Most high school administrators never experience the unique thrill of witnessing the first class of seniors in a school's history graduate.

After June 9, Andrew Zvara will have seen it -- twice.

The first time was at The Newport School in Montgomery County, formerly The Town and Country Day School, where Zvara was headmaster for 17 years.

The second will be as co-head of The Lab School of Baltimore, for students who are learning-disabled. The eight members of the senior class will receive their hard-earned diplomas in ceremonies at the Lovely Lane United Methodist Church next door.

"It's kind of exciting," said Zvara, 67, who keeps a framed photo in his office of three girls who were the first graduates at The Newport School in 1986.

The Newport girls went to prestigious colleges: Princeton and Emory universities and the Pratt Institute, a school of art and design in New York.

The Lab School seniors who are going on to college are enrolling at lesser-known schools, such as Davis & Elkins in West Virginia, Full Sail in Florida and Rocky Mountain in Montana.

But comparatively, it's a high achievement for them as well because they overcame learning problems and a lack of confidence in themselves, Zvara said.

Five of the eight grads have been accepted to colleges. At the more established Lab School of Washington, the rate is 93 percent.

The commencement exercises will be Zvara's swan song. He is leaving to go back to The Newport School as headmaster next fall.

Richard Meltzer, director of the upper school at the Lab School of Washington, will come to work at the Baltimore school in the fall.

Zvara, who is co-head of The Lab School with Daniel Blanch, said he already had been planning to take a lesser role at the Lab School next year, but then Blanch took a job in South Carolina.

"I didn't want to run this myself," Zvara said.

Coincidentally, the Newport job was open, and two of his former students -- now president and vice president of the board of trustees -- invited him back, he said.

He is leaving The Lab School with nothing left to prove. The proof is in the first senior class.

"It's sort of like giving birth to something, or as close as I'm going to get."

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