COURTESY PHOTO
St. Mary’s graduate Ana de Bernardo is Harvard bound.
BY PAUL HALLORAN
LYNN — When Ana de Bernardo arrives at Harvard University later this summer, she will become the latest St. Mary’s High School graduate to enroll at the most prestigious school in the world.
The seventh St. Mary’s grad since 2008 to attend Harvard, de Bernardo has scored an
impressive achievement when you consider Harvard receives more than 37,000
applications and offers admission to only 2,100 students.
“We are thrilled that Ana is keeping the St. Mary’s-Harvard tradition going,” said Grace Cotter Regan St. Mary’s head of school. “She is an outstanding student and a wonderful young lady. We’re very proud to have her represent St. Mary’s.”
A Danvers resident, de Bernardo said Harvard was her “dream school” and she didn’t tell anyone other than her family she was applying. Her sister, Lucia, graduated from Harvard this year.
“I had visited my sister and I fell in love with Harvard,” she said. “But I was realistic
about my chances of getting in.”
She had several other appealing alternatives, including Boston College, where her
brother, Dominic, will be a sophomore next year, and Dartmouth.
When she was placed on Harvard’s waiting list at Harvard, she was disappointed but far from crushed.
Then, on May 18, the day before the St. Mary’s prom, de Bernardo’s phone rang and
the caller ID indicated the call was coming from Cambridge. She missed the call, but quickly called back. Someone in the Harvard admissions office answered and gave her the good news: She was in.
“My mom started crying and I started crying,” de Bernardo said. “I’ve seen all the doors Harvard is opening for my sister and I’m thrilled to be going there.”
Participating in campus ministry and community service, especially through Rachel’s Challenge, played a significant role in her St. Mary’s experience. It laid the foundation for what she hopes will be a lifetime of helping others.
“I’ve had a cliché dream of changing the world one person at a time,” she said. “Going to an elite college has always been a goal. I think it’s the best way to be able to make a difference.”
A varsity tennis player and National Honor Society member at St. Mary’s, de Bernardo founded the Latinos in Action Club at the school. She also wrote a monthly column for the Valley Patriot, a Lawrence newspaper, for the last three years.
She will be one of three St. Mary’s alumni enrolled at Harvard next year, joining Nancy O’Neil (St. Mary’s ’13) and Hannah McCormack (St. Mary’s ’14). The pipeline started with Chris Liberge (St. Mary’s ’08, Harvard ’12) and continued with Gabriella Malatesta (St. Mary’s ’09, Harvard ’13) and Kevin McCarthy and Daniel Lobo (both St. Mary’s ’10 and Harvard ’14).
McCarthy, who is operations manager for Unreal Candy, a Boston-based company that produces healthier versions of peanut butter cups and M&Ms, said St. Mary’s prepared him well for Harvard.
“Harvard and St. Mary’s are very similar and very different,” he said, “But the values and principles instilled at St. Mary’s translate to Harvard. I felt confident to meet and get to know many different people from many different backgrounds. St. Mary’s prepared me well to succeed in an environment like Harvard.” McCarthy will return to Harvard for business school next year.
Lobo, an educational consultant at Parthenon-EY in Boston, said going to Harvard was a big adjustment, academically and socially.
“I was allowed a lot of space to make mistakes on my own,” said Lobo, who founded an organization at Harvard for first-generation college students. “That group has
changed the dialogue on campus. It was a transformative experience. My goal going into college was to come out a different person than when I went in. I was definitely able to accomplish that.”
Michael Durgin, a 1981 Harvard graduate, has been conducting interviews for Harvard for 30 years, including the last five years with St. Mary’s students.
“I have been very impressed,” said Durgin, a Lynn native who graduated from St. John’s Prep in 1977. “The kids I have met have been delightful, bright and engaged. There’s a lot more going on at St. Mary’s than reading, writing and arithmetic.”
