The Clermont Bi s h o p Lo u g h L i n Me M o r i a L hi g h sc h o o L Spring 2009 In This Issue • Homecoming • 75th Anniversary • Educating Leaders Educating Leaders Since 1851 | page 8 Celebrating the LaSallian Tradition Cover photo idents go here in this space The Clermont Fall 2009 In this issue Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School President’s Message 1 Administration Br. Dennis Cronin, FSC, President Principal’s Message 2 James Dorney, Principal Department of Development & Alumni Relations Around Loughlin 3 John E. Klemm ‘65, Director of Development Janet Griffin, Alumni Events & Publications Director Melissa Benjamin, Development Coordinator 2008 Alumni Reunion 4 Joan Hotaling-Cramer, Development Associate Charlie O’Donnell ‘59, Development Assistant R ita Monaghan-Maloney, Bishop McDonnell ‘59, Bishop McDonnell Alumnae Coordinator Homecoming 2009 5 Ed Bowes ‘60, Development Assistant Graphic Designer Going Green/Facebook 6 Creative Geers, LLC Educating Leaders Since 1851 8 Printing JNB Printing & Lithography 75th Anniversary 10 Cover Photo Bishop DiMarzio blesses the school at the 75th Anniversary. Angelo Consoli Award 12 Board of Governors 2008-2009 Hector Batista ‘77 Rev. Richard J. Beuther Lion/Lancer Open Golf Outing 13 Br. Thomas Casey Philip E. Chance Brian C. Connolly ‘73 This month’s cover story: Robert K. Conry ‘70 Br. Dennis Cronin, FSC, Principal ex-officio Educating Leaders Since 1851 Michael J. Dean, MD ‘69 James P. Flaherty, St. Augustine ‘65 Andrew L. Jacob ‘65 Rev. James F. Keenan, S.J. ‘55 Frank J. Macchiarola, PhD, St. Augustine ‘58 Yvonne A. Mason, MD ‘76 Dorothy E. McCabe, Bishop McDonnell ‘63 Noreen McCartney-Haffner, Bishop McDonnell ‘63 Clinton M. Miller ‘85 John D. Preiss ‘52 James J. Quinn, Esq. ‘63 The Clermont Daren Roberts ‘96 Claude Trahan Peter Williams ‘77 The Clermont is published by the Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School Development Office. Correspondence and address changes should be mailed to: Development Office Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School 357 Clermont Avenue Brooklyn, NY 11238 Phone: 718-857-2700 x2250 • Fax:718-857-2833 E-mail: [email protected] Visit our website: www.blmhs.org Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School www.blmhs.org President’s Message • 1 hile traveling to a conference for to chasten the spirit. Easter calls us to live Chief Administrators of Lasallian out the virtue of hope, to believe in God’s power to make right rather than our own. WSchools, I read an article in the Atlantic that cites an economist. He is Our founder, St. John Baptist De La Salle, credited with the line “A crisis is a terrible encountered many obstacles in establishing thing to waste.” We are living though a gratuitous Christian schools not the least financial crisis of some magnitude and of which was financial stability. It is good we will not squander the opportunities to remember De La Salle’s steadfast presented. commitment to his mission and his reliance on Providence - the source of all blessings. First, we are compelled to clarify our vision. After all, the work we do is God’s work. The Lasallian school provides a Christian Dear Alumni Loughlin needs your current support and and human education to the young, a bit more if possible to remain strong. & Friends of especially the poor. In an environment that This coming academic year we will be Bishop Loughlin, provides little margin for error, we need to hard pressed to find those very important have our priorities set straight. scholarship and grant dollars which Second, we need to order our priorities supports admissions and student retention. to remain true to our mission. In that Without your support, many students will ordering students come first. As a result, not have access to the quality education admissions and enrollment management, Loughlin provides. Wasn’t that a building academic programming, and faculty block to your success? staffing which serves students rank high. Third, financial decisions about spending ...while living through the are made in a way that supports the mission and the advancement of student “crisis, we need to remember learning. Practically, while living through the crisis, we need to remember our our mission...of a quality mission which focuses on the accessibility Lasallian education... of a quality Lasallian education to students and their families. Hence the allocation ” of scholarships and grants remain crucial. This focus supports the mission and As the school community embraces the joy enrollment. For many of us, diocesan of Easter and the promise of resurrection education was THE available option for be assured of our prayers and our gratitude our families. Since we are tuition driven for all that you do. (untrue for those prior to ‘65), sustaining Sincerely, enrollment goals supports programming and staffing through tuition generated income. Like