Class Notes

C O N C O R D A C A D E M Y M A G A Z I N E S P R I N G 2 0 1 0David CavellClass of 2002Channeling the GovernorWhen David Cavell ’02 tells new acquaintanceshe’s a speechwriter forMassachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick, he is accustomedto hearing a couple responses. Many ask,“Isn’t it weird to hear your words coming out ofsomeone else’s mouth?” But the mischievouswonder, “Do you ever slip in something silly orinappropriate just to see if he’ll say it?”To Cavell, both questions, even if meant injest, miss the point of what he does. “The governorisn’t a robot. The words he says are his,”Cavell said. “He’s a heavy editor and he knowsmore about speechwriting than I ever will. Afterlistening to pretty much everything Gov. Patrickhas said for the past three years, I’ve developeda good sense of how he feels about the world ingeneral and about specific issues. When I’m writing,it’s not my voice that I’m hearing, it’s his.”Politics has been in Cavell’s blood since hevolunteered as campaign coordinator for a Massachusettslegislative candidate the summerafter graduating from CA. During his senior yearat Tufts University, he interned with the mediadepartment of the Patrick campaign. But aftercollege, he was accepted into Teach for America(TFA), which recruits recent college graduates toteach in under-resourced public schools. FromAugust 2006 to August 2007, Cavell taughtfourth grade at a public school in the SouthBronx. “I don’t think I realized when I was at CAjust how massive the gap is between the bestand worst schools in this country,” he said. “Itwas shocking to me.”The teaching stint had highs and lows. “Iheld a parent-teacher conference in a homelessshelter. That’s not something you ever forget,”he said. “And when you see a kid who is everybit as smart as you were as a child, and remindsyou so much of your friends when you wereyoung, but is growing up in such a violent environment,it’s very hard. TFA is a complicated12Eugena Ossi/Office of the Governor of Massachusettsprogram but really worthwhile.”After TFA, Cavell headed back to his hometownof Boston and met with a former fellowintern from the Patrick campaign, who hadbecome the governor’s speechwriter. As interns,the two had once pinch-hit on a speech whenthe paid staff was out of the office. “He invitedme to work with him,” Cavell said. “Less thantwo weeks after I left the fifth floor of a chaoticelementary school in the Bronx, I walked into theState House and sat down at an oak desk in frontDavid Cavell ’02 and Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrickof a twelve-foot window overlooking Beacon Hill.That was an adjustment.”Cavell, officially Speechwriter and DeputyDirector of New Media for the Governor, loveshis job. With lead times that vary from fifteenminutes to several weeks, he relishes thechallenge of speechwriting. “It’s a learningprocess,” he said. “One of the things I learnedat CA is that you really have to get over yourfear of failure. You have to be willing to do somethingthat doesn’t work so that you can figureout what does.”Among Cavell’s proudest accomplishmentsare a speech announcing that Massachusettswould welcome same-sex couples fromanywhere in the country to marry and anothercommemorating the fiftieth anniversary of theLittle Rock Nine’s integration of Central HighSchool in 1957. “Helping prepare remarks thatwould be delivered to eight of the Little RockNine, about whom I’d learned in a history classat CA just five or six years earlier, was unforgettable,”he said.All this keeps Cavell excited to arrive at workevery morning and to stay late into the evening.“Governor Patrick is one of the most intelligent,thoughtful, and engaged people I’ve ever met.He really believes in his role as a public servant,”he said. “Ultimately, what matters to me is thatI can be part of the governor’s overall plan tomake the state a better place.”