Filmmaker Statement

I attended Brooklyn Friends School for fourteen years, during which I sat in about 500 Quaker meetings. Sitting in silence with my classmates and listening to their words served as an integral part of my week—like breathing, it felt natural and necessary. For most young people, the opportunity to have the space for reflection among their classmates and the empowerment to speak as an equal within their community feels foreign—especially in high school. While most students who attended my school were not Quakers, like myself, Quaker meeting fostered a strong sense of community for all of us. We filmed the project in the Quaker meeting house that I grew up going to, just 20 minutes from the neighborhood I grew up in, and we worked closely with the NYC Quaker community during pre-production. I set the film during the last meeting of the school year, which I look back on with immense fondness, sentimentality, and gratitude. These meetings remain strongest in my memory because they y