Celebrating the Class of 2025!

As numbers go, 32 is pretty cool. Water freezes at 32 degrees Fahrenheit; each game of chess begins with 32 pieces. Thirty-two is a so-called “Leyland Number,” which can take the form x^y + y^x, where x and y are integers greater than 1. (32 = 4^2 + 2^4) And 32 is one better than Baskin Robbins was able to put on offer.  

There are also 32 students in the Browning Class of 2025—and as students go, they, too, are pretty cool.  In terms of traditional academic and co-curricular accomplishments, this graduating class has done some remarkable work: Award-winning independent research, NYCAL and NYSAIS playoff appearances, outsized successes in mock trials and debates, bravura performances in music recitals and staged dramas, reliable social impact commitments, and a record number of Certificates of Distinction, among other collective achievements. 

But to assess this group of 32 simply on the basis of honors won and grades earned would be a bit like judging Emily Dickinson on the number of poems she published, or esteeming Rembrandt for the amount of money he made selling his paintings. Like these artists, there is something larger about the Class of ’25 that cannot be so readily quantified or reduced. As much as I admire our seniors’ stellar work in our classrooms, their triumphs on our playing fields, and their production in our creative and maker spaces, what stirs me most (and what I will long remember) are the low-key but deeply significant ways in which they served as keepers of the best aspects of Browning culture.  

One could have forgiven the Class of ’25 guys if they felt that the calendar was always conspiring against them. The Grade 8 year is one that is often both developmentally fraught and ritually essential, and thus a period where balance and continuity are especially important. For these boys, however, Grade 8 was syncopated by the scheduling and social restrictions occasioned by COVID-19 protocols. Now, as they conclude Grade 12, these same boys are again feeling the bad luck of timing, again during a transition year, as we complete our brand new Upper School building on East 64th Street, just in time for their graduation. While our community rightly celebrates an exciting new space and the hard work and dedication that it took to produce it, the Class of ’25 could themselves wonder why its divisional passages are always threatened with potential disappointment.

But that’s not who this group of 32 has been. Four years ago, many of them were confronted with a suboptimal way to depart Middle School, yet the “grytte” of those boys held the day, as they moved through the pandemic and into Upper School without lasting complaint, but instead with a certain sense of togetherness. Similarly, they have never begrudged their younger schoolmates the current excitement of a new building; rather, they elected to propel our school year forward with a unique combination of enthusiasm, maturity, and fellowship. The images of their leadership linger in my mind’s eye: Bouncing around Field Day cheering on younger Panthers; exploding with joy when one of their number gained admission to the college of his choice; camping out on our reading deck for a cookout that served as the most congenial “Senior Prank” of all time; collectively crowding our lobby on the last day of their classes to shake hands with entering students. In these instances and beyond, they looked after each other—and the whole of the school—with a selflessness that was frankly astonishing amidst a society so given to individual aggrandizement.

The arrival of June is always cause for celebration, for reflection on the connection, motivation, and authenticity that our boys have expressed and actualized throughout the school year. And as our summer approaches, there is the added excitement of the new construction that promises to enhance journeys of Browning boys on both East 62nd and East 64th Street.  But even as we look to the future, we do well to pause and commend the Class of ’25, those 32 who modeled so much of the intellect and integrity, of the courage and compassion that we seek from our boys. They have been reflective, resilient, and responsible, and have left Browning a better place not simply by what they have done, but by who they have been. They will graduate from our school on June 10, but they will not be forgotten.

A great summer to the Class of ’25, and to all those who call Browning home!