The Exeter Athletics Department is excited to announce the return of Bill Glennon as the head coach of the boys varsity lacrosse program. Glennon, who served as head coach from 2014 to 2022 after spending the 23 previous seasons as an assistant with the program, returns to the helm of the team after spending the 2022 and 2023 seasons as an assistant under Matt Callahan ’09. Callahan departed the Academy to pursue other professional interests this past summer.

“Bill Glennon is one of the best coaches of young athletes in the country and, while he never left, we are thrilled to see him return as the head coach of the boys lacrosse program,” said Director of Athletics Jason Baseden. “We were grateful to him for serving as a mentor to his former player, Matt Callahan, for the past couple of seasons, and are eager for him to continue to build Exeter lacrosse as one of the premier programs in the nation.”

“I am very excited to return as the head coach of the boys lacrosse program and am looking forward to coaching this terrific group of student-athletes,” said Glennon.

Glennon has helped mentor hundreds of Big Red lacrosse student-athletes both on and off the field during his 30 years on campus. On the field, he has coached dozens of All-Americans, Academic All-Americans and over a hundred All-New England selections. Coach Glennon has also been voted NEPSAC Lacrosse “Man of the Year” and “Assistant Coach of the Year” on several occasions throughout his career and is a pillar of the lacrosse community.

In addition to coaching lacrosse, Glennon served as head coach of the Big Red football program from 1991-2012 and 2019-2021 and currently serves as an assistant coach with the program. While at the helm of the football team, Glennon guided the team to four appearances in the NEPSAC Class A Tournament, winning two New England Championships in the process. He was elected to the NEPSFCA Hall of Fame and currently has a championship bowl game named in his honor.

Prior to Exeter, Coach Glennon served as the head lacrosse coach at Rochester Institute of Technology and Hampden Sydney College, and guided those programs to four NCAA Division III Final Four appearances. During that time, Coach Glennon was a finalist for NCAA Division III Lacrosse Coach of the year as well as voted ICAC/ECAC Lacrosse coach of the year. Coach Glennon is active in many youth lacrosse programs and has coached for the highly respected 3-D and 4 Leaf Lacrosse programs throughout the country.

Glennon is a proud parent of three Exeter graduates (Ryan ’00, Lindsey ’02, and Travis ’05). Travis Glennon will return to the Big Red sidelines as one of the assistant coaches with the lacrosse program in 2024.

Exeter students, faculty and staff took part in a packed slate of speaking events, panels and workshops on Monday as the campus community celebrated the life and enduring legacy of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

“This is a very complicated day,” keynote speaker Dr. Tricia Rose told the assembled crowd in Love Gymnasium. “It sounds like a very simple day for many people, the way we celebrate King, but it’s much more complicated than that.”

Rose, a professor of Africana Studies and director of the Center for the Study of Race and Ethnicity in America at Brown University, spoke about her view of King as a teenager who had grown up in Harlem and the Bronx. At the time, she resented the way many people celebrated King’s life and words as if the outcomes he was fighting for had already been achieved.

“How could it be that we still had profoundly deep levels of systemic inequality that was not just random, that was not just left over from the past, but in fact being manufactured all the time, while we were celebrating [King’s] victories and our collective victory as the country?” Rose asked.

Some of King’s most famous statements, Rose pointed out, had been co-opted to endorse views that contradicted his true message, such as the need for color blindness or accusations of reverse discrimination against white people. “There was a twisted effort to invalidate the meanings of his works and words so that we could not have a claim,” she said. In fact, King did not shy away from pointing out the systemic nature of racism, and the ways in which white Americans have benefited from governmental policies in ways that their Black counterparts had no access to.

“Everyone can love and create a love that would help Black people, but you have to know what folks have been through,” Rose said at the conclusion of her remarks, which the audience rewarded with a standing ovation. “If you don’t know that, then love actually becomes a capacity and a way to ask us to be quiet and to accept the suffering and the erasure of the love that will actually heal us.”

Rose’s speech was preceded by a performance by the student dance groups Precision and Outkast. The Academy’s Concert Choir, directed by Music Instructor Jerome Walker, sang “Hymn to Freedom,” an ode to the civil rights movement written by Oscar Peterson in 1963, with words by Harriette Hamilton.

“To this day, Dr. King remains a very powerful force in my life,” said Principal Bill Rawson ’71; P’08, in brief opening remarks offered before Rose’s introduction. “I want to express a hope for all of you that through all of the programs that we offer, all the ways that we celebrate and reflect on the life and legacy of Dr. King … that you come to know more and that he comes to have in your lives the important influence that he’s had in mine.”