many institutions of higher learning capital projects are put on hold. Well, these are my suppositions for taking Brother Dennis Cronin, FSC advantage of this crisis. Lent was a good President cause for personal and institutional soul- searching – nothing like a good examen The Clermont Spring 2009 2 Principal’s Message ast summer when I first wrote staff marched from old St. James to 75- to you, I asked for your fervent year young Bishop Loughlin and met the Lprayers. May I take this opportunity rest of the school community waiting to to thank you profusely, because based greet us in the school yard, literally under on the way things have gone at alma gigantic “banners, purple and gold, above”. mater this school year, your prayers must The banners have hung on the school have been plentiful. As principal, I am every day this year and will continue to blessed with students who are full of life do so as we live proudly into the future. and love; their parents, whose great love and sacrifice for them is matched only We have brought back a debate team to by their cooperation with us; and I’m Loughlin and the students involved have Dear Alumni blessed with a staff whose competence, experienced great success in the very first professionalism, dedication and love are few months. One pair reached the semi- & Friends of all immeasurable. You will notice that love, finals in a national competition involving Bishop Loughlin, which is synonymous with charity, is the some of the best teams on the East coast. common characteristic in the three groups. At our Afternoon of Culture and Fashion, we honored three graduates, including It is that same charity that exudes from Edward Smith ’47. After watching each and every one of you - on a routine approximately 300 Loughlin students visit to the school, at our Alumni Reunion perform 14 acts, Mr. Smith stated that extravaganza in October, at our Alumni although St. Thomas Aquinas theorized Homecoming in February or at the Hall that there are five proofs that God of Fame dinner in May - that buoys exists, he must add that the sixth proof me and our beloved school every day of God’s existence was all of the talent throughout the year. I thank you for that he and all of us had just witnessed. your financial generosity, but more than He could not have said truer words. that I express deep gratitude for your constant, charitable spirit and prayers. St. Paul said “there are three things that last, faith, hope and love and the In my last letter, I also stated that I was greatest of these is love.” As you have moving into my new office with complete just read, then, Loughlin is filled with confidence that I would witness the same the greatest of the abiding virtues. As love and goodness among the Bishop always, I ask that you pray fervently. Loughlin community, including all of Please pray that Christ’s love continues you that I had witnessed for the prior 35 to grow in our Loughlin community. years. If I was wrong at all, it was only in understating the case. As a result, this Sincerely, The Clermont year has been an over joyous one for me and for Bishop Loughlin High School. James Dorney Our 75th anniversary celebration on Principal October 9th was the quintessential personification of Loughlin “spirits high and hearts so true, our banners, purple and gold, above.” About 250 students and Bishop Loughlin Memorial High School www.blmhs.org Debate Team | Bowling Team Success! Around Loughlin • 3 Loughlin Debate Team Wins High Honors After this impressive and exhausting weekend, some of Written by Luke Patrick O’Connell, Religion Faculty the debaters were called upon to speak to their classmates during a prayer service prior to the inauguration of President famous “shot heard round the world” set in motion Obama. It was the debaters, on that stage, invoking principles a revolution pitting a group of fiercely committed of love and truth after living it with their own lives, that made rebels against a long-standing economic, political, A our newly minted President’s words so profound. He spoke of and military power. The symbolic importance of the town the price of citizenship in our country: could not be understated as the newly formed Bishop Loughlin Debate Team drove past the Lexington battle But those values upon which our success depends — hard green en route to represent the diocese on a national work and honesty, courage and fair play, tolerance and level at the Lexington Winter Invitational. Ten students curiosity, loyalty and patriotism — these things are old. from Brooklyn came together as relative strangers on These things are true…we have duties to ourselves, our Bishop Loughlin’s newly formed debate team in the fall nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly to test their mettle against select academies from the accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that Northeast and as far away as Tampa Bay and Nashville.