Tag: Brookline High School

  • Brookline resident and GBH producer recognized for dedication to youth education 

    Brookline resident Elizabeth Gardner was recently honored for her work creating public media projects that foster civic engagement and media literacy for students. Photo courtesy Elizabeth Gardner

    A Brookline resident and GBH producer has been honored for her work creating public media projects that foster civic engagement and media literacy for students.

    Elizabeth Gardner, who oversees video production for the social studies, civics and history curriculum on PBS LearningMedia, has been named a 2026 Becton Fellow. Her work includes the youth-facing educational web series “Why It Matters” and the civic action program “Youth Stand Up.”

    The Becton Fellowship is designed to support GBH producers in their professional development by providing them with grants to explore career opportunities, said Seeta Pai, GBH’s vice president of children’s media and education. Gardner is among eight GBH producers receiving Becton, Rey and Peter S. McGhee fellowships, all of which are awarded annually by GBH.

    Pai called Gardner the star of GBH’s education department who “brought out the best of GBH.” 

    “There’s nobody else that does it quite like us,” Pai said. “We don’t just use media gratuitously. We use it for a purpose.”

    Gardner, who joined GBH in 2016, frequently collaborates with educators and students to turn complex histories into accessible classroom tools.

    “All of this is to equip students to be engaged citizens in this world and know how to do it and why it matters to them,” said Gardner. 

    At a rocky time for GBH and public media across the country, Pai said, Gardner has been essential in helping the department navigate funding cuts by creating content that performs well and addresses current civics and democracy headlines in a digestible way. In July, Congress pulled back funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, costing GBH  $18 million, about 8 percent of its budget. 

    “All the work she’s done is the example of what public media brings and what could be lost if it isn’t around,” Pai said.

    “Youth Stand Up,” designed for middle schoolers, features short video profiles of young civic leaders, explainer videos and a skill-building toolkit to support student-run projects, such as worksheets and activities that teachers can use in the classroom.

    “We really are looking for opportunities to bring in youth voices wherever we can,” she said, “so that we’re not just making media for young people. We’re also making it with young people.” 

    Gardner takes a social media-style approach to “Youth Stand Up” videos, drawing inspiration from TikToks and Instagram Reels to capture students’ attention.

    “We knew [there] was an issue [of] young people that were learning civics in the classroom and really not connecting it to their own lived experience or understanding how this had to do with them,” Gardner said. 

    To find a solution, Gardner’s team went into middle school classrooms and found that students respond “overwhelmingly” well to videos that feature quick cuts, text on screen and a first-person perspective from a young person speaking to the camera. 

    One video centers on a Native American teen who organized a book drive on Native American reservations that featured Indigenous characters and authors. Another was a TikTok-style explainer on how to identify a credible source created and presented by a freshman at Cornell University. 

    As a Brookline resident, Gardner said she has seen student leaders in the community step up and take action. 

    In 2020, Gardner and her team produced a “Youth Stand Up” video on Adaeze Anyaosah, who at the time was a Brookline High School student who organized a rally for racial justice in Brookline. 

    The team turned her activism efforts into a short video and created accompanying materials for classroom learning. 

    “My experience of Brookline is that it is a community of people who care deeply about the place that they live and about their neighbors in the world, and that’s been very inspiring to me,” Gardner said. 

    Zaheer Ali, an educator in New Jersey, worked with Gardner on the documentary series “American Muslims: A History Revealed.”As executive producer, Ali said Gardner respected his goals and vision for what needed to come to fruition.

    Ali said he felt comfortable rejecting ideas and pushing back on different decisions during the production. 

    “Elizabeth and I had long conversations where it was clear that she respected what I wanted to make sure came across in the materials,” Ali said.  

    Ali said being able to draw on public media is more important than ever, as the media spaces young people turn to may not always be credible. 

    “It’s really important for my students to be able to find that kind of media that we can critically engage with but depend on as having gone through some kind of process that has passed the test of scholarly rigor and academic integrity,” Ali said.  

