News

Student-athletes in Newton Country Day’s rowing program recently had the opportunity to hear from alumna Megan Lee ‘19, who returned to campus to share insights from her journey from novice NCDS rower to U.S. Rowing National Team athlete. Lee reflected on her first rowing experiences on Boston’s Charles River with the Falcons (including shouting out her favorite boat, the Confidence), the lessons she learned while balancing academics and athletics, and the mindset of Courage and Confidence that helped her progress to the highest levels of the sport.

From as early as the age of six, Lee dreamed of competing in the Olympics. Initially, she thought she would compete in swimming, but her first time in a rowing shell in Grade 10 at NCDS changed everything. “I remember the first day I rowed here,” she said. “It was 39 degrees and raining. We were on the water and I was in the novice eight and I said, ‘Well, I'm going to go to the Olympics.’ I didn’t know how to feather or put my oar in the water. I didn’t know anything. But I was dead set on that dream.” 

After graduating from NCDS, Lee went on to Duke University where she rowed for four years and represented the United States internationally, including winning gold with the U23 National Team. After graduation, she earned a master’s degree at the University of Cambridge in England and competed in the historic Boat Race against Oxford before returning to NCAA competition for a fifth year at the University of Washington, where she helped the program win a Big Ten Championship.

Lee now trains full-time with the U.S. Rowing National Team in Princeton, New Jersey, and recently competed in the women’s eight at the World Rowing Championships in Shanghai, China. Just as she did when she was six years old, she has her sights set on competing in the Olympic Games next, specifically in Los Angeles in 2028.

In her Q&A session with NCDS’s student-athletes, Lee shared advice on navigating rigorous academics while also prioritizing athletics. “NCDS is hard,” she admitted. “There were times in high school where I was like, ‘I’m doing five hours of homework after three hours of practice… and I have to wake up at six in the morning and do it all again?’ But I felt so prepared for college because of everything that I learned here. It is totally worth it.” 

A student asked Lee how she prevented academic pressure from impacting her athletic performance. No stranger to mastering this balance, Lee replied, “The most important thing is to be able to turn school off and turn rowing on when you’re on the water. And that definitely takes some learning,” she explained. “I would use practice as my escape from school and school as my escape from rowing.” This separation, she shared, was key to letting her passions for both athletics and classroom learning exist and thrive in separate spaces.

Later in the Q&A session, Lee recalled competing in the Head of the Charles Regatta during her Grade 11 year. “It was probably one of my most formative rowing experiences. We started out around 28th and finished eighth,” she recalled. She painted a vivid picture of the river that day, which included her coach, Kate Spelman, trailing the boat along the river on her bicycle. “After the race, Coach Spelman told us we were the fastest school crew, and we got a trophy. That was the first time I truly found success in the sport,” she explained. She has been chasing that success ever since, and attributed it to the fun she had with her teammates at practices and races. “We didn’t expect it, but our boat gelled so well that year. We had so much fun and I think that’s why we were able to do so well. I come back to that memory often.”

When asked where she has seen Courage and Confidence on the national stage, Lee replied: “Every. Single. Day.” When she finds herself surrounded by the world’s best in rowing, she acknowledges that some might struggle with impostor syndrome. “Sometimes, especially on the National Team, I'm one of the youngest people,” she said. “And when you get into a boat full of Olympians and you're the only non-Olympian, that's definitely a mental challenge.” But she does not succumb to feelings of not belonging, whether it’s in a race, a boat, or on a team. “It comes back to a sense of self-belief. I am a very confident person, and that is something I rely on,” she explained. “I know it’s because I went to school here and was taught to be a strong woman of Courage and Confidence. I notice in the real world when women don’t possess those traits.” 

Today, Lee rows alongside some of the best athletes in the world, but the Courage and Confidence she first developed as a Falcon remain the driving force of her journey, propelling her toward her childhood Olympic dreams and inspiring the next generation of Newton Country Day rowers.