Britton Keeshan ʼ00 Recounts Seven Summits Quest at All-School

VISIT US ON THE WEB AT www.phillipian.net Volume CXXVIII, Number 19 Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts October 21, 2005 15 GDA STUDENTS Schedule Changes Disscussed ARRESTED FOR By Faculty and Student Council NDERAGE RINKING U D By STEVE BLACKMAN By EMMA WOOD Since Head of School Barbara On all these days, a period from This past Saturday night, Landis Chase unveiled proposals 8:30 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. would be the police arrested 15 Governor to extend the academic calendar set aside for additional academic Dummer Academy students for two weeks ago, students and support, such as meetings with underage drinking at some faculty members have teachers or department and Our the house of a GDA discussed the changes and their division meetings. Senior in Danvers, implications for the academic The rest of the day on the Peer MA – a few miles program. remaining four spacer days Schools from the school’s Some of the extra days would would be used for the “Non Sibi campus in Byfi eld. be used for classes, but most Program,” which would combine According to fellow GDA would serve as “spacer days,” and surpass existing co-curricular Senior Tod Eudailey ’06, the police used for meetings, workshops, activities, such as FCD week, counted 250 empty bottles at the and long weekends in an effort to AIDS awareness seminars, date student’s house. ease the pace of life for students. rape prevention workshops, and All the students at the house Alongside the change in the ninth-grade dorm presentations. were arrested. calendar will come proposed The entire faculty would be The neighbors notifi ed the police changes to the diploma involved in this program, either when a friend of the student from requirements and support in an administrative or a teaching Danvers, not from GDA, arrived networks. capacity. at the party and began to cause a Although faculty members The second of the two plans disturbance in the neighborhood. returned to campus in September proposes a three-week fourth The boy was said to be anticipating a brief dialogue and term in December between screaming and creating a scene in then a vote, the complexity of Thanksgiving and Christmas the yard. this issue has made it clear that vacations. All of the students have been more discussion is necessary. According to the Dean of tried in court, though some qualifi ed A number of All-School Studies Offi ce, the December for a juvenile trial. Others were over Meeting dates have been set Term Model would “provide 18 years old and are therefore no aside for faculty meetings about what trimesters alone cannot: longer considered minors, thus the proposals. characteristically rigorous requiring them to stand before a Under either of the two plans academic courses…that would regular court. set forth over the summer by a permit student immersion in a The students were tried in court Courtesy of Britton Keeshan Britton Keeshan ’00 stands on the summit of Mt. Everest. Keeshan was the youngest person to climb the seven summits. task force team headed by Dean subject, intensive off-campus this past Monday, yet judgment of Studies Margarita Curtis, the service learning, and connections is still pending and will be settled school year would be lengthened among previously discrete following another court date. by ten days in comparison to this disciplines.” Governor Dummer has not yet Britton Keeshan ʼ00 Recounts Seven year, increasing the total number A “major” course, meeting offi cially responded to or informed of school days to 150. six days a week for over two its students of the incident. Mrs. Chase said, “This was hours, would offer much more The school has yet to decide Summits Questthe odds, at that All-School I was willing minutes Meetingafter passing [our] an administrative decision. There class time than a fi ve-hour course how the offending students will be had been a lot of discussion about does in a regular 10-week term. punished. By JOSHUA SCHULTZ to risk death in the name of camp [site at 22,000 feet], it After reaching the summit success.” flew off the mountain and fell it for a long time, and I felt that In addition to the major The arrested students have it was something we needed course, students would select a attended classes and athletic of Mount Everest last May, At that time, Mr. Keeshan 5,000 feet into a glacier below Britton Keeshan ’00 became had already ascended three of and at the moment we knew we to do…One hundred and fi fty “minor” course, which would practices as usual. [days] is, in my view, really the meet for one-hour classes four the youngest person ever the seven peaks. had made the right decision. Governor Dummer does have minimum based on what we are times per week. to climb the world’s seven a special “training room” rule that Mr. Keeshan