All-A-Taut-O: The Class of 2026 Sets Sail

In Tabor Academy's 150th year, the Class of 2026 gathered under the big tent on the waterfront on Friday, May 22, 2026, to receive their diplomas. For the first time in nearly a decade, they did so surrounded by the entire School by the Sea—underclassmen filling the tent alongside families, faculty, staff, trustees, and friends, restoring an older tradition that returned the full community to Commencement morning. The day before, Tabor also revived Prize Day, recognizing students across all four grades for their achievements during the academic year.

Head of School Tony Jaccaci opened the ceremony by welcoming the school's trustees, faculty, staff, families, and friends—many joining by livestream from around the world—and by thanking the parents and guardians whose lifetime of support brought their children to this day. He invited the room to see the soon-to-be graduates not as the students who arrived on campus tentatively, years ago, but as the confident, principled young women and men they had become. "In this, our sesquicentennial year," he said, "it is not an overstatement to say that the Class of 2026 has been a historic group."

Chair of the Board of Trustees Regina Shakin, mother of three Tabor alumni, addressed the graduates next. She charged them to carry Tabor's mission of connecting, serving, and leading into whatever came next. "You have learned how to care for your classmates and collaborate across the classroom, dorms, stage, and field," she said. "You have found the courage to try new things, to fail, and then succeed. And you understand that curiosity leads to invaluable knowledge and experiences."

Co-Heads of School Vince White '26 and Chloe Fox '26 followed. White, who built his student co-head campaign on the promise of weekly chicken tenders, used Tender Tuesdays as a lens for what he wanted his class to remember: not the destinations but the road. "The championships, the awards, the college acceptances—those were the destinations. But now consider the road getting here. The late nights with friends, the Tender Tuesdays, the Macbeth performance. That was the actual trip." Gratitude, he said, is a deliberate choice. "The amount of beauty in your life is dependent on whether you choose to notice it."

Fox took a different tack, reflecting on firsts. She recalled her freshman-year friend Mavis tripping in a too-long romper and laughing it off—the first laugh of a friendship, and a small image of what high school turned out to be. "Every year here, we became beginners again," she said. "Just when we finally thought we understood something—whether it was academics, friendships, or ourselves—life handed us something completely new." As her class stepped into what came next, she urged them to embrace being a beginner once more.

After the Madrigals led the singing of the alma mater, Izzie Konowicz '26 introduced this year's Commencement speaker: her father, U.S. Air Force Colonel (Ret.) Dean Konowicz '95. A 1995 graduate who went on to the U.S. Air Force Academy and a 26-year military career—including service as a nuclear weapons inspector in Russia and as vice commander of 20th Air Force—Konowicz now leads the Utah Field Office for Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.

Konowicz spoke as an institutionalist. Tabor's core values—care, courage, collaboration, and curiosity—were, he said, the roots from which connection, service, and leadership grow, and they would outlast any single discipline the graduates had studied. To illustrate, he told the story of Walter "Cappy" Lillard, Tabor's headmaster from 1916 to 1942, who, after the Second World War, led the United Nations resettlement effort in Vienna. Lillard's office helped over a million displaced persons—many of them Holocaust survivors—resettle to safety in the years following the war. "This caring leader was not a politician, a diplomat, or a statesman," Konowicz said. "He was a humble and curious boarding school English teacher." He invited the Class of 2026 to keep their own core memories of Tabor close—a reservoir, he said, to draw from in times of need—and closed with the words he had given every airman, soldier, and sailor he had ever led: "I love you and I'm proud of you."

The ceremony then moved to the presentation of awards. Frankie Paciello '26 was recognized by U.S. Air Force Colonel (Ret.) Mary Beth Ulrich for earning an appointment to the United States Air Force Academy, where he will join the Class of 2030. The following awards, voted by the faculty, were then presented:

• The Cum Laude Award: Chenxi "Tutu" Hu
• The Cum Laude Award: Shicheng "Sage" Ding
• The Jonathan A. Smith Award: Nick Faiella
• The Joseph Tomlinson Jr. Prize: Ashley Roch Piersol
• The Award for Outstanding Contribution to Athletics: Mavis O'Neil
• The Award for Outstanding Contribution to Athletics: Heyden Hildebrandt
• The Faculty Award for Outstanding Extracurricular Contribution: Marc London
• The Alumni Award for Excellence in Scholarship: Chenxi "Tutu" Hu
• The Travis Roy Humanitarian Award: Chloe Fox
• The Hamilton Webster Thayer Prize: Merrick Brannigan

Interim Dean of Academics Matt Voci stepped to the podium to lead the conferral of diplomas, but first asked the seniors for a final few minutes. He shared a moment from the Artemis II mission, in which pilot Victor Glover, asked what he wanted to say to the people on Earth, paused and offered this: "You are on a spaceship called Earth. It was given to us as a place to live in this universe… you have this oasis, this beautiful place where we get to exist together." Voci asked the graduates to look around the tent—at peers, at teachers—and to acknowledge what Tabor had been. "Take this oasis with you," he said, "and build others like it."

One by one, the Class of 2026 crossed the stage. As they did, they walked across a red carpet bearing Tabor's school seal—the same seal that, by long tradition, community members carefully hop over or around at the entrance to the Fish Center for Athletics, where stepping on it is said to bring bad luck. Jaccaci closed the ceremony with a note: "By vote of trustees," he said, "they have declared that stepping on this seal today will actually bring you good luck."

In the center of that seal is Tabor's motto, All-A-Taut-O—a nautical term meaning that everything on a boat is ship-shape, taut, tied, and in the right place. Drawing on Ecclesiastes and on the changing seasons he watches from his office in the Stroud Academic Center, Jaccaci reminded the graduates that they too would face seasons in their lives, and that they were prepared for each one. "You have a strong foundation in our values of care, collaboration, courage, and curiosity. You understand the importance of connection. You have served and will continue to serve, and others will look to you as leaders. And when you feel you may not have all the answers or know the path forward, remember that you have done so before."

Tabor does not wear caps and gowns at Commencement, and so, in place of mortarboards tossed skyward, the Class of 2026 sent their programs into the air. They recessed out of the tent through a gauntlet of applauding faculty and staff—the teachers, coaches, advisors, dorm parents, and supporters who had walked them through four years now lining the path to send them off as the school's newest alumni.  

Class of 2026, congratulations. All-A-Taut-O.

Photos, the recap video, the full recording of the ceremony, and other Commencement resources for the Class of 2026 can be found at taboracademy.org/celebration-of-seniors. Please note, that photos and the recap video will be posted by early June. An email will be sent to families directly, letting them know these assets are available.