Featured “Black Entrepreneurs” panel

Following Rose’s keynote, students had the opportunity to engage in various workshops organized by the MLK Day Committee and facilitated by both Exeter faculty and staff as well as visiting speakers and alumni. As part of a featured panel in Love Gym, three Black entrepreneurs with businesses in Exeter and the surrounding region sat down with student moderators to answer questions about their respective business journeys and the challenges they’ve faced along the way.

Oneta Modern, owner of The Office Lounge, an upscale neighborhood restaurant and lounge in Dover, New Hampshire, spoke to the student audience of finding inspiration in the example of her mother, a native of South Korea who met her American-born father when he was serving in the military there. When Modern’s father later died in a car accident, her mother learned English in order to support her family on her own.

“She started her own business; she had a little candy store in the mall,” Modern recalled. “She became an entrepreneur herself. I watched my mom do this thing to feed my family, and that’s who I became.”

Modern and her fellow panelists spoke of how they sought out and found support as business owners of color in the largely white communities of seacoast New Hampshire, and how they dealt with the prejudice they had encountered over the course of their careers.

“I have a string of failures behind me,” said panelist Daryl Browne, who is the co-owner of Soleil’s Salt Cave, a wellness sanctuary and spa in downtown Exeter, and a former Exeter select board member. “I’m a technologist by trade … and I’ve done a bunch of tech startups and gone to the highest levels of Google, Apple, Amazon with technology that I created. Each time the door was opened to look at the tech and then they looked at me, like, this couldn’t come from you.”

“In the antiques business, 95% of the people don’t look like me,” said Lionel Loveless, owner of Officially Knotted Bowties, a business specializing in custom-designed bow ties made from upcycled materials, as well as two antique shops in the area. “I’ll get people who come in and say, I need to speak to the owner. I’m like, yes, how can I help you?”

Such prejudice was difficult for Loveless to confront, and he even considered leaving New Hampshire altogether. But at a certain point, he came to the realization that there were enough good people who came into his shop to make up for those who questioned his success or refused to sell antiques to him based on his skin tone. “[Now] I just laugh it off and say, you know what? We have the best shops in the Seacoast, and possibly all of New Hampshire. If you don’t want to shop here, that’s your loss. Deal with it.”

Workshops across campus

Students also participated in a wide range of workshops held in locations all over campus. The thumping beat of African music and the rhythm of pounding feet filled the third-floor dance studio in the Goel Center for a workshop called “Spirit Moves.” Taught by Ethel Calhoun, a teaching artist for Ailey Arts in Education & Community Programs, it explored how music and dance has played a role in uniting Black communities in Africa as well as the African diaspora, including the Caribbean and Latin America.

Over in the Class of 1945 Library, students gathered in the ground floor Commons area to explore “5 Steps to Becoming a Climate Justice Superhero” with Inemesit Williams, a longtime educator and adviser for In Good Company, a climate justice-centered nonprofit. Williams spoke to the students about the course of King’s career, and the shift he made to expand the battle for Black civil rights to campaign against poverty as well.

“The main thing with climate justice is just acknowledging the fact that climate change is not impacting everybody the same,” Williams told the students. “It’s often impacting poor people. It’s often impacting people of color more.” After Williams spoke, she had students take time to brainstorm 10 ways they could think about climate action, while considering the intersection of three key questions: “What are you good at?” “What problems need to be solved?” and “What brings you joy?”

Meanwhile, the warm smells of butter and vanilla wafted through the basement of the Elizabeth Phillips Academy Center as English Instructor Courtney Marshall held a workshop on “Food and the Civil Rights Movement.” Students baked pound cake based on the recipe of Georgia Gilmore, who organized a group of women who cooked and baked to support participants in the bus boycotts in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1955–56, as Marshall discussed such topics as segregated restaurants, sit-ins and the “shoebox lunches” that Black passengers carried on trains in an era when they were not allowed to enter the segregated dining cars.

These workshops were just a few of the many offerings attended by Exeter students over the course of the jam-packed MLK Day celebration. During the previous weekend, the campus community also enjoyed several related events, beginning with a special concert, “A Musical Tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.” on Sunday in the Forrestall-Bowld Music Center, featuring Symphonia, Concert Choir, Band and the Jazz Ensemble. That evening saw the school’s annual production of UnSilenced, Exeter’s student-run social justice showcase, which energized the crowd in the Goel Center’s Main Stage with a wide range of mediums including song, rap, dance, spoken word, film and poetry.

Coaches, family and friends gathered to celebrate the first wave of seniors who will go on to play at the collegiate level.

