories. In the first, people travel back in time, change something in the past, and return to a reality that has been altered by their actions; in the second, when people go back in time, what happens there is consis- tent with the future and nothing is changed. Professor Lloyd’s theory, he said, falls into the latter category. And in order to explain the idea without advanced mathe- matical calculations, he related it to the famous “grandfather paradox,” in which a woman travels back in time and accidently Using the laws of physics to think about problems—like how Time Travel Potential kills her grandfather before he has met to escape from a black hole or her grandmother, thereby preventing her travel through time—is pure “What if you had a time machine?” asked own birth. In his experiments involving enjoyment for MIT Professor MIT Professor Seth Lloyd at the start of his photons, Professor Lloyd said that he and his Seth Lloyd. presentation on September 15. “What would colleagues have not found that a photon sent you do?” “back in time” will destroy itself. They have Suggestions from the audience were therefore concluded that, at least at the level quick and creative, with most focusing on of elemental particles, time travel is possible traveling back in time to “see the Beatles” or and will not alter present-day conditions. “invest in Apple,” while one student proposed Offering a solution to the grandfather para- visiting the future to “find great technology dox, he suggested that perhaps the woman and bring it back.” For a mechanical engineer thought she had killed her grandfather, but and physicist like Professor Lloyd, thinking “a quantum fluctuation deflected the bullet,” about the possibility of time travel—and how sparing his life – and hers. it might work within the laws of physics— is “absolutely the most fun thing to do.” And Rethinking Theories he clearly enjoyed sharing his theories about Allowing that “this is not technology that seemingly improbable concepts, like time is ready for commercialization,” Professor travel and teleportation, as he delivered the Lloyd explained his fascination with topics first Hub Lecture of the new academic year. like these. “My goal is to change the way we think about things,” he stated. “What I get Possibilities and Paradoxes to do is absolutely the most fun thing to do A principal investigator in the Research if you want to think about what is possible Laboratory of Electronics at MIT, Professor and maybe change the way that people Lloyd is perhaps best known for his work think about things like time travel.” M in the fields of quantum computation and 2 MIDDLESEX FALL 2011 MIDDLESEX FALL 2011 An Inspiring Dateline Cambodia Speaker Series Spring Hub Lecture Borrowing its name from Oliver Wendell Holmes’ famous com- For journalist Kevin Doyle, reporting accu- Run by the Prime Minister, the government ment that Boston’s State House rate, unbiased news in a “tottering democracy” tightly controls education and the media, yet was “the hub of the solar system,” The Hub at Middlesex lecture can be a dangerous business.