1. To Whom It May Concern
At Your Institution,
Aloha. I am writing with great enthusiasm to recommend Mr. Michael Weddington for
consideration for your open position of interest at your fine institution.
I do so in my former capacity of Admissions Director for St. Anthony Junior-Senior High School,
located here in Wailuku, Maui. As admissions director, I worked closely alongside Michael for two
school years (2008-2010), and we actually shared an office during Michael’s first year.
I was responsible for training Michael in his part-time duties as school registrar, and for helping to
get him acquainted with St. Anthony’s overall operations and culture. During this time, we spent a
good deal of time “talking story” about how to make our school better. This is when I learned just
how passionate and dedicated Michael can be with regards to making every student’s education
as favorable as it can be.
Most of Michael’s time at St. Anthony was officially dedicated to his duties as school college
guidance counselor, but he consistently went above and beyond his job description.
When no one among our administration, staff, and faculty volunteered to lead a discussed 160th-
year anniversary celebration for our school, Michael volunteered to take charge (as a first-year
teacher new to the school and Maui) and partnered wonderfully with many within our St. Anthony
‘Ohana to make a quality celebration a reality. When approached as a brand-new teacher to take
over guidance duties for our campus student Key Club, Michael readily agreed, and eventually led
our club to statewide honors last year as Hawaii’s “most-improved Key Club” at the State
Convention. When the need was obvious to many of us that our school especially needed to
improve our website services, Michael took the initiative and partnered with Ed Knoyle to greatly
upgrade our website in so many useful ways.
Michael made his greatest impact as a college and career guidance counselor, however. When he
arrived, our college guidance program was in great disarray, with many parents and student upper-
classmen very concerned over it’s perceived lack of quality service. However, almost immediately
Michael gained the respect of many of our students and parents by carefully listening to their
concerns and then taking bold actions. These included lobbying for and bringing a nationally-
renowned online and college career system called Naviance that significantly improved student
and family college exploration efforts. Michael also quickly and greatly improved financial aid
assistance for our students and families by making local and national scholarship and financial aid
options much more accessible to our entire ‘ohana.
Parental involvement greatly increased under Michael’s tenure compared to previous counselor
eras. Parental college nights that numbered about maybe 5-10 parents and students combined
prior to Michael’s arrival (as I know from personal experience) jumped to first 50 and then almost
80 during his tenure. Michael also greatly increased informational resources for students and
parents via our school website, which could then be accessed from home and during weekends
and holidays.

2. Another area Michael made an important contribution to our school’s well-being was in helping us
to prepare for and then pass our WASC visitation and accreditation process. His very detailed
and often original standardized test-score data and analysis presentations, and very
comprehensive student graduation tracking information (concerning how many students
matriculated from St. Anthony into which 2-year and 4-year colleges each year from around the
U.S.), as well as analytical reports concerning how well our students are performing (or not
performing) at college-ready work as compared to their peers state- and nation-wide, were very
helpful in enabling St.Anthony to gain additional years of accreditation.
Michael also effectively partnered with our school counselor Malorie Chong to provide quality
monthly guidance period presentations and activities for our entire student body. He put in many
hours in doing so, in a ways that tried to make guidance both more meaningful and more
entertaining for our students. One of his most impressive efforts was in arranging with the Maui
Ritz Carlton in Kapalua to host an all-day “career day” for our entire student body last Spring,
where Michael coordinated with dozens of Ritz Carlton managers and employees to provide
career-path information on practically everything Ritz Carlton employees do for a living. Everyone
involved agreed this event was a great success, thanks to Michael’s hard-working efforts.
Michael also brought many interesting career and employment professionals to his classes (along
with many college recruiters) to enrich the minds of our students as much as possible, and Michael
also arranged some “career shadowing” opportunities for a few of our interested seniors, with local
employers.
I think some of Michael’s greatest qualities are his vision, sensitivity to the needs and concerns of
others, and his compassion. He always comes up with new and exciting ideas, but always finds a
way to positively involve others in doing so. As a teacher new to our school and to St. Anthony, he
has been extraordinarily effective at reaching our local students (including the boys) and gaining
their trust. When observing Michael on a daily basis, it became obvious just how much he loved
his job and enjoyed helping everyone around him.
I believe Michael would make a great and positive contribution to whichever place he joins. He is
creative, caring, and very hard-working. He follows through with commitments, and always brings
positive attitude to the workplace. It was an honor serving alongside him for these past two years.
Sincerely yours,
Melony NeSmith
Former Admissions Director
St. Anthony Jr-Sr High School