    Gardner said her colleagues and their department’s mission inspire her to continue working in public media as the industry evolves. 

    “I found a home at GBH,” she said. 

    This story is part of a partnership between Brookline.News and the Boston University Department of Journalism.

  • Alumni golf tournament helps fund scholarships for 17 students in BHS class of 2025

    Maria Udalova, who graduated from Brookline High School this month, will attend George Washington University this fall with her first year fully paid — thanks in part to a scholarship awarded in the memory of a lifelong resident.

    Udalova, who helped found Brookline’s Students for Nuclear Disarmament club and lobbied at the U.N. as a junior, is one of 17 students from the Class of 2025 to receive scholarships from Brookline High’s Alumni Association.

    “It’s important to show young people that they are cared about and that people are invested in our futures,” said Udalova, who plans to study international affairs, “especially right now when there’s so much going on in the world.”

    About $10,000 of student scholarships were funded by alumni donations and the association’s annual charity golf tournament, held June 13.

    The alumni association was founded in 1990 to build a network of Brookline graduates, help organize class reunions and raise scholarship money for current students. It has hosted the annual golf tournament as its only fundraiser for 31 years.

    The scholarship Udalova received is named for Brenda Moran, a member of the Class of 1965 who lived in Brookline her entire life until her death in 2020. Moran was named to Brookline’s sports hall of fame in 2012 for her accomplishments in field hockey and softball, and she was named a Greater Boston League all-star in both sports.

    Her niece, Caroline Moran, travels from Texas each year to support the community and golf tournament, which was renamed in her aunt’s honor in 2020, even though Caroline has never lived in Brookline.

    Although she was awarded less than $2,000 — which may seem insignificant compared to college tuition — Udalova said the scholarship will have a huge impact on her family’s finances. The money is expected to cover the balance after her other scholarships are deducted, making her first year of college free.

    Sarah Smolyar, who also won one of this year’s scholarships, will attend UMass Amherst in the fall, where she anticipates double majoring in business and math.

    “It’s just gonna make everything a little bit less stressful,” Smolyar said, “especially since everything’s gonna be new and different, it’ll just take a little bit of that off.” Smolyar, whose mother, Olga, graduated from Brookline in 1990, is one of several recipients this year with an alumni parent.

    This year the tournament hosted 40 golfers — a drop from previous years that attracted around 100 participants.

    “We need more golfers,” said Paul Deletetsky, a member of the Class of ’69.

    Deletetsky grew up across the street from Robert T. Lynch Municipal Golf Course, where the tournament was held, and participated for his fourth year.

    New golfers, like Tara Sales, were also in attendance. A 2006 alumni, Sales played alongside her father and brother, who participate each year.

    The golf tournament and alumni association are both searching for fresh faces.

    “Unfortunately, what we’re finding is that we’re having a really hard time finding younger people that want to be involved,” said Marcy Kornreich, Class of ’74, the alumni association’s newsletter editor and former president. “I think that’s a challenge a lot of organizations are facing, especially nonprofits.”

    Kornreich acknowledged the tournament has become more demanding, with much of the planning falling on her and 83-year-old treasurer and president Stanley Goldberg. She said attending the scholarship ceremony for the first time reminded her why she got involved in the alumni association to begin with.

    “When we walk through the halls, they’ve done a lot of renovations on the school,” she said, “but it feels like the same place and the same sort of vibrant spirit and commitment to individual success, whatever that looks like.”

    Abigail Ketema, the only recipient to attend the golf tournament, will continue her education at Wentworth Institute of Technology, where she plans to major in architecture.

    “The amount of stress taken off my family — and definitely other families’ backs — is just, like, incredible,” Ketema said, “and I don’t know how else to say thank you.”

  • BHS celebrates the graduating class of 2025

    BHS Graduates throw their caps in the air. Photo by Miu Tung Rong

    Friends and family gathered at Cypress Field on Sunday to celebrate the 531 graduates of Brookline High School’s Class of 2025.

