“Don't make your world too small”

Growing up, I used to drive past Shawnigan's gates and wonder what life was like inside. I never imagined I'd end up here.

 

When I arrived in Grade 9, I came as an athlete. Hockey was my identity, my passion, and what I thought defined me.

 

That same year, after the hockey season ended, I decided to try something new and joined rugby. I was excited, eager to get out on the field and be part of a new team.

 

In my very first game, something unexpected happened.

 

I got tackled awkwardly. When I tried to stand up, I couldn't move my leg. Fractured tibia. Torn ACL and PLC. In one moment, my next nine months changed completely.

 

At the time, I thought it was the end of the world. Hockey was everything to me, and suddenly I couldn't live it.

 

But I was wrong.

 

When I finally returned, I went on to play for the U18 Prep hockey team. But the months of recovery had already changed something in me. That time away forced me to look up. And when I did, I realized how narrow my world at Shawnigan had been. I had been so focused on one thing that I hadn't actually let this place in.

 

So I started saying yes. To events. To roundtables. To opportunities. To conversations and communities I would have walked past before. I stopped being a hockey player at Shawnigan and started actually being at Shawnigan.

 

And somewhere in that shift, I started to find out who I actually was – not just what I was good at.

 

That opened something up in me. I became a better listener. I started paying closer attention to the people around me. And that's when I learned the most important thing about leadership.

 

Leadership isn't about being the loudest voice in the room. It's about doing the right thing when it's hard. It's about showing up for people when it matters most.

 

Integrity. Kindness. Resilience. These aren't abstract values – they're choices you make in specific moments, usually quiet ones, when no one is watching.

 

And those are exactly the values that define the scholarship I'm honoured to have been awarded.

 

The Ned Larsen Scholarship made it possible for me to be here. And I don't take a single day of it for granted. Part of honouring it means making sure one day I can pay forward the immense generosity, so another student gets the same opportunity that I did.

 

Ned Larsen spent decades at this school – as a student, Housemaster, Senior Master, and eventually Headmaster. But he wasn't remembered for any single role or achievement. He was remembered for how he showed up everywhere. Classrooms, boarding houses, playing fields – fully present, curious and passionate. Not belonging to just one part of the School, but to all of it.

 

The Shawnigan all-rounder. Not because he was the best at everything, but because he gave himself fully to every aspect of the School.

 

And that's what this place has been teaching me too.

 

Not to be one thing. But to grow through everything.

 

And if there's one thing I hope you take from this, it's simple.

 

Don't make your world too small.

 

Because what you'll be remembered for isn't what you achieve – it's how you make other people feel along the way.