Maximus \u201cMax\u201d Camaj \u201923 hails from Hopewell Junction, NY and has been a joyful presence on campus since he joined Trinity-Pawling as an 8th grader five years ago. His outgoing and friendly personality is known and appreciated by all.<\/p>\n
For his Senior Independent Project (SIP), Camaj has been developing a leadership program to help unite our community \u2014 specifically, by creating an opportunity for Upper School students to mentor Middle School students.<\/p>\n
I recently asked Camaj to share the details of his newly-formed Big Brotherhood Club for this issue of The Quad<\/em>:<\/p>\n How did the idea for the Big Brotherhood program come about?<\/strong> Was there anyone who inspired you to create this program?<\/strong> Are other students joining the Big Brotherhood yet?<\/strong> What activities are planned for mentoring Middle School students?<\/strong> What’s next for Max?<\/strong> Favorite Trinity-Pawling tradition?<\/strong> One thing you hope will never change at the School?<\/strong> Camaj’s mentor, Todd Hoffman adds, “Max’s Big Brotherhood Program adopts the ethos of interactive, age-inclusive learning in a way that helps build new and organic friendships within the School’s brotherhood and helps boys of different friend and peer groups get to know one another in non-academic and non-athletic endeavors. Max has tapped into something that fully accentuates the student-centered educational approach here, which provides leadership and entrepreneurial ideas such as this to expand our already robust efforts in these areas. Kudos to Max for adding his zest for all things Trinity-Pawling!”<\/p>\n by Judy Redder<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Maximus \u201cMax\u201d Camaj \u201923 hails from Hopewell Junction, NY and has been a joyful presence on campus since he joined Trinity-Pawling as an 8th grader five years ago. His outgoing and friendly personality is known and appreciated by all. For his Senior Independent Project (SIP), Camaj has been developing a leadership program to help unite […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":5032,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[84],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5031","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-april-2023"],"acf":[],"wps_subtitle":"SENIOR INDEPENDENT PROJECT WITH A MISSION","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5031","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5031"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5031\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5050,"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5031\/revisions\/5050"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/5032"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5031"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5031"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/trinitypawlingthequad.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5031"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nSince joining the School as an 8th grader, I\u2018ve always stayed connected with the Middle School students, as a friend and a mentor, and I realized that there aren\u2019t too many other Upper Schoolers who do this. If we had a bunch of guys doing this, it would really help the School shine and help the Middle School boys out. Having been on both sides (Middle School and Upper School), I know what it\u2019s like.<\/p>\n
\nThe person at Trinity-Pawling that has always inspired me the most is Mrs. Barker \u2014 she has so much compassion and respect and she really helped me find myself. There were also some Upper School students who inspired me \u2014 Danny Csaszar \u201920 and Lucas Hughes \u201920 were always good to me and helped me grow \u2014 they were like big brothers to me and are still my friends. Mr. Hoffman was a tremendous help with this SIP and I am hoping he will continue to oversee the Big Brotherhood program after I graduate.<\/p>\n
\nThe other students are excited about the club and how it will benefit the School. Emmett Croddick \u201924, Roni Eloranta \u201925, and Ryan Impellizeri \u201925 are a few of the students that will be helping to plan events and will, collectively, keep the club going. They all know the School well, have a sense of purpose, have good character, and will be good leaders. Our first meeting was on April 6, and I\u2019m hoping we will have a few more before the school year ends. The club will be presented at the Club Fair in September so that new juniors and seniors can also join.<\/p>\n
\nLunches with the Middle School students will be a natural way for them to connect, and informal club meetings will create opportunities for teaching them skills like kindness, effort, respect, and humility.<\/p>\n
\nGo to college and get the degrees I need to come back as a history teacher at Trinity-Pawling. When I come back, I hope I will see that the Big Brotherhood program has kept Middle Schoolers engaged and valuing their time at the School.<\/p>\n
\nCandlelight, I love it!<\/p>\n
\nThe amount of respect we have for each other \u2026 the brotherhood \u2026 it really gives you the ability to be the best you\u2019ve ever been.<\/p>\n