• Saturday, June 2
• 10:00 a.m.
• The Tannery

All Darrow students are required to attend. Since there is limited seating in the Tannery, only parents and guests of seniors are able to attend Commencement exercises. All students and parents are invited to attend the Darrow Family Luncheon following Commencement.

Further information regarding regulations for Baccalaureate, Commencement, and end of year procedures are available on the Family Weekend page or by contacting Lisa Leary, 518-794-6016.

It is an end of year tradition at Darrow to recognize the successes of our seniors and underclassmen, as well as the efforts of all departments, at the Baccalaureate Ceremony.

• Friday, June 1
• 7:30 p.m.
• The Tannery

All students are required to attend the pre-Baccalaureate Ceremony dinner in the Dairy Barn at 6:15 p.m. as well as the Baccalaureate Ceremony. Parents are also welcome to join us.

Further information regarding regulations for Baccalaureate, Commencement, and end of year procedures are available on the Family Weekend page or by contacting Lisa Leary, 518-794-6016.

Dan Gibson, Reporter and Chief Coordinator of Our Energy Independence Community writes about his visit to Darrow's Fourth Annual Sustainability Symposium.

Darrow School will welcome several guest musicians from around the region who will join with students and faculty in presenting the Spring Musical Showcase. This year's concert features a full complement of strings for arias, pop songs, and original music by Darrow students. Throughout the prior week, music students will be working with visiting local professional musicians in master classes and rehearsals. With music ranging from Baroque, to movie soundtracks and original scores, the concert will also include an aria from Handel's "Messiah" performed by Marshall Cooper (father of Alexis '12 and Emily '08), who starred in a touring company performance of "The Phantom of the Opera." The concert will also include horns, blues, a cappella, and Motown selections.

• Friday, April 27, 8:00 pm
• Darrow Tannery Building
• Free and open to the public

As an added musical bonus, visitors during Spring Family Weekend will be treated to a command performance of Darrow's popular Coffee House. Free-form performances of music, songs, poetry will be featured.

• Saturday, April 28, 7:30 pm
• Darrow Heyniger Library
• Free and open to the public

Public inquiries: Lisa Leary, Assistant to Dean of Students, 518-794-6016.
Media inquiries: Steve Ricci, Director of Communications, 518-794-6004.

Darrow’s Family conferences are ideal opportunities to meet with your child’s advisor and tutors for dedicated discussions and updates. Conference meeting slots are filled on a first-come, first-served basis, so your timely response will aid us in maximizing the schedule for each day. Once the meeting times are scheduled, you will be notified of your appointments approximately one week in advance. Thank you for your patience. Please be prompt for your first session when you are on campus so that the schedule can be maintained throughout the day for everyone.

Please fill out the online REGISTRATION FORM.

Direct all inquiries to:
Lisa Leary, Assistant to the Dean of Students
(p) 518-794-6016
(f) 518-794-6099


5:00 pm–5:30 pm: Registration, Heyniger Memorial Library
5:30 pm–6:30 pm: Dinner, Dairy Barn Dining Room
6:30 pm–8:00 pm: Advisor/Tutor Conferences, Heyniger Memorial Library
8:00 pm: Spring Music Showcase, Tannery

Darrow music students join with faculty and special guest musicians to present a variety of songs ranging from Baroque to movie soundtracks. This year’s concert features a full complement of strings for arias, pop songs, and original music by Darrow students receiving string scoring advice through master classes with professional players.


7:00 am–8:30 am: Hot breakfast, Dairy Barn Dining Room
8:00 am–10:30 am: Registration, Heyniger Memorial Library
9:30 am–3:00 pm: School store open hours, Wickersham 205A
10:15am–11:15am: College counseling meeting for families of Juniors, Bethards
11:30 am: Community meeting for families, students & faculty, Tannery
12:15 pm–1:15 pm: Lunch, Dairy Barn Dining Room
1:00 pm–2:00 pm: Parent Council Meeting, Dairy Barn Glass Room
1:00 pm–3:30 pm: Art & Book Sale, Heyniger Memorial Library
2:30 pm: Softball, baseball, tennis, and Ultimate Frisbee competitions vs. Marvelwood, Athletics fields
5:00 pm–6:00 pm: Reception with Head of School Nancy Wolf and faculty, Whittaker House
6:00 pm–7:00 pm: Dinner, Dairy Barn Dining Room
6:30 pm–7:15 pm: Student art show and dessert reception, Joline Arts Center
7:30 pm: Coffee House: Command Performance, Heyniger Memorial Library mezzanine

