By Nancy Schatz Alton, Writer/Editor, and Abby Heinicke, Marketing and Communications Intern

The fifth annual Young Men’s Conference aimed to create an affinity environment for male-identifying students in grades 8–12. This one-day event, hosted at UPrep, provided opportunities for open conversations on positive masculinity and workshops that paired skills not commonly associated with each other, such as cooking crème brûlée with power tools. 

The day was planned by a group of faculty and staff from UPrep, The Overlake School, and The Northwest School. UPrep Theatre Teacher Leroy Timblin assisted in organizing the conference. “Our main theme this year was 'What is a man?'” he said. “There are all these ideas out there, like a man drives a truck and a man provides for his family. We’re trying to give a different perspective on what makes a man.”  

About 100 students attended from nearby schools and Catlin Gabel in Portland, OR; one teen traveled all the way from Idaho! The day started with keynote speaker Professor Chesko, a college professor and content creator who focuses on teaching anti-misogyny with a combined online audience of more than 1.5 million. The group then transitioned into a series of activities and workshops, which ranged from “Let’s Get Real, Bro: Conversations that Matter” to mending clothing and writing poetry.  

UPrep Upper School Science Teacher Moses Rifkin hopes students exited the conference thinking about masculinity in new ways. “Seeing that there are other boys thinking about being masculine in a positive way is an antidote to what they see online,” Moses said. “There are so many people telling young men what they should and shouldn’t do, and this conference is one more brick in a big building of experiences that will shape their idea of male identity.”  

In matching together skills commonly seen as feminine with those seen as masculine, conference attendees were able to break down previous associations and recognize that they can be "manly" by their own definition. Skills workshops included clothing mending paired with sports strategy, childcare basics paired with starting a fire, cooking and baking with power tools, poetry paired with changing a tire, and sketching paired with tying ties.

"You can be a man who cuts down trees, but you can also be a man who knits and makes dresses for friends,” Leroy said. 

Abe S., a UPrep 10th grader (pictured here baking with power tools), shared that the conference gave him a chance to examine his identity. “It made me think about how we connect as young men, and how we can do something fun together that we don’t normally do, like making crème brûlée,” he said. “I also realized my interactions are different with different people, like how I speak with a teacher or with someone who is younger than me versus someone who is the same age as me.”  

Hank B., a UPrep 12th grader, enjoyed the open community he found at the conference. “I was able to make friends from so many other schools, even all the way from Portland,” he said. “It was super fun, and I am very appreciative of those who ran the conference.”  

Attendee Ty Talbot, UPrep’s dean of faculty and visual arts teacher, was so impressed with the students who attended the conference. “They were honest, vulnerable, funny, and bright, and it was so great to hear their perspectives on masculinity," he said.

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