Since Abbot Academy and Andover merged in 1973, the Abbot Academy Fund has been preserving its name and tradition by pursuing its goal to fund educational ventures at Andover. Students and faculty members can submit an “Abbot Grant” to apply for funds. Here are this year’s recipients.
Jeffrey Pan ’21 and Erik Wang ’21 – Rocket Propulsion Laboratory
The Abbot Grant that we received will allow us to purchase all of the materials that are needed to fund and fulfill our year-long goal of breaking the water rocket altitude world record.
Igor Barakaiev ’20 and Keishi Kimura ’20 – Electronic Music Production Club
We both created an electronic music production club this year and to get more involved in the actual production, we needed a grant for a lot of plug-ins and softwares, such as Ableton Live and other sound engineering softwares.
Best Chantanapongvanij ’19, Klang Jatusripitak ’20, and Mudmee Sereeyothin ’20 – Cultural Festival/Southeast Asian Club
I’m part of Southeast Asian Club and we wanted to have a cultural festival or a fair to spread word and bring attention to Southeast Asia’s culture [and] political issues. We needed money to fund for guest speakers, food, and [the grant] helped us do that.
Saffron Agrawal ’21 – Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Dialogues (Female Author Speakers)
My proposal was to fund a series of conversations with female authors called The Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Dialogues. The Abbot Academy Fund was extremely generous to offer the money to provide honorariums for multiple authors, and fund the cost of transportation some authors require.
Dominic Yin ’19, Mitch Duerr ’19, and Christina Li ’21 – Andover Skating Club
Financially, the expansion of the Andover Ice Skating Club was made possible by this grant from the Abbot Academy Fund, continuing Abbot’s tradition of boldness, innovation, and caring. This means that we will be able to pay for more interested students to rent skates and get on the ice with us during club meetings.
Jacob Buehler ’19 and Andrew Stern ’19 – Faces of Andover Senior Book: Class of 2019
Andrew Stern and I are in a club called Faces of Andover and our grant was for the Faces of Andover Senior book. What we do is we take pictures of every Senior in the class which is 327 Seniors this year, and we accompany that with something written by them. We’ve had poems, my favorite part about Andover — that sort of thing.
Vincent Marino ’19 – Para-Pants Development
My Abbot Grant was for the development of a prototype for a project that I’ve been working on since last year, which is a pair of compression pants that use electricity to stimulate various leg muscles to help if someone is paralyzed from the waist down.
Carley Kukk ’19, Mangai Sundaram ’19, and Ava Stills ’19 – Meals for a Million 2019
This year, we wanted to increase the amount of meals we packaged. With this, we needed a much larger Abbot Grant! When presenting, all of the trustees are so friendly and make the environment so welcoming. It has been a pleasure working with the Abbot Society on grants for these past two years.
Harry Shin ’20, Klang Jatusripitak ’20, and John Murphy ’20 – Convention for Sustainable & International Coffee
We thought it might be a good opportunity to get a jumpstart to advertising our club around campus. We’ve been talking to our faculty advisor, and he’s been really helpful and we’re actually very excited because this coffee convention can be the first step to becoming bigger and getting more student participation.
Stephanie Sparling Williams and David Freilach – “Harlem: In Situ” — Distinguished Public Speakers
The Addison Gallery of American Art’s exhibition “Harlem: In Situ” has created a unique opportunity to bring to Andover and the region several innovators who represent the important artistic community of Harlem, N.Y. In order to realize this potential…the Addison applied for Abbot Grant support.
Marla Taylors, Ryan Wheeler – Digitally Transcribing the Peabody Collection
We propose using Abbot Grant funds to hire a part-time temporary employee…to complete the transcription of the catalog ledgers. Transcribing and transitioning the catalog ledger information into a digital format will create a formidable tool for research and intellectual control, but requires a time and manpower.
Hannah Kim ’20- Literary Magazine: Give Voice to AAPIAsian, Asian Americans, Pacific Islanders
In my Abbot Grant this year, I asked for funding for a new literary magazine on campus. It’s called ‘Re-Model’, a spin off of the term ‘model minority,’ and its purpose is to give a creative platform for the [Asian American and Pacific Islander] community on the Andover campus.
Caroline Odden – Telescope Upgrade for the PA Observatory
The grant is to purchase a new 20-inch Planewave telescope for the [Andover] Observatory. The current telescope (a 16-inch telescope) needs a major and costly upgrade. This new telescope will effectively double the light collecting ability of the telescope, and it also has other nice features that we find appealing. This telescope will be a wonderful addition to the school. Students in the astronomy courses will have a better instrument to use for observing and science, and visitors to the observatory will be treated to beautiful views of celestial objects.
