Editor’s Note: Mark Conroy, director of athletics, presented the following during Upper School Assembly on November 28, 2012.

Good morning everyone.

The primary purpose of our assembly this morning is to review our fall athletic season. Before doing so I wanted to take this opportunity to acknowledge a beloved member of our community, Al Lavalle, who passed away earlier this week.

Many of you know that Al worked at Williston for the past 13 years. While he was on the athletic grounds staff the past three years, for the previous 10, Al ran our Cage at the Athletic Center.

Al had an incredibly profound impact on everyone who knew him. With all due respect to all of us who work with students on a regular basis here, no one in our community impacted more students than Al during those ten years.

The 2007 yearbook was dedicated to Al. I wanted to share a couple of words from this dedication “Al is the second Dad we all wish we had. Never condescending, always funny, he is the person at Williston we go to for advice – Al is a true teacher in every sense of the word.” “Please and Thank You—two simple words that Al constantly reminded us to say—the lessons we learned from Al at the cage will stick with us for life.”

I would like to ask all of us to observe a few moments of silence in Al LaValle’s memory.

Go to the full list of Fall Team Highlights and Individual Honors.