Honor Assembly 2024: Living with Honor and Integrity at Foxcroft

The Honor Code and Honor Pledge are integrated into all aspects of life at Foxcroft, keeping our core values at the forefront of all we do. Framed copies of the code and pledge hang in classrooms and offices across campus, and students regularly write and sign the pledge on their academic assignments.

At Sunday’s assembly, the community heard several voices — Chair of the Honor Council Elise R. ’25, Patty A. ’25, Ariana A. ’26, faculty members of the Honor Council Karin Thorndike and Megan Barrett, and Head of School Cathy McGehee — reflect on the meaning of honor.

As the newest faculty member of Honor Council, Mdme. Barrett cited well-known historical and fictional stories where honorable choices are made as part of the narrative and seemingly easy to make. “Honor is easy when we sit in FoxHound and we listen to what our peers give us as definitions of honor; when we consider quotations and stories in which integrity and being truthful are the subjects… But is honor easy when we are on our own?" As the audience contemplated this, Mdme. Barrett charged them with this; “I hope that you will consider your signature a promise to choose the honest path, even when the semester gets difficult, and that your signature promises to support and uphold your classmates when they also find being honorable challenging.” Senior Patty A. supported this call to action with her own definition of honor: “It is about matching our actions to fit our values, even at the most inconvenient and difficult of times. It means being truthful not just within our words, but within the actions we take.”

Other members of the Honor Council cited their inspiration for living honorably, sometimes presenting themselves in unexpected places. Faculty member Karin Thorndike admired her Grandpa Lunde, an honorable man whose mission was “to work hard, be honest, be kind, and make a difference.” Junior Ariana A. also attributed her strong values to family citing her parents and the honorable example they set. 

Honor Council Chair Elise R. ’25 was struck by a recent passage she’d read. “History is… a treasure house ready for us to draw upon as we will. The limit of our taking from its stores is marked only by our capacity to receive.” She was surprised to find this profound quote in The Practical Book of Interior Decoration housed among the stacks in the senior study loft in Currier Library. No matter the source — a family member, a peer, or a work of fiction — we can always find examples of living honorably by which to model our choices. The Foxcroft community is fortunate to have members of the Honor Council setting the tone for the school year and helping to guide our moral compasses.

This year’s signed Honor Code and Honor Pledge will be framed and hung in Schoolhouse as a reminder of each community member’s commitment to living and learning with honor at Foxcroft. Many thanks to all members of the Honor Council — Honor Council Chair Elise R. ’25, Student Head of School Tashae’ A. ’25, Student Vice Head of School Sara W. ’25, Head Prefect Hayley B. ’25, Patty W. ’25, Priscilla C. ’26, Anneliese C. ’26, Ariana A. ’26, Cece Y. ’27, Fiona J. ’27, and faculty members Megan Barrett, Erika Page, James Sweeney, and Karin Thorndike.