Join us in the library mezzanine for an intimate performance of the best of this year’s Coffee House songs, readings, and fun. Students present covers of their favorite songs, original songs, poetry. prose, and perhaps some stand-up  comedy. See why Coffee House is one of the community’s favorite evening activities.


10:30 am: Brunch, Dairy Barn Dining Room

Families and guests are invited to view the Student Art Show in the Joline Arts Center and visit the Samson Environmental Center throughout the weekend.

All boarding students must stay on campus overnight on Friday and Saturday. Check-in/out procedures provided at registration.

Open Houses feature a full information session, an in-depth discussion with faculty, lunch with students and faculty, Q&A with current students, and tours of Darrow School’s facilities and historic Shaker campus.

• Student exhibits in Darrow’s state-of-the-art, 12,000-square-foot Joline Arts Center
• The Samson Environmental Center, chosen for seven consecutive years as a stop on the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association’s National Solar Tour.
• The Living Machine™, the only secondary-school, all-natural wastewater treatment facility in the nation
• Darrow’s innovative Sustainability Program which is incorporated across the curriculum.
• Darrow’s Tutorial Program offering individualized, one-on-one academic and skills-based support.

Mirai decisively won at #1 Singles, 10-1, and Sullivan won #6 singles, 10-2. We also had a victory from a very close match in #1 Doubles, featuring Mirai and Yukari. This was their first win of the year together, and Sullivan’s first win in Singles.

Unseasonably warm temperatures across the Northeast have spurred many flowering plants—from Washington D.C.’s renowned cherry blossoms to the forsythia in Central Park—to blossom early this year. Darrow School’s famous corpse flowers are no exception, and are expected to be flowering within the next week.

The corpse flower is an Indonesian plant, also known as the konjac arum (Amorphophallus konjac). It boasts the largest unbranched inflorescence in the world, and the third largest flower of all known plants. The konjac arum gets its name from its distinctive odor, which many liken to the smell of rotting meat. The corpse flower, a relative of the calla lily and the jack-in-the-pulpit, grows wild in the rainforests of southeast Asia from a large underground corm. The plant first flowered in cultivation in London in 1889. Fewer than 50 of the largest variety of corpse flower, the titan arum, are known to have bloomed in the United States, with the smaller konjac arum, typically found only in botanical gardens, museums, and private greenhouse collections.

The large green bud of the konjac arum grows at a rate of about an inch per day, until it finally blooms into a central stem that can reach up to four feet tall, as well as a huge, purplish-brown blossom that resembles an asymmetrical collar. Its powerful fumes, which last for days, help to attract pollinating insects. After about a week, the plant wilts and goes dormant for its next phase, a branching, treelike structure.

“The corpse flower is a rare plant that is challenging to grow,” notes Craig Westcott, director of Darrow’s Samson Environmental Center (SEC), which houses four of the plants. “It wouldn’t be possible in this region without a facility like the Samson Environmental Center and the careful attention of both students and faculty. It’s a real triumph for us as a secondary school, and yet another visible symbol of Darrow’s commitment to global education and to environmental stewardship and preservation.”

Built in 1988, the SEC features many green-design elements, from photovoltaic panels to wind turbines, and is the destination for nearly 500 visitors annually from schools, civic and municipal organizations, urban planning firms, and the general public. The SEC also houses the Living Machine™, an innovative wastewater treatment facility that uses a natural ecosystem to clean wastewater from campus dorms and buildings before returning it to the Hudson River watershed.

Media inquiries: Steve Ricci, Director of Communications, at 518-794-6004, riccis@darrowschool.org.