Rory ConnorQ: What brought you to St. Mark's?
When I visited the School, I felt comfortable. Brinley Hall, the Admission director at the time, and the guys I stayed with overnight, all made me feel comfortable. It was a gut feeling that I didn’t have at any other school. The central building was an important element too. It seemed to unify everyone and everything.

Q: What is your favorite St. Mark's memory?
My time living with Tim Cutler during my II Form year, and also the sports trips we took for basketball and crew.

Q: What does St. Mark's mean to you?
Friends, and the habits I learned that I still use today, especially those I learned during my first year living on the same floor as Mr. Glavin.

Q: Why do you continue to support St. Mark's School?
It is imperative to donate resources to formative institutions or experiences in your life. Some can give time; others can give money. What you give doesn’t matter. What matters is that you give if you are able. St. Mark's is where I formed life-long friends and developed habits that benefit me today. The ability to live, study, eat, and play in the same environment is unique and is to be cherished. While we were there, we took this for granted and didn’t appreciate all we had, but we were omniscient, narcissistic teenagers.

Q: How has your time at St. Mark's prepared you to lead a life of consequence?
St. Mark's solidified the principles my father taught my sisters and me, and I hope I instilled into my children—serve others when you can, be kind, be humble, be polite, and don’t focus on things. Instead focus on experiences, relationships, and most, your family if you are blessed enough to have one.

I have an awesome wife to whom I have been married for 25 years (she is patient, kind, loving and forgiving) and we have three amazing sons, who are kind, honest, respectful, and fun. 

I also learned that nice things are nice to have, but they are temporary. Money is nice to have, but an abundance of it or a lack of it usually causes more stress than it should.  Time is finite and we never know how much we have. Cherish it, and use it wisely.  We need the proper perspective on time, and to appreciate it, not wish any of it away.

"It does not matter what you give. If you are afforded amazing opportunities in life, if you are put in a position to give back, give it."

St. Mark's is where I formed life-long friends and developed habits that benefit me today. The ability to live, study, eat, and play in the same environment is unique and is to be cherished.