Family, classmates and friends joined to celebrate 25 members of the class of 2024 who have received a National Letter of Intent, Likely Letter, or early admittance to play their respective sports at the collegiate level. This was the first of two celebratory ceremonies that will take place this year, the next taking place during the spring.

“Nights like this are a great way to celebrate our students and their families,” said Director of Athletics Jason Baseden. “We are lucky to have such a supportive environment on our campus, seeing many peers support and cheer for one another in the crowd. These students put forth years of effort and training to be able to go on and play at the collegiate level, it is really nice to be able to honor that and we’re looking forward to doing the same again this spring.

The students will go on to compete at some of the top programs in the nation at the Division I and Division III levels. Click here to watch the ceremony on-demand.

By listening to a single song — Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car” perhaps, or U2’s “With or Without You” — Debbie Norris can picture herself at 16 years old, living away from home for the first time and attending the Exeter Summer program.

Norris is Navajo, and she grew up on the Tohono O’odham reservation in southern Arizona. During the summer of 1988, she sampled lobster for the first time, at a restaurant in Maine. She also took classes in Russian and history, and met fellow students from New York City and Puerto Rico, Japan and Korea.

“It was the first time I interacted with people from different countries,” Norris says. “Ironically, it was also the first time I met members from other [Native American] tribes — the first time I’d gone to school with Hopi students, students from San Carlos Apache and Laguna Pueblo.”

Norris learned about Exeter Summer from her brother, who had attended a year earlier. “We had traveled a little bit as youngsters but spent most of our time growing up in Arizona,” she recalls. “So it was a real eyeopener for him and then for me.”

In addition to the friends she made, some of whom she’s still close with today, Norris has also kept in touch with teachers she studied with that summer. She credits them with encouraging her to challenge herself intellectually. “I knew that I was intelligent, but nobody had ever really pushed me to see how far I could take that,” Norris says. “[Exeter Summer] really changed the trajectory of my life.” 

Norris would go on to major in history at Stanford University and attend a study abroad program at Oxford. After graduation, she embarked on a career focused on education in her home state. During a decade spent working in the Arizona Department of Education, Norris served as the state’s Indian Education Director as well as a deputy associate superintendent. “Having a broad knowledge of what it’s like to be a student in so many different types of schools made me a very effective Indian education leader for the state of Arizona, because I had so many different experiences in my background,” Norris says.

Earlier in her career, Norris served three terms in the Arizona state legislature, helping to pass education and school capital finance laws that impacted various learning environments and students across the state, including in tribal nations. In her current position as a compliance and policy project manager with the state’s Department of Administration, she is working to improve education from a different angle.

“I focus on creating policy, not legislation,” Norris explains. “One of the things I’m most proud of is that I worked for an administration that figured out a way to certify Native American language teachers in a state where there was no professional exam available for 22 languages that were Native American or Indigenous. Today, we have more than 120 Native American language teachers in the state of Arizona — I’m one of them.”

Norris hasn’t forgotten the role Exeter Summer played in her learning journey, and she has worked consistently over the years to help recruit Native American students for the program. Her efforts have been especially important as Exeter Summer seeks to rebuild attendance after the COVID-19 pandemic. “I encourage young people to look at the program, to put themselves out there and try some classes that they don’t have back at home,” Norris says.

Nathan Poocha of Flagstaff, Arizona, remembers his family connecting with Norris before he attended Exeter Summer’s Access program as a rising ninth grader in 2023. It was his first time traveling to the East Coast, and his first time living away from home. “I don’t think I’ve ever met people of such cultural diversity,” Poocha says. “I’ve met people from the United Arab Emirates, China, Poland.”

As a student in the Classics: Exploring the Ancient World cluster, Poocha got an introduction to both Latin and Greek and read excerpts from Homer’s The Odyssey and Ovid’s Metamorphoses. He and his classmates took a field trip to Boston, where they viewed ancient Greek pottery and statuary at the Museum of Fine Arts. “I didn’t really know what Classics was,” Poocha says. “My school only has Spanish and French, and I thought it would be a good thing to learn. I’ve really enjoyed it, and I would definitely recommend [Exeter Summer] to other people.”

For Norris, seeing students like Poocha explore new subjects and experiences is evidence that her efforts are paying off. “Exeter has a long-term commitment to our students in Arizona,” Norris says. “I’m just a part of that, but I’m very proud to play whatever role I can. For me, it’s been a lifelong relationship with educators, and with Exeter.”

Byron Grevious ’24 concluded his Exeter cross country career in emphathic fashion, running to an 11^th place overall finish at Nike Cross Nationals with a time of 15:28.0. Grevious was running with the lead pack throughout the rain-soaked, 5 kilometer course and jostled for position late, kicking to an exciting and crowded finish line that featured many of the top-ranked runners in the country.