    The graduation ceremony opened with a welcome from Associate Dean Jenny Longmire, followed by multilingual greetings from international students in celebration of the more than 70 languages spoken throughout Brookline High hallways.

    Sarah Moghtader, vice chair of the School Committee, congratulated the Class of 1975 on its 50th graduation anniversary. Although decades have passed, the classes of 2025 and 1975 are connected by their vision, courage and creativity, Moghtader said.

    In an address to her fellow graduates, Rou-Qian “Esther” Wang discussed her experience attending high school in America as a first-generation immigrant from Taiwan. The last few years were filled with self-exploration, friendship and support from her community, she said.

    BHS graduate Rou-Qian “Esther” Wang addresses the crowd. Photo by Muayad Al-Barwani

    “My time at Brookline has taught me courage — courage to stand out and be different,” Wang said. “The second family I found here has helped me navigate the surreal landscape of an American high school.”

    Two student music groups, Band 504 and the MCs, performed during the ceremony.

    In a speech to his graduating class, senior Elias Brendel quoted Thomas Jefferson on the importance of an educated society. Recent political debates and attacks on education make the Class of 2025’s insight more critical than ever, he said.

    “For the past four years, BHS has prepared us to be good stewards of our democracy, not just by accumulating knowledge, but by cultivating discernment,” Brendel said.

    Link to Slideshow of Brookline High School graduation on June 8, 2025: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xEnvl3wcaDA

    During his keynote speech, MIT graduate and Brookline alum Danny Kanamori reminded students that life is not luck but a series of choices. He encouraged graduates to forge healthy relationships through kindness, which “comes from willingness to favor empathy and not fall slave to sympathy.”

    The self-described “worst hire Morgan Stanley had ever made” joked about the unexpected twists that have occurred in his own life and career. Kanamori urged the graduates to embrace failure and resist fears of public perception.

    “The war on others is not a coincidence,” Kanamori said. “Find the people you disagree with most and understand how they got there.”

    Derek Choi, whose daughter, Clara, graduated Sunday, said in an interview that the school’s strong sense of community and inclusive environment helps students become better people.

    Aidan Kapusta, who will study biology at Cornell University in the fall, said he will cherish Brookline’s charismatic and supportive teachers. Timur Tuncman, who is headed to the University of Chicago, said his teachers and peers from the past four years have strongly impacted him.

    Graduate Miles Nygren, who will study psychology at the University of Southern California in the fall, said after the commencement he will miss the freedom Brookline High gives its students.

    “From freedom of thought to freedom of expression, it’s really special how much they let us be ourselves and think for ourselves,” he said.

  • Brookline officials outline local public health strategy amid federal funding cuts

    Brookline public health officials promise more local support as President Trump’s administration slashes federal funding for programs across the country.

    Dozens of residents attended Friends of Brookline Public Health’s event “High Stakes for Public Health in 2025” at the Brookline High School freshman building Wednesday night. The event was part of National Public Health Week, which included a public health carnival and a pilates class earlier in the week.

    Patricia Maher, the Friends’ president, said the event is critical at a moment when public health programs are being threatened across the country.

    “These are not normal times,” said Maher, a nurse practitioner. “There already are and will continue to be profound consequences for everyone but especially for vulnerable populations.”

    Trump terminated $11 billion in public health grants last month, though a federal judge has temporarily blocked the cuts. The Massachusetts Department of Public Health will lose $100 million over the next year if the cuts go through, according to Governor Maura Healey’s office.

    The cuts will likely not mean direct staff cuts to Brookline’s public health services, said Sigalle Reiss, director of the town’s public health department, but could create uncertainty that has “ripple effects.”

    It’s possible that state grants could get redistributed, she said, or that local nonprofit partners could lose funding that limits their services.

    “There’s really exciting public health work that we might have to pare down or go back to basics,” Reiss said in an interview. “There’s certain things we have to do, and there’s certain things we’d like to do.”

