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Through our history curriculum, Commonwealth students learn how to be historians rather than passive absorbers of facts. They read and analyze primary sources from a variety of voices in their historical contexts. And they graduate knowing that a single textbook could never tell the whole story. Core to this discovery process is an annual research paper that hones students’ analytical and writing skills and challenges them to dig deep into a variety of sources on any topic of interest, whether it be debunking the “primitivist” myth around jazz, the impact of the breakup of the AT&T monopoly, or, as you will see in this recent example, where Siri '27 finds parallel fears over artificial intelligence in computer science today and the "automatic programming" introduced by Grace Hopper in the 1950s. In both eras, women programmers were—and are—the most vulnerable to extinction.

Toko ’28 looks for the bigger picture. Studying for a test? She zooms out to examine the trajectory of her learning throughout the course. Her favorite classes? Those that deepen her understanding of how they connect to others. And her take on Commonwealth students? They’re talented academics…but they’re a lot more than that, too. Read on to learn more about this rising junior and the wide-angle view she brings to everything from English class to lunch clean.

For those who aren’t seasoned in economics—and even for many who are—trying to predict financial news or policy moves can feel like starting a seven-season prestige drama at its midpoint and trying to guess the end. Who will react to a new tariff measure and how? Will that much-hyped startup keep rocketing upward or crash and burn? What role will artificial intelligence play: savior or villain?

As you might expect, the Commonwealth community has met the moment with a drive to learn more, leading to student groups like the Investment Club and Project Weeks spent at organizations like Fidelity Investments and government finance departments in Greater Boston. So when we invited students and faculty to share their questions for alumni/ae experts who work, broadly, in economics, finance, and investing, they leapt at the chance. Below you’ll find that Q&A, and—spoiler alert—the insights alumni/ae had to share, about career-building, risk, and human behavior, applied beyond the market. 

It’s a Monday afternoon in early March. The winter play is days away, French and Spanish students are preparing to jet off to their studies abroad, seniors will embark on their projects soon, and the third quarter of the school year is about to end. Despite their novella-length to-do lists, about twenty students are seated in 2C, listening intently while quietly eating their lunches. 

For these students, lunchtime has turned into “an emergency meeting of Current Events Club,” as announced as recess that morning, given the war with Iran, now on day three. Some students offer thoughts on the motivations for war or pose questions about what they’ve heard online or at home; others provide live updates as they receive news alerts from an ongoing press briefing. The rest simply take in the discussion, digesting their food and the specter of war before resetting for sixth period.

Whether frequenters of Current Events Club or not, Commonwealth students are grappling with the national and world events that will define, at the very least, their high-school years. How do we, as teachers, mentors, and an educational institution, guide them through the realities of our times? It’s a responsibility that stretches across academic disciplines and areas of school life, and one that our faculty and staff approach with varying perspectives but shared intentionality.