Collingswood Teen Delivers Moorestown Friends Graduation Address

Collingswood's Joshua Gregory received an honor bestowed each year to only two graduating Moorestown Friends School (MFS) students: His classmates voted him to deliver one of the school's graduation speeches.

Unlike most schools, Moorestown Friends does not select a valedictorian or salutatorian. Instead, the students vote among themselves on a male and female student who best represent the class.

Bestowing praise on his senior class, Gregory, who will enroll at Swarthmore College in the fall, recognized the group’s personalities and individualities.

“We are a group of people who will become scientists, teachers, fashion designers and doctors,” Gregory said. “Every member of this class is unmatched in at least one facet of knowledge.”

Gregory delivered his address Saturday evening under dark and ominous storm clouds, as 74 students became the 225th graduating class of MFS.

Held on MFS grounds, the ceremony culminated a yearlong school anniversary celebration.

Commencement began at 7 p.m. as the seniors walked from the front of the Upper School to the sounds of Bob Marley’s “I Wanna Know Now” and ceremoniously filed past the driveway, known as the Oval, to the seating area, where family and friends awaited their arrival.

Since the early 1900s, graduates have eschewed caps and gowns for white dresses and formal men’s attire. Quaker schools usually do not wear robes.

“This is a faith-based school, and I’m asking all of you seated here today to have faith that we can carry on this commencement without any rain,” said Larry Van Meter, head of the school, as those assembled chuckled. 

Van Meter then recognized 10 decades of alumni among the gatherers, a group the Class of 2011 now joins.

This year’s graduating class includes 16 students who have attended MFS since kindergarten, designating them part of the “originals.” Van Meter mentioned the tight-knit links among the class, even as new students joined the school in subsequent years.

“The Class of 2011 formed very close bonds,” said Van Meter. “I believe wherever they go, these are friendships that will continue to flourish.”

The other student speaker, Isabella Whittaker-Inserra, of Moorestown, chided her fellow classmates during her speech, “We are ridiculously good-looking,” but with heartfelt appreciation thanked her mom “for the sacrifices you’ve made for me to come here.”

The Class of 2011 has a 100 percent college acceptance rate. The class is headed to colleges and universities that include Bryn Mawr College, Carnegie Mellon University, Cornell University, Dartmouth College, Duke University, Johns Hopkins University, Lehigh University, New York University, Penn State, Rutgers University, University of Pennsylvania, Smith College, Swarthmore College and Washington University (MO).

Also during the ceremony, 17 senior choir members sang a rendition of “Time of Your Life” by Green Day, and history teacher Joel Hager quoted the writings of George Fox, founder of the Religious Society of Friends.

An informal reception for the graduates followed in the school’s dining hall.