    Maher said the best way to handle the federal cuts in Brookline is to care for people in the community – including by donating to the Friends of Brookline Public Health.

    The organization raised $3,812 in a fundraising push in the fall of 2024. The money is directed to programs to assist public health such as health services for Brookline public schools and funds for the food pantry.

    “Caring is a form of power,” Maher said.

    Public health awards

    Outstanding contributors to public health in Brookline received awards to start Wednesday’s event.

    Chris Chanyasulkit, former president of the American Public Health Association, was given the Alan Balsam Public Health Leadership Award. Previous recipients include former Massachusetts Governor and Brookline resident Michael Dukakis, who was a mentor to Chanyasulkit.

    Chanyasulkit assisted in the creation of the Diversity, Equity, Inclusion and Community Relations office in the Brookline Public Health Department.

    “I hope each of you leaves today recognizing that things are tough but together there’s all these great people and we’ll be fine,” she said.

    Deborah Brown, president of the Brookline Community Development Corporation, received the inaugural Public Health Equity award.

    Brown, who works on projects such as improving housing stability for town residents and helping fund the Brookline Food Pantry, said health and justice are intertwined.

    “Equity is not a dirty word,” she said.

    A fitness center, Healthworks Fitness, and a yoga studio, Down Under School of Yoga, both received the Herb Carlin Community Health Award.

    Academic advice on navigating cuts

    Nicole Huberfeld, a Boston University professor of health law who researches the intersection of health and constitutional law, spoke about navigating federal cuts in public health at the local level.

    Huberfeld said local officials should prioritize “cost-efficient” instead of “cost-saving” public health initiatives. Public health requires significant investment to create healthier citizens, so the main focus should be on efficiency and not simply on reducing costs for the sake of it, she said.

    “Almost nothing has happened in medicine or public health in the United States without partnership between the federal government and the states,” she said.

    Reiss, the town’s public health director,and John Kleschinsky, the assistant director of policy and programming, talked about the new Community Health Improvement Plan.

    The improvement plan focuses on four priorities: financial security, access to social and health services, affordable housing, and mental and behavioral health.

    For financial security, the plan includes working with career development programs to help residents find financially secure jobs, Kleschinsky said. Access to social and health services will be improved by hiring “diverse and culturally competent” social workers and other facilitators.

    “Each strategy is designed with health equity at its core,” Reiss said. “We want to make sure that resources and opportunities are distributed fairly, and that historically underserved communities receive the support they need.”

    Brita Lundberg, founder of Lundberg Health Advocates in Brookline, attended the event and said she appreciated the plan’s emphasis on working with nonprofits.

    “We always talk about in healthcare how things are so siloed,” said Lundberg, who is a physician. “But they are very siloed in the nonprofit world too.”

    Chanyasulkit said the event established a strategy for dealing with federal cuts even though it was planned well before they were handed down.

    “The theme is it starts here,” she said. “We have a plan that has actual strategies attached to each, as opposed to just lofty goals.”

    Sam Mintz contributed reporting. 

  • Brookline alum in the running for a global marathon record

    James Redding and his mother Lisa Redding started their running journey together. Photo by Claire Law

    James Redding is getting a head start on spring break.

    The 19-year-old Boston College sophomore flew to Japan a few days ahead of his mid-semester break to take his spot among 37,500 people who ran the Tokyo Marathon on Sunday.

    The Brighton teenager, who grew up attending Brookline schools and is now an assistant varsity hockey coach at Brookline High, already has five marathons under his belt, including three of the six original Abbott World Marathon Majors: Boston, New York and Chicago.

    The World Marathon Majors, sponsored by the health care company Abbott Laboratories, is a competition that awards points and prize money to top finishers in high-profile marathons over the course of a year. The Sydney Marathon was added this year as the seventh race in the series, but the competition will continue to award its Six Star medal for any participants who complete the original six marathons.

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    Redding unexpectedly secured a spot in the Tokyo race, his fourth World Marathon Major, through the lottery system, he said.

