St. Stans Students Secure Second Place in Battle of the Books

ADAMS, Mass. — On Wednesday, May 14, St. Stanislaus eighth-grade students participated in the annual Battle of the Books competition at Dolorosa Mater in Holyoke.

The annual reading competition involved teams answering trivia questions based on a list of 20 books.

An eighth-grade team from St. Stanislaus was among 10 teams competing in the seventh- and eighth-grade division and secured second place.

Berkshire Arts & Tech Grads 'Grateful to Be Weird'

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
06:30PM / Saturday, June 06, 2026

Class speaker Liliana Choque says she was thankful to be 'weird with all of you.' See more photos here. 

ADAMS, Mass. — Among the things that Berkshire Arts and Technology Charter Public School senior Lilianna Choque was thankful for on Saturday was the fact that she knows all her classmates.

 

"In preparation for today, I have read and watched a lot of other graduation speeches," Choque said during her "senior reflection" at the school's graduation exercises. "All of them, without fail, had some version of the same throwaway line: 'Although I don't know all of my classmates,' or, 'Some of you may not know me.'

 

"But the beautiful thing about a graduating class of 32 is that that doesn't apply. I do know all of you … quite well."

 

And, Choque said, she likes what she knows.

 

"Maybe the rumors are true, and we are the weird kids," she said. "But — and you have to forgive me, because I'm going to invoke the right I've been given as a BArT student to be a little cringe here — I'm so grateful to be weird with all of you."

 

Choque was not the only one to extoll the virtues of what she called her "32-ring circle of friends," and she was not the only one to talk about the kindness exhibited by the Class of '26.

 

Head of School Jonathan Igoe set that tone in his opening remarks.