How can it be? We have reached the end of yet another successful year at Wilmington Friends, a school known for its intense Quaker pride, highly involved students, championship sports teams (sometimes), outstanding academics, and of course, the legacy the school leaves its students. Friends students leave senior year ready to enter the dreaded ‘real world’ and become prosperous contributing members of society.

Although many seniors are ecstatic to finally be finished high school, they will not be able to help but miss certain aspects about the life changing years that they have spent at Friends. From life-long friends to life-changing teachers, there is just so much to miss! Jodi Lessner ’16 commented, “What I will miss most about friends is my amazing teachers. I learned so much from all of them and feel very prepared for college!” Natalie Szumel ’16 is also very laudatory of her teachers: “I’m going to miss the way some teachers refer to students as ‘friends.’ I never really thought about how warm and comforting that was until I realized I probably won’t have professors holding up a hand and saying ‘friends’ to a talkative class.” At WFS, it is clear that the teachers strive to not only be teachers of a subject, but also life-long mentors.

Active student involvement in clubs is typical at Friends. Students are given the opportunity to join any club and even create one of their own! In clubs from Entrepreneurship to Robotics to African American Affinity, students have an array of wonderful clubs to partake in during lunch everyday.

Jessica Saunders ’16 comments: “I’m really gonna miss yearbook class because we’re like a family, and also Prism Night because it’s such a great community event!” Students like Jessica are appreciative of the experience, people, and knowledge that clubs have to offer.

Wilmington Friends students are very familiar with the six Quaker ‘Spices’; Simplicity, Peace, Integrity, Community, Equality, and Stewardship. Although all six ‘spices’ are relevant and deeply ingrained within Friends, perhaps the one most appreciated is the school’s phenomenal sense of community; everyone looks out for everyone. Patrick Haubert ’16 comments, “The strong sense of community that WFS has, it’s something that I’ve really grown to like in my time at friends and something that makes this school stand out.” Maddie Ireland ’16 adds, “I’ll miss having such a small grade because even though you know everyone, you develop close relationships as well.” Seniors will without a doubt miss this tight-knit community when they are at large colleges.

When asked what they will miss most about Friends, seniors did not hesitate to answer; there are so many things that make Wilmington Friends a fantastic place to go to school.  Perhaps something all current students should take away from all of this is how important it is not to take any time at Friends for granted, because, as the seniors have discovered, it will be over in a heartbeat.