Ms. King's English classes that I took senior year, both senior seminar and Scene to Screen were amazing.Something about just the way the material was presented was so fresh to me. And I love film too. So doing Scene to Screen was one of the best experiences. Also, Ms. Garnsey's Chemistry class was super fun.

I’m going to NYU to study theater.

I would say Thayer has helped shape those plans a lot. I hadn't really considered a career in the arts before I came to Thayer. As I was doing the productions here and taking the advanced acting classes, and through the encouragement of Kelly Hines [Thayer’s drama teacher], I was really feeling confident in the fact that this could be something that I could do for the rest of my life. And I feel like Thayer's productions and the amazing staff and faculty really helped me prepare for the career that I want to pursue.

Ms. Hayman’s AP Language & Composition class was by far the most difficult class I had. She says, “ I don't want you messing around with this, I want you to get your point across.” I was such a fluff writer before that class. And I feel like as difficult as it was and as much as I was dying to end the course, I feel like I came out the other end a much better writer.

Be yourself. That is something I struggled with my freshman year, and it brought me to a not great place. I presented myself as someone that I wasn't, and when I came back that sophomore year and I said, “I'm just going to be me and not be ashamed of who I am as a human being,” I had one of the best years that I've had.

One of the best memories I had was after a rehearsal freshman year, Ms. Hines came up to me and said, "Thank you, please keep doing this. No matter what you do. I want you to keep at this." She gave me a hug, and it was the best. At that moment I thought, “This is the place that I need to stay.” In my heart I knew this is where I need to be. Every time I think about my experience in the theater, that's the first thing that pops in my head.

The pizza. If they delivered it, I would order it to my house.

One of the traditions that we do in theater for the big musical is the Duke of York. It's a chant we sing before we go on stage at every show. When we start Duke of York, all of the seniors go to the middle, create a circle, face out towards the people looking in at the seniors. And we put our hands in the circle. And each night we do a count into the name of the shows that we've done. So for mine it was, one, two, three, Hairspray. One, two, three, West Side Story. One, two, three, Footloose. So I've seen all those seniors say all the plays, all the productions that they've done. And then when it was my time, we got into that circle, said those things, turned around and start that Duke of York chant.

It just gets everyone fired up and ready to go. It was the best, it was so worth all those years. It was one of those things that when I got to production time I had forgotten about, and when they said seniors to the middle, it just filled me with so much passion and I was so ready to go. It was the best. I love that tradition.