David O'Halloran, Headmaster - Saint David's School, New York City

Yesterday, the Saint David's community was honored to welcome Sean Hagerty '98, S.J., as speaker for our first ever virtual Alumni Homecoming and Chapel Talk.  Following September 11, 2001, Sean served his country as a soldier in Iraq, then worked in the corporate world until he "listened to the whisper" that called him to serve his faith. He is now in the ninth year of his journey toward the priesthood as a Jesuit. Sean's talk, shared below, addressed the suffering and loss presented by the Covid-19 pandemic and asked us to consider how we will tackle the challenges posed by the outbreak.   "How are we to be the 'good men' that our teachers at Saint David’s hoped we would become?" he asked. While Covid may be a devastating plague, Sean warned that the lack of civil discourse in our country is an even greater threat. "The ability to find consensus is vitally important to civil society," he said. " The question before us today is, h...

 Last night, we time traveled to East Fourth Street in the mid-19th century.   For our annual Alumni Parents Council cultural event, Saint David’s alumni and alumni parent community were treated to a virtual tour of The Merchant’s House Museum, led by Museum Historian and our very own Alumni Parents Council Co-Chair Ann Haddad P ’09, ’12. Annie provided a firsthand look at the domestic lives of the Tredwells, a wealthy merchant class family and their Irish servants who lived in this home, our nation’s first structure to receive national historic landmark status.   The tour was fascinating, taking us through the entire late-Federal and Greek Revival row house, featuring the “jewel box” parlor level with beautiful architectural details, furniture, and other personal belongings from the Tredwell family. Throughout the tour, Annie provided a glimpse into life in Old New York, when the city’s destiny was determined by its proximity to the seaport and its northern boundary stop...

School is not about answers, it's about questions—especially “why” questions we ask boys and they ask each other. "Why" targets the heart of any matter, it asks not for a simple response but for careful consideration, exploration, and reasoned analysis. At the core of inquiry is respect for difference; to be able to entertain a different perspective with an open mind. It was Aristotle who once wrote, "It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." It is with an open mind and intellectual curiosity that our boys can critically analyze ideas and issues. In a recent publication of  Saint David's Magazine ,  History Curriculum Chair Joe Shapiro addresses this in his piece entitled: "Exploring Others' Perspectives in History's Lessons and Questions." The article demonstrates our widely used Socratic seminar approach -- in this example employed during a sixth grade history unit on the Hamilton/...