Leaving one’s hometown is often heralded as a landmark of the transition from adolescence to adulthood, with a Senior Superlative even being devoted to identifying the students most likely to never return to their hometowns. Though many might eventually come back for brief trips down memory lane or to visit their families, for some Piedmont alums the connection goes even deeper, inspiring them to return and work within the community they grew up in.
Ben Breber, a current freshman at Santa Barbara City College and a 2024 PHS graduate, is one such individual. During his gap semester in the fall of 2024, Breber decided to explore his lifelong passion for coaching by serving as an assistant to the PHS JV boys basketball team.
“I kind of knew throughout most of my life that I wanted to be a coach at some point, and specifically basketball… I see a lot of value in teaching people to do things and helping them grow,” Breber said. “So when I was home, I thought, ‘Well, if this is something I’ve always wanted to do, this is a great time to get some experience’.”
Breber also discussed his relationship with the players as a mentor figure and liaison able to bridge the gap between the students and the older coaches, saying that he particularly wanted to emphasize building community and resilience throughout his time with the team.
“Going through a very similar process [high school] that they’re not even halfway through, I think that it was really useful and helpful to make that connection,” Breber said.“What I realized was, a lot of the knowledge that comes with coaching comes from being able to recognize the mistakes that you’ve made before as a player, or just living your life – recognizing those mistakes, and then learning how to address them when you see them in someone else.”
When questioned about his motivations for returning to Piedmont, Breber said he returned to Piedmont because of his personal connection with the town and the joy he finds in mentoring younger members of the community as values present throughout the experience.
“There’s something to where you grow up – as of now, I’ve spent almost my entire life [in Piedmont]… everything I’ve experienced is in this town, so I do put a lot of weight on that, and then when you see kids younger than you in the same town, it’s hard not to relate your own experiences to them and just try and help them navigate it as well as possible,” Breber said.
Joining Wildwood’s staff this year after graduating from UCLA last spring, Ella Lee is another PHS graduate who has made her way back to the community to work as a special ed paraeducator. Lee agreed with many of the sentiments expressed in Breber’s statement, saying her love for the Bay Area was part of what drew her back.
“Honestly, a big part of it for me was the comfort of knowing the area, having grown up here – I love the Bay Area. Also, [going] to school in L.A. is very different culturally and ecologically, and so I was really missing being in the Bay… the nature here, the good food here, stuff like that,” Lee said.
Having worked as a teacher assistant at Wildwood when she was in high school, Lee shared her interest in revisiting her passion for working as an educator..
“The anxiety that comes with graduating college felt overwhelming, and I was like, ‘Okay, if I can take, like, a safe step towards something like an education path or any other thing, then I’d want to start with that’, and then increase my risks after… I love working here full-time. You get to know [the students] really well,” Lee said.
1995 PHS graduate Ayyana Chakravartula said that her own service as a local robotics coach and volunteer with STEM organization Piedmont Makers was largely due to the inspiration she found in memories of her parents’ community work during her childhood.
“Even when I was in school, my parents were very involved in the community – my dad was in the Dads’ Clubs, and he was on the school board, and my mom volunteered quite a bit for the schools and then for the extracurriculars that I did. So I think that was a model in my head of: a way to be part of a community is to volunteer,” Chakravartula said.
Another shared experience of PHS graduates who make their way back to Piedmont is observing the district’s increasingly progressive attitudes and cultural shifts. Chakravartula said that the current culture is much more different than what she experienced during her time at PHS.
“The town has become much more progressive, which is fun to see… When I was in high school, there was a lot of uncomfortable stuff happening around race – it was a quiet attitude towards some things that we would be a lot more open about today, and I think that shift is good,” said Chakravartula.
Several PHS alumni have also been inspired to use their past experiences as PUSD students as points of reflection to perpetuate these cultural changes and shifts for their students and mentees. Lee said she has been motivated to continue working towards positive change within the elementary schools and wishes to use her position as a paraeducator to continue encouraging open-minded attitudes in younger students.
“I’ve been thinking a lot about Piedmont’s demographics… For me, being a person or color, or just being Asian in Piedmont, was a specific version of a Piedmont experience, and so I’m definitely thinking about kids’ positionalities when they’re in the classroom,” Lee said. “As [the elementary schoolers] are forming ideas about what’s normal or what’s allowed and all of that, I try to broaden their minds.”