“With these national championships and bringing all of the best guys from around the nation, just having this competition really excites me,” Grevious said in a pre-race interview with Runnerspace.com. “All these times I get to race to represent my school and the people that support me is what makes me most excited just to see what I can do. Its high school cross country, I’m having fun with it.”

Grevious wraps his fall career as one of the best to ever wear an Exeter uniform. He finishes his cross country career as a three-time New England team and individual champion, a Nike Cross Regional champion (2023) and runner-up (2022), while posting a 11^th place (2023) and 12^th place (2022) finish at Nike Cross Nationals while winning virtually every regular season race on the Big Red schedule.

His performance at Nationals this week follows a championship run last weekend when he placed first overall at Nike Cross Regionals on a challenging course at Bowdoin Park in Wappinger Falls, New York. Grevious cruised to a time of 15:32.8, a whopping 17 seconds ahead of the second place finisher, to pace the Exeter boys cross country pack to a fifth-place overall finish out of a field of 33 elite teams at the Northeast Regional.

Grevious will now turn his attention to the indoor circuit this winter. An on-demand broadcast of Nike Cross Nationals is available on RunnerSpace with a +PLUS account. Full results will be available on Athletictiming.net.

As cooler temperatures mark the end of the fall term at Exeter, dozens of students will head to warmer climes for hands-on-learning opportunities in New Orleans, Costa Rica, Miami and California. The week-long Global Initiatives programs will focus on various topics of study, like the history of indigenous Filipinos in the United States and environmental sustainability in many forms.

Ten students will head to “The Big Easy” to immerse themselves in the culture of New Orleans. The program is highlighted by service projects where participants will work restoring wetlands and supporting neighborhood revitalization projects alongside members of the local community.

Over a thousand miles to the south, 15 students will travel into the rain forest of Costa Rica to learn about the country’s commitment to protecting its natural resources and how it’s become the model for sustainable tourism. Here Exonians will interface with local scientists and farmers to learn about the delicate balance of preserving Costa Rica’s ecological beauty while welcoming nearly two million visitors each year.

Back stateside, 12 students will partake in a program studying a similar topic in South Florida. Participants will examine Miami’s plant and animal life and the tenuous ecosystem of one of the United States’ most popular vacation destinations. Students will tour the University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science and visit Everglades National Park.

In the late 16th century, the first recorded landing of Filipinos in North America occurred along California’s central coast. Nine students will travel to the area to study the impact of indigenous Filipino culture to the fabric of American history. The trip will include time in San Francisco, Morro Bay and Los Angeles where participants will meet with historians and visit Filipino cultural centers.

Exeter’s Global Initiatives programs are considered an extension of the Harkness table, offering students lessons in global citizenship through experiential immersion. Last year, more than 400 students and 51 faculty members participated in over two dozen travel and learning opportunities.

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With an emphatic 47-20 victory over Andover in the 142^nd meeting between to two schools last weekend, Exeter football wrapped up the Northeast Prep Football Conference outright championship and will host Choate Rosemary Hall this Saturday in the New England Preparatory School Athletic Council (NEPSAC) Leon Modeste Bowl for the New England Football Championship.

Exeter, which finished the regular season with a 7-1 record, is a winner of six straight games and will playing its first bowl game since the 2012 season. Choate enters the Modeste Bowl as winners of the Founders League title with an 8-0 record.

Both sides are explosive when they have possession of the ball. Exeter features an offense that has scored 34 points per game; Choate has put up an average of 43 points on the scoreboard each week.

Here’s what you need to know:

Kickoff: The Leon Modeste Championship Bowl will be played at Phelps Stadium at 1 p.m. Saturday.

Getting to campus: Search 3 Chadwick Lane, Exeter, NH into your GPS to navigate to Phelps Stadium. Parking is available in the garage below the William Boyce Thompson Field House and in lots 2-6 on Chadwick Lane. There will be limited parking available along Hammy’s Way, the dirt road adjacent to Lovshin Outdoor Track. Please walk over Hill Bridge to Phelps Stadium. Restrooms are available at the stadium.

Watch it live: The game will be streamed on Exeter Live.

Click here to view all of the NEPSAC Bowl matchups.

The most anticipated athletic event of the year: Exeter/Andover Weekend. A bright, sunny, Saturday with a chill in the air set the perfect setting for the 142^nd clash of Red and Blue. The promise of talent, sportsmanship, and school pride shined through as thousands descended on the Exeter campus to celebrate the oldest rivalry in high school sports.

