It’s a Friday night, and drifting lights that sway back and forth fill the Forrestal-Bowld Music Center, in time with the voice of a girl who sits on a stool in the center of the crowd with an acoustic guitar propped on her lap. Before her, a crowd of students has gathered to hear her sing “It Ain’t Me Babe” by Bob Dylan. Her voice echoes through the room, lyrical and expressive, transfixing everyone listening. That girl is Asha Masoudi.

It’s a typical scene at Exeter: four coffees deep, well into the early hours of the morning, working on a paper due at eight. That, and resigning oneself to giving SparkNotes a quick skim half an hour before class. Our Academy is renowned for the lightning-fast pace of its courses, so it’s hard to fault students for cutting corners here and there. But, in surviving the intensity of the school’s English curriculum, the heart of its intended effect can be lost.

Phillips Exeter Academy hosted its annual Family Weekend of the 2025-26 school year on Oct. 10 and 11. Grainger was flooded with families picking up their lanyards and coffees, and classrooms were filled with parents and siblings sitting in folding chairs. Although some students were nervous about sharing their progress in classes with their families, most were excited to reunite with their parents and siblings.

On Saturday, Oct. 12, International Student Coordinator Jennifer Smith took students without family members attending Family Weekend to an OMA-sponsored trip in Boston. For many international families overseas, it can be difficult to make a trip to Exeter for only a few days. To accommodate international students who wanted to take time off campus during that weekend, Smith thought of a great idea.

Forgive me, I’m not what you want me to be….But I was raised under a roof of unfinished dreams. Cleo Sol’s “Build Me Up” reverberated through Phillips Church on a cool Wednesday morning, vocalizing a tale of hardship, acceptance, and growth.

In the movies, we often see characters with superpowers walking straight through walls and objects, and this year’s Nobel Prize in Physics brings us closer. We now have a better understanding of how matter can pass through barriers. John Clarke, Michel Devoret, and John Martinis were awarded the prize “for the discovery of macroscopic quantum mechanical tunneling and energy quantization in an electric circuit” (nobelprize.org). In simple terms, they proved that mechanical tunneling — the phenomenon of the passing of particles through walls at the quantum scale — can happen on a scale that humans can hold in our hands.

We live in a time when some of us are blessed to experience peace, while others are suffering deeply. It’s hard to measure every individual’s ethics within the larger picture of the world of 8 billion people, but I guess the truest measure of our morality lies in how responsible we act and how much we care about what we can control. And at our age, the easiest way to evaluate this responsibility is through our influence in Exeter’s community.

On a Friday afternoon, Maria Raine found her 16-year-old son’s body hanging in his bedroom closet. There was no note. Although he had been withdrawn for the past month of his life, he had been an active, humorous teen who worked out with his older brother almost every night. Shocked and confused, the boy’s father searched his phone, looking for answers. There, he found a dialogue with ChatGPT titled “Hanging Safety Concerns.” (NYT)

KPop Demon Hunters is by far one of the biggest successes of 2025. From becoming one of Netflix’s most-watched originals ever to its soundtrack topping the Billboard Hot 100, there is no denying the massive impact the movie has had. Even on campus, it’s proven to be popular, with OMA hosting a KPop Demon Hunters Sing-Along just a few weeks ago.

The ball flies down the field, a flash of white and black. In a perfectly coordinated fashion, the boys’ varsity soccer team moves the ball from player to player. Someone shoots for a goal, but it bounces off the goalpost, and the defense takes possession. Seniors Alex Sahinoglu, Finlay Fitch, and Aiden Xia, the captains, gather the team together, high-fiving and offering words of support and advice. This positive atmosphere is a result of weeks of sportsmanship, bonding, and dedication from the captains.

It’s deep into the winter in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and after a grueling two-day swim meet, the swimmers finally climb back onto the bus. At the front, Coach Don Mills raises two gleaming trophies as the team erupts in cheers. Beaming with pride, Mills announces that the 2025 boys & girls varsity swim team has accumulated the highest team score in program history. For 23 years at the Academy, Mills has been coaching boys varsity water polo in the fall, varsity swimming in the winter, and varsity cycling in the spring, leading all three of these teams to massive success.

After nearly three years without a victory, Exeter’s junior varsity football team finally broke through. On Oct. 8, the Exeter JV football team received a well-deserved win after 1,064 days of tough losses. After the scoreboard settled at 40-6, the team erupted in celebration at the Pingree School. “We followed the instructions of the coaches—we also had high energy, and we wanted to win,” shared prep Barry Hang, defensive lineman on the team.

The Big Red varsity football team delivered a commanding performance against Salisbury School last weekend, securing a decisive win powered by a relentless rushing attack and cohesive teamwork. Running backs senior Ty Neal and lower Fogo Filani led the charge, combining for four touchdowns and nearly 400 total yards on the ground. “Our running backs really carried the game and set the tone,” said upper Jackson Sparks, who was cheering from the sideline for part of the game due to injury.

Living in the dorms at Exeter can be fun, but at times, unpredictable events occur and things get out of hand. Here are some of the problems that our peers have dealt with throughout the past few weeks in their respective dorms. If these resonate with you, hopefully I’m making some good suggestions.

During assembly, one small house is left praying that they won’t have to embarrass themselves with a potpourri of different names resulting in a cacophonous clamor. If you couldn’t guess already, the name behind that predicament is none other than Guptill House.