began In the end, I learned a lesson trying to teach and deliver.” During the December term, does not allow any student caught highest mountains. mountain-climbing in earnest in humility. With this lesson, The two proposals entail one- students would also be required ingesting illegal substances to At this Wednesday’s All- the summer before his I considered myself ready to week reductions in both summer to participate in an afternoon participate in games for a week. School Meeting Mr. Keeshan freshman year at Andover give Everest a try.” and winter vacations. activity, such as a sport, Model If any student is apprehended a discussed his five-year quest when he climbed the Grand Although mentally and In the new calendar, fall term UN, community service, theatre, second time, the school will remove and the trials and triumphs Teton in Jackson Hole, physically prepared for would end before Thanksgiving student publications, or music. him or her from the team. that accompanied it. Wyoming. Everest, Mr. Keeshan lacked break. Thanksgiving vacation Exhibitions, such as lectures, The only other offi cial Mr. Keeshan decided when By 2001, Mr. Keeshan the necessary financial would also be restored to its concerts, and interscholastic punishment currently confronting he was 17 years old that he had climbed four of the resources. He needed previous length of ten days, games, would take place after the students is mandated community would attempt to become the seven mountains – Denali, $100,000 to fund his climbs giving teachers enough time to dinner. service. youngest person ever to reach grade fi nal exams. While most Juniors and When asked about the state of Aconcagua, Elbrus, and of both Vinson, in Antarctica, The fi rst of the two proposed Lowers would be on campus the student body at GDA, GDA the top of the Seven Summits. Kilimanjaro. and Mount Everest. calendars, known as the Spacer attending classes and focusing Senior Britney McKenna said, He said, “I dreamed of The following summer, Mr. Mr. Keeshan obtained the “Everything is pretty normal. I throwing myself at a goal, at Keeshan climbed Cho Oyu, money through a corporate Day Calendar Model, sets on academic skills, Uppers and mean it has mostly just stirred [up] a a challenge that seemed so which stands at 27,000 feet on sponsorship from AT&T. aside two days of each term Seniors would be encouraged lot of gossip.” insurmountable in the face of the Tibet-Nepal border. After In January 2004, Keeshan for co-curricular and faculty to study off-campus or remain reaching roughly 22,000 feet, climbed Vinson, and in May development activities. at Andover for intensive a storm arose. 2004 reached the summit of One of these six days would interdisciplinary learning. The weather forced Mr. Everest, which stands at 29, be the current Martin Luther This proposal is much more King, Jr. Day, while another diffi cult to enact than the fi rst. Community Service Popular Keeshan and his team to 035 feet. in the spring term would be a It is both time-consuming and remain at this camp for 18 Mr. Keeshan credits his Senior Exhibition Day, allowing expensive to develop courses Despite Lack of Requirement days and then turn back to the childhood and his experiences seniors to exhibit their work and programs both on- and off- base camp. and accomplishments to the Mr. Keeshan said, “Twenty Continued on Page 6, Column 1 community. Continued on Page 7, Column 3 Schools in International Academic Partnership Unreachable After Earthquake in Pakistan; Phillips Academy to Aid Relief Effort By ALEXA REID At 8:50 a.m. on Saturday, October 8, a 7.6 magnitude earthquake hit Pakistan, Afghanistan, and parts of Courtesy of Chad Green India. Although Andover has no community service requirement, 90 Though its epicenter percent of students participate at least once over four years. was 60 miles northeast of By SONG KIM Islamabad, tremors were felt While athletics, theatre, recently taken place, students are as far away as New Delhi, and music, and even drown-proofi ng more eager to help than ever. It’s its ramifications were felt as are required a way of recognizing the sense of close to home as the Andover for graduation privilege and the need to have a campus. from Phillips responsibility of giving back,” said Phillips Academy is a A c a d e m y , Choate Director of Community member of the International c o m m u n i t y Service Mary Pashley. Academic Partnership (IAP), a service still The Andover faculty have coalition of schools consisting remains optional. considered including a community of Andover, Schule Schloss Phillips Andover and Phillips service component among its Salem in Germany, Aga Khan Exeter are the only two schools diploma requirements in the past University in Pakistan, and among their peer institutions but eventually rejected the idea.

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