    “I was like, ‘I can’t pass this up,’” Redding said. “We gotta go now.”

    After Tokyo, he is on track to run the remaining two World Marathon Majors: London in April, then Berlin in September. If he finishes as planned, he has a chance at becoming the youngest male athlete to finish the six World Marathon Majors, at age 20 years and four months.

    That distinction is now held by American Paralympic athlete Daniel Romanchuk, who completed the six Marathon Majors in the wheelchair division at 20 years and 7 months, in 2019. For non-para athletes, the youngest male to finish all six is Hendrik Tomala of Germany, who finished the six Marathon Majors in 2024 at just one day older than Romanchuk was when he finished, according to Abbott World Marathon Majors staff.

    Redding’s mother, Lisa, whom he began his running journey with, was cheering him on in Tokyo.

    “I never imagined going to Japan,” said Lisa Redding, who also went to Brookline High School and has worked at the school for over 20 years, first as a math teacher and now as an administrator. “Supporting him and watching him do his thing brings me so much joy.”

    James Redding, center, runs the Tokyo Marathon on Sunday, March 2, 2025. Photo by Deb Redding.

    James started running when he was a freshman at Brookline High in 2019, to get in shape for hockey tryouts. He persuaded his mother to join him on runs, with the goal of running a 5K every month.

    “When your 14-year-old son says, ‘Hey, Ma, let’s do something together,’ you don’t say no,” Lisa Redding said. “I just kept saying yes, because my son wanted to spend time with me.”

    After the 5K, they trained for a 10K. By the fall of 2021, they had finished their first half marathon together.

    “And then, as soon as I crossed the finish line of the half marathon, I turned to her and I said, ‘Let’s do a full,’” James Redding said.

    Lisa Redding refused at first, she said, until James told her one of the charities partnering with the Boston Marathon was the cancer center where she was treated for Hodgkin lymphoma, when James was 2 years old.

    “He told me, ‘Ma, you can run the Boston Marathon for Dana-Farber,’” Lisa said, blinking away tears. “How could I say no to that? They literally saved my life.”

    James, not yet 18, was too young to run the Boston Marathon. He cheered on his mother as she ran her first marathon in April, and he ran his first marathon in Portland, Maine, the following October, as a high school senior.

    He went on to run his second marathon in Clearwater, Florida. Then, he ran the Boston Marathon for the Brookline Education Foundation, the Chicago marathon for the Huntington’s Disease Society of America, and the New York City marathon for New Balance. He secured a spot in the New York City marathon through his work at the Warrior Ice Arena, which includes coaching clinics, being a hockey camp counselor, working games, and doing facilities and ice management work.

    Redding’s finish times for his marathons have been around 4 hours, plus or minus 15 minutes, he said. Tokyo was his slowest time, at around 4 hours and 54 minutes, as he had been battling a cough for the past few days. His fastest time was in Chicago, at 3 hours 43 minutes.

    James said his training cycles are around four months, starting at 10 miles, and going up in 2-mile increments every two weeks.

    “A lot of a lot of people are, like, ‘You’re nuts,’” James said. “I’ve gotten to the point where running doesn’t suck anymore. After a certain point … you mentally grasp it, you physically grasp it, and as you do it more and more, it hurts less and less.”

    Deb Re, James’ great-aunt, said she’s watched him grow up into a young man who is warm, caring, curious, brave, and disciplined.

    “He keeps moving that goal post. Every time he reaches a goal, he sets another one,” Re said. “It’s not really so much about the endgame, it’s about how he lives his life … it’s a joy to watch him do that.”

    Redding said when he goes running, he’s in his own world.

    “Everything else just stops … I never think about school, work, hockey, anything else,” Redding said. “It’s just, I’m going for this run. Enjoy that it’s a beautiful day out. Or, if it’s raining … it’s good practice, and if it’s not raining on race day, it’s just a bonus.”

    This story is part of a partnership between Brookline.News and the Boston University Department of Journalism.