At Roxbury Latin, boys pursue multiple passions
“It is the thing I most look forward to each week,” says Richard Impert, a senior at The Roxbury Latin School. Richard is talking about his a cappella rehearsals, and the important role they’ve had in his overall growth as a student and person throughout his high school years.
Richard—who lives in Boston and attended the Boston Preparatory Charter School as a younger student—is in his sixth and final year as a student at Roxbury Latin, an independent school located in West Roxbury and serving boys in grades 7 through 12. Reflecting on his previous five years, and on the broad contributions he has made to the life of the school community, Richard identifies how his participation in the choral programs at RL has opened opportunities for practicing teamwork, developing close friendships, and taking healthy risks. “There is a strong sense of camaraderie with the guys,” he says. “You spend so much time practicing that you build a real connection with one another. That feeling of taking the stage for a performance is something I won’t forget. You get up there, and all those hours of rehearsals are behind you, and it is time to show everyone what you’ve got. It’s an amazing experience.”
Like most Roxbury Latin boys, Richard’s passions are not singular. He is a student; he is an athlete; and he is a performer. He holds these three aspects of himself in proper balance, recognizing that they together work to comprise the fullness of his interests. Challenges overcome in the classroom work in tandem with challenges overcome on the wrestling mat, and it is through the accumulation of these small tests that Richard has forged his identity and fashioned himself into the confident young man who now, along with his 51 classmates, helps to lead the student body.
During his time at the school, Richard has taken part in countless curricular and extracurricular endeavors. He cites his junior year Computer Science course as one that tested him particularly. “My strength has always been in working with numbers. Languages have challenged me more. Computer Science is a course that asks you to bring numbers together with language. It was a challenging class that opened my eyes to the duality of those concepts within coding.” Richard is a committed wrestler who has been a part of the program since his first winter season as a seventh grader. After five years of playing soccer, he has decided in his senior fall to try football for the first time. Richard has played lacrosse while here, and tennis, and is even contemplating trying track and field this spring. He has sung in the school’s choral program each of his years at RL and for his final three years as a member of the school’s selective a cappella group, the Latonics. He has been on Roxbury Latin’s stage for two plays and one musical, so far, with more productions in his future. He has traveled with the school to Quebec, Washington D.C., and Los Angeles. He has spent a month in France as part of RL’s language immersion program, and this spring he will travel to the Czech Republic with his peers. He is committed to his passions while unafraid of trying something entirely new, even late in his high school years. He has been, as we want all our boys to be, open to new opportunity—and opportunities abound at Roxbury Latin.
Richard and his RL schoolmates benefit from supportive teachers and coaches who care to go beyond the requisite attention to their classes and activities. The school’s advising system ensures that each boy will be cared for as an individual, whose six- or four-year journey through the school will result not merely in his growth as a student and athlete and artist, but will—and must—result in his growth as a person of character and of unflinching integrity. The school cares most of all what kind of person a boy is. As a community, Roxbury Latin places great importance on civility, cooperation, and respect, and it reinforces these behaviors always. The students who comprise the school are bright and talented as individuals, but their precociousness gives way to humility as they recognize that power lies in their collected assembly and not in their individual exploits. “I really like my classmates, in particular,” says Richard. “We are close, and the guys who came to RL in ninth grade meshed really well. We’ve been through a lot together and have depended on one another.”
A small school of 304 boys, Roxbury Latin is located in West Roxbury. Easily accessible from all parts of the City of Boston, the school is proud to serve the community it has been a part of since its founding in 1645. Richard Impert, a shining example of one whose commitment is broad and whose spirit is generous, is one of many similarly bright and engaged students who together make up the Roxbury Latin student body. As an independent, all-boys’ day school, Roxbury Latin is a distinctive community comprised of boys from various backgrounds contributing various talents. Through its need-blind admission process, the school seeks ambitious young men who endeavor to realize their potential and aspire to do something good with their lives. To learn more about Roxbury Latin, please visit www.roxburylatin.org, or contact us at admission@roxburylatin.org or 617-477-6317.
