Page 3 - Georgetown Preparatory School Alumnews Winter 2021

From the President
Dear Members of the Georgetown Prep Community,
I hope you and your family had a blessed Christmas and a Happy New Year. Yes, 2020 was a trying year but, by God’s grace, we more than got through it and, as I reflect back on 2020, I see many examples of the courage and resilience of our Georgetown Prep community.
Last spring when I wrote the Letter from the President for the spring edition of the Alumnews, we were faced with a mountain of uncertainty—as a nation and as a School community. In the early stages of the pandemic, we were left with more questions than answers. Yet, our dedicated faculty and staff created
a virtual campus last spring and ensured that the Georgetown Prep experience would continue uninterrupted and unrivaled. This fall we launched our hybrid program, a mix of in-person and virtual learning, and have been able to stay open because of the dedication of our students, their parents, and the faculty and staff while accommodating our students who could not be on campus, even our international students. Through a rigorous testing program we have been able to keep the members of our community and their families safe through the pandemic. However, we could not have accomplished any of this without the support of our alumni and friends, and because of that support we are well-positioned to provide Prep’s redoubtable program through these multiple platforms as long as we need to.
In April at the height of the first surge of the COVID-19 pandemic, we launched a short-term campaign, Prep Strong: Keeping Our Family Together. In typical Prep fashion, our community stepped up. Combined with our yearly fundraising priority, the Annual Fund (now known as The PREP Fund), we were able to take care of our own – those who lost jobs, found salaries reduced or businesses shuttered, and thought they might not be able to have their sons continue at Prep. Because of this generosity, Prep was able to award over $1 million in aid to the Class of 2024 and about $900,000 to each of the Classes of 2021-2023.
What we saw as a nation this past year with political, racial, and civil unrest has not gone unnoticed by our alumni, our faculty and staff, and our students and their families. Over the summer and into the fall, I had a terrific series of conversations with several of our Black alumni about their experiences at Prep and afterward, notably Skip Davis ’62, Frank Spellman ’68, John McKnight ’70, Gregory Dyson ’76, Carnot Evans ’87, Sheldon Gay ’00, and Alexander Lee ’13, who met with me several times and created a town hall style session for some seventy Black alumni. Some of the stories were very hard to hear, but in the end I was consoled by the candor of these men and by their love of Prep and their deep hopes for our community. I am very grateful to all who participated in these conversations.
Here on campus, we have organized a forum among our minority faculty members to understand their experience of what it means to come to Prep from a minority community. In addition to the work done by individual faculty and staff members, we are also working on creating a general conversation for our minority students and our larger student body. We know that there are no quick fixes to the issue of racial injustice, and we will always face the challenge of teaching young men how to treat and regard others with respect and reverence. We will not tolerate racism at Prep – it is utterly opposed to our Jesuit charism – but institutionally we need to understand our minority students’ experience and to assure that the school itself is not creating experiences of structural or systemic racism. I am particularly thankful for faculty member Dacque Tirado’s assistance in creating these opportunities.
In this issue of the Alumnews, we honor and thank those members of the School community who supported Prep during the 2019- 2020 fiscal year (Honor Roll of Donors pages 30 - 55). I thank you again for keeping John Carroll’s 232-year-old vision alive and well through the generous gift of your time and talent and treasure, your prayers and your goodwill.
In addition, you will read about our most recent graduates and their 2020 Commencement Exercises on July 31, 2020 (pages 10-13) and a preview of Dr. Stephen J. Ochs’, Lawler Chair of History, “Gold Star Sons of Georgetown Prep,” a captivating piece on Prep alumni who lost their lives in War World II (pages 14-17). You will also read about our ongoing For the Greater Glory: Georgetown Prep’s Legacy Campaign and see the first renderings of our Campus Center, Residence Hall, and New Athletic Facilities (pages 18-29).
I look forward to the day when we can welcome you all back to campus, hopefully in the very near future. Thank you for your love, support, and generosity to your School, to Georgetown Prep. Because of you, we are able to support our students as they grow and mature as men of competence, conscience, courage, and compassion; men of faith and men for and with others.
God Bless and Happy New Year,
Rev. James R. Van Dyke, S.J. President