Student Life

When you ask current students about their favorite time of the day on The Frederick Gunn School campus, they invariably talk about time spent with friends, whether they are hanging out in the dorm or creating their own fun outside. School days are busy. Students move from academic and co-curricular commitments to dinner and evening study hall. But there are opportunities for friends to gather throughout the day. It might be grabbing a table together for lunch in the dining hall, hosting a movie night in your dorm room, or meeting up for an impromptu baseball game on the Quad, spikeball on the turf, or sledding on the hill behind Teddy House in winter.

Weekend activities include Open Skate and Open Hockey times at Linen Rink, trips to the Danbury Fair Mall and other local shopping centers, movie theaters, and area restaurants as well as the ever-popular Arethusa Farm Dairy for ice cream. Sign-ups are available for excursions to try bowling or visit a trampoline park, and some weekends are just good for sleeping in and going to brunch in the dining hall, where chocolate chip waffles and a fruit and yogurt bar are usually on offer. Students can also take advantage of dances, the fitness center, open gym times, seasonal activities (carve your own pumpkin, anyone?), movie screenings and guest performances right on campus, and cheer their fellow Highlanders at home.

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Student Life News

Silver Breath_Cleve Gray
"Cleve Gray: Towards an Art of Hope," A Retrospective Exhibition, on View Through May 22

A retrospective exhibition, "Cleve Gray: Towards an Art of Hope," opened April 10 in the Perakos Family Cares Art Gallery at The Frederick Gunn School, featuring works by American Abstract Expressionist painter Cleve Gray.

An opening reception will be held on Thursday, April 25, from 5:30-7:30 p.m. in the gallery, which is located in the Thomas S. Perakos Arts and Community Center on campus. The gallery is open to the public free of charge, Monday through Friday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Parking is available in the Upper Parking Lot off Kirby Road, with a limited number of accessible parking spaces outside the Thomas S. Perakos Arts and Community Center. Please see the Campus Map for details.
 

Adam Farber '00 Speaker Series 032224
Top Gun Instructor Adam Farber '00 Shares His Fighter Rules to Live By

U.S. Navy Commander Adam Farber ’00, who trained and served as an instructor in the U.S. Navy Fighter Weapon School (TOPGUN), returned to campus March 22 as part of the school’s 2023-24 Speaker Series and shared with students and faculty his “fighter rules to live by.”

A native of New Jersey, Farber’s dream from a young age was to fly an F-14 Tomcat, the supersonic, twin-engine fighter aircraft featured in the 1986 film, “Top Gun.” He didn’t get into the U.S. Naval Academy on his first try, and at the age of 18, enrolled at The Frederick Gunn School for a postgraduate year.
 

Gunn Music students Aryel Sealey, Stella Zhu and Colin Hall
Highlanders to Perform at All-State Music Festival

Three students from the Gunn Music Program will perform at the Connecticut Music Educators Association’s All-State Music Festival being held this weekend, April 4-6, at the Connecticut Convention Center in Hartford. The students were selected by audition after qualifying for the CMEA Northern Region Festival in February. 
 

Peg Addicks
Margaret P. Addicks Memorial Blood Drive is April 14

The Frederick Gunn School student group Hearts for Action is supporting an American Red Cross Blood Drive on April 14, 2024, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the Thomas S. Perakos Arts and Community Center on campus. Qualified students, faculty, parents, and community members are all invited and encouraged to participate in this annual event, honoring the late Margaret P. Addicks for her 45 years of service to the school and the Town of Washington. Walk-ins are welcome but appointments are strongly encouraged. Please use the link below to schedule an appointment online. 
 

Boys Varsity Hockey 2024 NEPSAC Quarterfinal win
Boys Varsity Hockey Advances to NEPSAC Semifinal on March 2

Gunn will face #1 seed The Rivers School in the 2024 NEPSAC Boys Ice Hockey Tournament Semifinals this Saturday, March 2, at 2 p.m. at The Rivers School in Weston, Massachusetts.

To catch the Highlanders in action, view the Live Stream here.

The winners of Saturday's semifinal matchups will advance to the New England Championship Finals, which will be played on Sunday, March 3, at noon at Harvard University.
 

Girls Varsity Ice Hockey vs. Millbrook 23-24
Boys and Girls Varsity Hockey in NEPSAC Tournament Doubleheader at Home

The Frederick Gunn School Boys and Girls Varsity Ice Hockey teams are headed to the 2024 NEPSAC Tournament. Both teams will play in their respective New England Quarterfinal games at home in a doubleheader at Linen Rink on Wednesday, February 28.  

Boys Varsity Hockey, the #4 seed, will play #5 seed Groton School at 3:30 p.m. 
Girls Varsity Hockey, the #3 seed, will face #5 seed The Rivers School at 6:15 p.m.

Both home games may be viewed via the Live Stream from Linen Rink.
 

Jason Koza, Dean of Academics
The Frederick Gunn School Names Dean of Academics

The Frederick Gunn School has named Jason Koza of Denver, Colorado, an experienced administrator and teacher, to lead its academic program as Dean of Academics beginning July 1, 2024. Koza’s appointment followed an intensive, three-month search process that drew interest from a diverse pool of applicants from across the country and around the world. 
 

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