In addition to a celebratory day on campus, Big Red had plenty to cheer about on the road, as the dominance of Exeter cross country teams continued. The Big Red boys captured their fourth consecutive New England title, while and the Big Red girls claimed their fourth New England championship in the past five seasons. The boys followed the lead of Byron Grevious ’24, who claimed his third straight individual title. Grevious, the third-ranked cross country runner in the nation in the latest Dyestat rankings, set a new Loomis Chaffee course record and came in at a blistering 14:56. Max Lacombe ’24 (4^th overall, 15:41), Pearce Covert ‘25 (8^th, 16:14), Jack Hutchins ’24 (9^th, 16:19), and Austin Desisto ’24 (12^th, 16:22) followed Grevious to help lift Big Red to the win.

The Big Red girls followed the lead of Tenley Nelson ’24 and Daria Ivanova ’24 en route to their title. Nelson cruised to a time of 18:21 to place second overall while Ivanova followed at 18:30 to capture third place. Julia Malysa ’26 (9^th, 20:18), Leta Griffith (21^st, 20:19), and Melani Dowling (22^nd, 20:21) each put forth strong races for Exeter. Big Red accounted for 67 total points, edging Andover by one to secure the win. Just last week, Andover beat Exeter by one at the E/A dual meet at Andover.

The boys JV cross country team continued their own impressive dominant streak, capturing their eighth straight JV title while the girls JV team place second overall.

The third-seeded boys varsity water polo also enjoyed an exciting Saturday as they bested second-seeded Hamden Hall, 10-6, in the semifinal round of the New England Championship Tournament. Big Red, who avenged a loss to Hamden in their lone matchup of the regular season, will travel to Andover tomorrow to square off with top-seeded Brunswick School for the New England title.

Back on campus, it was the girls volleyball team who ignited the day in front of a loud and raucous crowd with a 3-1 victory, to sweep the season series with the Blue. Ellie Ocampo ’25 was outstanding for the hosts, powering an explosive offensive attack that led to Big Red’s 20-25, 25-19, 25-15, 25-12 set victories. Exeter, which finishes their regular season with an 11-3 record, will await announcement of their postseason opponent. The NEPSAC Class A Tournament opens on Wednesday.

Andover boys soccer scored first midway through the first half before doubling up their lead with some tic-tac-toe passing with three minutes to go before the break. The score would remain the same in the final 45 minutes as the Blue earned the 2-0 victory. Dieder Wagner ’24 and Aaron Park ’24 were strong on the back line for Big Red.

Andover girls soccer bested Big Red by a score of 4-0. Morgan Mayer ’24 and Morgan Signore ’26 played well for Big Red, creating several chances throughout the day, while Esme Shields ’24 was strong in the middle of the field for the hosts.

A hotly contested match on Hatch Field saw Andover field hockey outlast Exeter and hang on for a 4-3 overtime win. The Blue held a 1-0 lead at the half, but Big Red was able to even the score early in the third period when Clare Stewart-Selvan ‘25 capitalized off a corner opportunity. The even score would not last for long, however, as Andover scored a pair over the next three minutes to reclaim a 3-1 edge. Exeter continued to battle and cut the deficit to one midway through the fourth when Natalia Ulbin ’24 found the back of the net. Ulbin would strike again four minutes later to even the score once again with three minutes to play in regulation and force overtime. Exeter had the first scoring chance in the extra period, but a stingy Andover defense cleared Big Red’s corner opportunity and quickly turned defense into offense and netted the game-winner on a breakaway chance.    

In the 142^nd matchup on the gridiron, Exeter capped an exciting day with a 47-20 victory over Andover. The win marks the third straight for Big Red in the series while also earning the Northeast Prep Football Conference outright championship. Exeter (7-1) will await to hear the possibility of a NEPSAC bowl game this week.

Exeter got on the board first when Zion Simmons ’24 took a reverse for 20 yards and into the end zone for the lone score of the opening quarter. Andover would stake a 7-6 lead early in the second quarter on a 25-yard scoring scamper of their own, but from there it was all Big Red. Simmons broke away for a 58-yard touchdown run before Kai Honda ’24 plunged in from four yards. Isaiah Reese ’25 then took a screen pass 50 yards, breaking multiple tackles en route to the end zone as Exeter broke the game open with a 26-7 lead at the half.

Johnny Getman ’24 hauled in a four-yard touchdown pass from Eddie Buehler ’24 before Big Red hit the ground running once again, as Reese exploded for a 51 yard score and Buehler added a touchdown on a keeper from six yards to secure the 47-20 victory.