Every spring, the entire Sidwell Friends School community comes together for Founder’s Day to honor the School’s visionary founder Thomas Sidwell. But a single day could not contain the inspiration, impact and generosity of this year’s Founder’s Day, which spanned from Tuesday, April 16 to Thursday, April 18. A cornerstone of the celebration is Founder’s Day for Scholars — a day of giving to support Sidwell Friends School’s financial aid program, one of the most generous in the Washington, DC area. For the past two years, the event has culminated with an evening in tribute and gratitude for how financial aid helps pave the way for students to let their lives speak.

To help launch Founder’s Day for Scholars, Assistant Head of School for Enrollment and Financial Aid Frankie Brown said, “We want to create an environment at Sidwell Friends that is steeped in honest intellectual exchange and a community of caring at the same time. If there’s more representation from all walks of life experiencing it together, it’s less of a bubble. It strengthens us if all our students are able to talk about where they’re from with pride and know that they’re here because they belong here. We don’t want finances to get in the way of what every student brings to this community.”

The magic of the environment Frankie describes was evident in this year’s “Let Your Life Speak” series which kicks off Founder’s Day. This signature event brings alumni speakers back to campus to share their journeys from Sidwell Friends to their careers across an array of professions. Among the 40 featured alumni was Upper School keynote speaker Dr. Cornelia Griggs ’01. Griggs is a pediatric surgeon and the bestselling author of The Sky Was Falling: A Young Surgeon’s Story of Bravery, Survival, and Hope about her experiences during the Covid-19 pandemic. Griggs said she often sees the “worst of humanity” when patients enter the hospital as victims of gunshot wounds, drug abuse, and domestic violence. “But my deep sense of altruism comes directly from Sidwell.” Middle School keynote speaker Yasmina Ahdab ’15, a communications specialist at Johns Hopkins University’s Planetary Health Alliance told students, “Sidwell is where my love of conservation began. I learned fundamental knowledge that I have taken with me for my whole life.”

Such stories helped inspire the next day’s fundraising push to keep Sidwell’s financial aid program strong. Last year, the School awarded $9.27 million in financial aid, which is only possible because of our community’s ongoing dedication to student success. A champion of the effort, Melissa del Aguila ’01 said, “Financial aid opened doors for me that I never thought possible, but the importance of financial aid extends far beyond my own experience. It’s about paying it forward and ensuring that future generations of students have the same opportunities that I did. It’s about giving back to a community that has given us so much.” 

Donors rose to the challenge, surpassing the day’s $500,000 goal by raising $570,000 — over half a million dollars of that on a single day. The next evening was a celebration of donor generosity that made this year’s Founder’s Day for Scholars so successful. Like Melissa, many donors had been recipients of financial aid themselves. They shared their firsthand stories of the profound impact a Sidwell Friends education has made on their lives.

Head of School Bryan Garman said, “Providing financial aid enables us to bring the most talented students together in this community so that those students can learn from one another, so that they can push one another, so that they can form deep and lasting friendships with one another.” Helping to light the way forward for the next generation of ethical leaders began over 140 years ago with Thomas Sidwell. His vision of a school that would educate ethical forward-looking students prepared to take on the challenges of tomorrow is one we celebrate not just on Founder’s Day, but every day.

Save the date for the Founder's Day for Scholars event on Wednesday, April 23, 2025!  Contact Dana Saab, director of annual giving, at saabd@sidwell.edu to learn more about supporting this fundraiser for financial aid and/or to volunteer.