On December 8, 2011, 15 Lunenburg High School students attended the Massachusetts Junior Classical League Classics Day, held at Boston University.

                This event had approximately 500 attendees from middle and high schools from all across the state. At this event, students attended workshops led by college professors and graduate students from the Boston area, centering around the theme "Powerful Women in the Ancient World". Afterwards, these same students participated in a classically-themed skit competition, confronting such modern topics as the Occupy movement and the popularity of Justin Bieber.

     As the First Vice President of the Massachusetts Junior Classical League, Derek was charged with organizing this wonderful event. Starting last May, he began to contact professors and schools to generate interest in the event and to schedule the workshop sessions around the theme. After scheduling the two workshop sessions, Derek had to give all the information to participating schools and begin to gather registration for the event. Working with the Boston University staff, Derek organized lunches, rooms, and parking for the event. Finally, on the day of the event, he made sure that everything ran smoothly and all of the students made it to their respective workshops at the correct times.

        The event went extremely well, and for the first time ever we received a signed proclamation from Mayor Menino of Boston officially proclaiming December 8 as Classics Day in Boston.

        At this event, students from Lunenburg High School each attended two workshop sessions, with topics like Medea, the education of Roman women, the wives of Caesar, and even how to find the lost city of Atlantis. During the skit competition, we performed a skit based upon the Harry Potter and Twilight novels. Samantha Collette, the Second Vice President of the Massachusetts Junior Classical League, also helped to run the event by bringing students to their workshop sessions and helping with lunch and the skits.

         The Massachusetts Junior Classical League is an organization comprised of Latin and Greek students from across the state and their teachers. This organization seeks to promote the study of the classics through events such as Classics Day, a semiformal dance, and a state convention, taking place over the weekend of April 27-29, 2012.

    Congratulations to Derek Booth, Class of 2012 for organizing a highly successful classics day.