School News, March 30, Sag Harbor And East Hampton Town

Pierson High School has announced that its valedictorian and salutatorian for the 2022-23 academic year are Emily Squire and Griffin Greene, respectively. Both are strong community members at Pierson High School who both found inspiration in their academic successes from watching their parents.

“The motivation behind my grades came from having a hardworking family. My parents inspired me,” said Squire. She then emphasized how she knew working hard meant opening the doors to the opportunities she wanted to set herself up for. One of those opportunities is the plan to major in digital communications with a minor in marketing, with ambitions to focus on social media marketing and video editing.

Squire explained she feels confident in taking what she has learned at Pierson into the new experiences to come.

“I am 100 percent going to miss the art experiences at Pierson,” said Squire, “The teachers created an amazing environment. We have 3D printers, massive scale photo printers, fashion workshops, and more.”

While Squire looks forward to a life beyond her local community, she explained she will miss Pierson and her classmates. “I am going to miss my second family who have become my classmates. After going through COVID together and then coming back together these last two years it’s been super bonding.”

In turning to the younger grades at Pierson, Squire offered words of advice that she’s gathered from her high school career and boxing at Hill Street Boxing in Southampton: “Do as much as you can. Anything that you’re interested in and want to pursue, do it, even if you try one thing you can learn from it. Things take time and you can’t succeed if you don’t fail sometimes. The success feels so much sweeter when you know you really worked for it.”

As the salutatorian, Greene found his motivation for academic success by watching his hardworking mother. Greene explained finding the right balance between school and life was key. Greene’s values are held in establishing good character. Through the movies he watched as a child, Greene learned themes like helping others and never giving up even if you might be under appreciated. Greene’s appreciation for film has only grown as he plans to major in film with a minor in English literature studies.

Greene is eager to embark on his college experience. He plans to find new communities alike and learn what he hasn’t yet been exposed to. Particularly, analyzing scripts, literature and film are topics of excitement.

During his four years at Pierson, Greene has run cross-country and gained the title of captain. He’s contributed to the newspaper club by writing film reviews and has even branched out beyond Pierson into film and art communities like the Sag Harbor Cinema and The Church in Sag Harbor. “Sometimes we fall into the trap that grades and school are everything,” said Greene, “but you are allowed to have a balance. It’s important to balance your community and school.”

For Greene, he will miss the most his classmates and how close they’ve grown. “Since COVID, we’ve developed a strong support system. We help each other prepare for tests and projects and have really gotten close since going through COVID together. The people feel like home.”

On March 11, the annual student exhibition at the Parrish Art Museum opened, including the work of Sag Harbor Elementary’s fourth grade students. Amongst more than 1,000 fellow young artists from the East End of Long Island, the Sag Harbor fourth-graders stood out with projects based on passion.

Named “Passion in Action,” the students used mixed media to create an art piece that would invoke thought and conversation around the desire to make a difference. In Lisa Miller’s art class, the students worked on individual projects before coming together to discuss their work. “Students finalized their pieces by writing an artist statement and helping each other express their ideas both visually and verbally,” said Miller.

Themes across their work included the planet, animals, sports and family. Georgia Weiss, created a display of pink dolphins which she hoped would inspire others to want to save wildlife. “I created this art because I wanted to save wildlife and the Earth. I am trying to say that pollution affects the animals,” she said. “I want people to look at my art and think they can change the Earth.”

On a similar note, Maggie Moore focused on pollution. “I made this project to tell people that polluting the Earth is bad,” she said. “How I want people to feel is sad that the Earth is being trashed. It’s about an oil spill and pollution.”

For Thomas Oppenheimer, he hoped his piece would encourage others to reflect on themselves. “I made a Cherry Blossom because when I look at it, I feel peaceful. When other people look at it, I want them to feel peaceful as well,” he said. “I used paint on paper.”

The SCMEA East Division All-County Festival has wrapped up and Sag Harbor students at the elementary school and Pierson Middle-High School participated. Preparation for the festival included weekends of rehearsals which accumulated to about 10 hours of practice per division. To participate in the festival, students are recommended by their music teachers.

For the Sag Harbor students in Division 1, practice was held at Riverhead High School and the concert was at Longwood High School. Heidi Rizzo and Ammiel Sobey attended from fifth grade, and Sophia Perri, Gabriella Hugo, Mia Milazzo, Emily Drohan and Kate Deleski represented grade six.

For Division 2 students, Pierson students, Shoshana Sobey, Mia Luna, Georgia Finelli, Jack Fuer, Vanessa Rizzo, Savannah Romano, Olivia Quinn of grades seven and eight attended rehearsals at Miller Place High School with their final performance at Longwood High School.

Allison Cottrell was the sole performer for Pierson in division 3 with her rehearsals held at Eastport-South Manor Junior-Senior High School and the concert at Longwood High School.

Ross School Admissions invites prospective students and parents to visit the school on Friday, March 31, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Ross School students, teachers, heads of school divisions, coaches, and other faculty and staff will be on hand at the Goodfriend Park campus. The Ross School serves students from nursery to grade 12. RSVP by emailing admissions@ross.org.

Tate Webster of Sag Harbor was named to the winter 2022-23 honors list at Pomfret School, as was Charlotte Reis of Sag Harbor.