Bolles President and Head of School Tyler Hodges, along with student and faculty leaders, hosted the Bolles Upper School San Jose Campus First Quarter Honors Convocation virtually on October 20.

Another first time ever event for Bolles administrators, the honors assembly included recognition of students named to the First Quarter President’s List, campus announcements from Bolles Student Council President Adarsh Aratikatla '21 and a presentation on the Honor Code from Bolles Honor Council President Avani Bansal '21. A performance from the newly formed Bolles Drumline also took center stage in McGehee Auditorium, where organizers filmed the live Teams meeting. Students and faculty watched the streamed convocation from their classrooms.

The President’s List is comprised of a select group of students nominated by teachers and students. A faculty committee identifies student candidates who best exemplify The Bolles Way by pursuing excellence through courage, integrity and compassion. This year, President’s List winners explained their service work in pre-recorded videos filmed prior to the virtual meeting. The 2020-21 First Quarter President’s List recipients are:

• Kate Hastings ’21, Sophia Mitchell ’21 and Caldwell Connolly ’21: These students were tasked with planning Homecoming Week 2020 festivities and received the award for successfully and safely reworking a longstanding and important tradition at Bolles. Hastings, Mitchell and Connolly modeled courage during these abnormal times by keeping a positive outlook on all Homecoming events. The Bolles community was very proud of their innovation and the way they came up with the idea for two separate pep rallies and filming the upper school Homecoming convocation. Without their countless hours of dedication, the School would not have been able to keep as many of the “normal” traditions associated with Homecoming.
• Sophie Monahan ’21: Monahan won a President’s List award for her passionate involvement with the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s annual fundraiser. She recruited team members, organized multiple planning meetings, set team goals, developed various fundraising strategies and regularly communicated with her team. Monahan’s extensive efforts helped raise $70,000 for LSS – more funds than the other dozen or so teams from various schools in Northeast Florida. Monahan was named one of the LSS Students of the Year.
• Adarsh Aratkikatla ’21: Aratikatla received the award for his work raising funds for Wolfson Children’s Hospital. He spent the summer planning ways he and his school club could support and honor one of the community’s greatest medical resources. Despite the pandemic shutting down initial fundraising plans, Aratikatla pressed forward with new plans for a drive-in movie fundraiser. He was able to plan and execute two of the fundraising events in recent months – learning how to work with different vendors, law enforcement and city officials to make it all happen. Due to his extensive efforts, these events were such a huge success.
• Emily Lekas ’21 and Natalie Garcia ’21: Lekas and Garcia received the honor for their tireless and thoughtful efforts on the Bent Center Reef Mural. The project was a cooperative effort involving four art classes, who created more than 40 relief carved fish and planned the 8-foot by 40-foot mural’s point of view. The Art Club primed and prepared the wall and had just begun to add color to the wall when our campus switched to distance learning in March. Sadly, the project came to a halt. Lekas and Garcia worked to complete the mural safely and authentically. It was an incredible achievement to see the mural completed after they worked long days for three weeks to ensure the fish created by others were thoughtfully presented. The students demonstrated dedication, commitment to excellence and concern for campus beauty.
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