Nice To Meet You, I’m Luke!

My name is Luke Lacilla, I live in the small quiet town of Litchfield, CT. I am currently a student at Salisbury Boarding School in Salisbury, CT. I maintain an “A” grade point average, play competitive JV basketball, Captain of the Varsity Cross Country Team and a coxswain on the Varsity Crew Team. I am also involved with many community service activities in my hometown of Litchfield, CT which I will explain later in more detail. My objective is to share with you today I am the person I claim to be which is, authentic, generous, patient, kind, hardworking, a follow-through person, highly organized and will always push myself to do the uncomfortable. I have collected evidence of my actions from 3rd party sources such as newspaper articles, and letters of recommendation from School Superintendents, Principals, Employers, and Coaches in my accomplished areas of Education, Athletics, Community Service and Work-related activities.

I enjoy playing golf, tennis, pickleball, swimming and boating. I also enjoy playing the piano in my spare time. I hold down two part-time jobs and work at Bearicuda, Inc. and Petraroia Deli in my hometown during the off-school months.

When I am not busy with school, sports, or work, you can usually find me helping in my community. I volunteer at the Torrington Soup Kitchen serving meals to the homeless and those in need of a hot meal. In addition, I volunteer at the Possum Queen foundation raising money to help families with unforeseen medical expenses. I also help at the Oliver Wolcott Library, at an event called “The Festival of Trees in every November where I either volunteer my time at the event or make a Christmas tree with decorations for a silent auction.

I am a brother to my two sisters Brooke and Madison. Brooke attends Providence College and Madison Fairfield University. I share a very close and special friendship with my siblings. My parents have always instilled the importance of family and that no one is going to care about me more than my parents and my siblings so we always have this bond that will never be broken.

I began my schooling at St. Johns a private Catholic School located in Watertown CT (pre-K thru 5^th grade with an A grade point average and participated in cross country, basketball, guitar and a few school plays). I was the first student to race competitively with the 5th through 8^th graders when I was only in 2^nd grade. My parents had to sign some kind of letter saying they would not hold the school responsible if I got run over by the bigger boys, I think that’s why I ran so fast. In my first race as a 2nd grader, I placed 14^th out of 86 runners which was a combination of 6 different local schools grades 5^th through 8th. Below is a picture of a 7^th grade boy from Swift who told me I didn’t belong in the race. As you can see, even as a 2^nd grader I was focused. I have never been intimidated by a challenge, nervous yes, but not intimidated even as young as 2^nd grade.

One thing that has been engrained into my thinking by my father is he always tells me that “The difference between successful people and unsuccessful people is that successful people do things unsuccessful people are unwilling to do”.

Successful people often do things they don’t feel like doing. Successful people know how to delay gratification. They do the right, tough thing before they do the fun, enjoyable thing.

JV Salisbury Basketball – I am the smallest in the entire league and as a Freshman I played approximately half of the game. As a sophomore I am the 6^th man coming in amongst mostly Juniors and Seniors.

Salisbury Varsity Cross Country – I was voted Captain of the Team this year, youngest runner to hold that leadership position. In 2024 I tied a 123-year-old record for the most wins in a single season of a Salisbury runner.

I am a Coxswain for the competitive Salisbury Varsity Crew Team coxing for both the V1 and V2 boats. When I was told my body was not made for crew I found another way to contribute, Coxing!

In all the above pictures I am the smallest and so many times I was overlooked because of my stature. Friends, coaches, and my peers always drew a perceived notion that I couldn’t contribute as much as some of the other bigger, stronger kids. As from the movie “Rudy” I think it was said best by the groundskeeper who was friends with Rudy and said, “You’re 5 foot nothing and 100 and nothing”. As with the groundskeeper, my parents encouraged me to fulfill my desires and prove I could accomplish anything with motivation, relentless follow-through and execution. Cross country I have the shortest legs, for every 1 stride the other runners take I need to take 2 strides. Basketball I am about a foot shorter than all the other boys on the floor, so I figured out three things; 1) to be the quickest on the court, 2) To be the best ball handler on the court and 3) know where to be before the ball gets there. These actions gave me one of the spots on the JV Basketball team as a freshman. Twenty-two kids tried out for the team and many of the players came back from the previous year, of which there were only 2 spots opened, I did get one of them. No one thought I could make the team, the coach even had doubts and sent me an email telling me it was going to be difficult to make this team, but she saw my hard work and ended up giving me one of the spots.

When I tried out for crew, I was told I did not have the power, the height, the upper body strength so I soon realized that one of the most important positions in the boat is the coxswain. I studied how to be the best coxswain before the tryoutbegan and made the Varsity crew team at Salisbury. There were 4 boats and in my freshman year I was crewing both the V1 and V2 boats because one of the top cox swains was released from school for not following school policies. This created a huge opportunity to slide into a very important leadership position that was extremely stressful, but sharpened me beyond anything I have ever done prior in any sport. It was my job as a cox swain to provide leadership, not only steer a boat worth well over Twenty thousand dollars but motivate my team, make the right calls on the water and understand technique of the sport while knowing that each of my rowers had their own set of strengths and weakness that I had to harness at the right times. These kinds of situations build mental toughness and steadiness in uncertain times, especially when you feel the weight of everything is on you.

In addition to my sports, I continue to work in my community helping others when I am home. To all my future employers, college admissions faculty, and those that just want to know a little more about me please take a moment and review this website. If I have fallen short, I want to know, if I have done something that inspires you, I want to know or if there is something I can do to help you I want to know. What I have learned is that I get the greatest amount of joy and fulfillment when the focus is not on me, and I am helping others. I want to become someone that can have a meaningful impact on the lives of others while achieving big goals.

My parents have told me that accomplishing big goals in my life isn’t going to happen overnight. The bigger your goal, the longer it will take. The more significant your goal, the more time and energy will be involved. Reaching goals takes time and discipline this is why my father told me in 6^th grade start early in the areas of education, leadership and taking good care of myself – meaning eating healthy and working out every day.

I have been learning that nothing great is ever accomplished without patience, persistence, determination, and endurance. My dad said to me “I suggest that you set big goals and spend the rest of your life going after them and while going after these goals you are going to have to learn how to delay gratification and put in the hard work”. 

For many years of my life, I have always done the uncomfortable. If that meant working extra hard at school to get great grades I would do it. If that means getting involved in community service work and leading the effort I will do it. If that means being the best and even pushing my abilities in my athletics, I will do it, regardless of my size. If that means getting a job at the age of 12 and learning about things that I knew little about, I did it. I have always overcome obstacles putting in the hard work when 99% of people may have just given up.

I have found that if I want to fulfill my dreams, goals, ambitions and help others I must dare to be different from the culture around me. You can’t fit in and be different or make a difference at the same time. You have to decide: “I’m willing to be different from the culture”—because the culture is headed one way, and many times I must head in a different direction.

Luke Lacilla – Salisbury Knight