How financial aid helped hockey standout Malaya Anaba ’25 find success—on and off the ice
Malaya Anaba ’25 was just a kindergartener when she discovered ice hockey, but the sport rapidly became a driving force in her life. Living in the Indianapolis suburb of Fishers, Indiana, she was the rare girl skating with the boys—until age 12, when she was invited to join a girls team from the Cleveland area. Her dominating performance in her first tournament (ten goals and five assists—playing defense) caught the eye of local coaches. Before long, she was traveling to Europe with select travel clubs and eventually recruited to Gilmour Academy, an independent high school outside Cleveland, supported by a generous financial aid package.
At Gilmour, Malaya recalls, it was hockey every day from August to April, with long bus rides to games on the weekends. She excelled on the ice, but the pace and absence of a broader social life were taking a toll. So when Gilmour made a coaching change, Malaya and her family began thinking about other options. After meeting with Williston coach Christa Talbot Syfu ’98, Malaya came to Easthampton in 2023 as a junior. That’s when something remarkable happened—off the ice.
“She has just blossomed at Williston,” observes her mother, Shelly. “She’s so confident now. She’s doing things like tutoring in the science center. A couple years ago, she never would have had the confidence to do that. This has been a night-and-day experience for her.” Indeed, Malaya’s transfer to Williston has helped her discover a host of new talents and interests. She began playing and excelling at a new sport (field hockey), helping the team win the 2024 NEPSAC championship while earning a league Honorable Mention. She also leaned into her academic strengths in physics and chemistry (she is taking Advanced Placement classes in both), and even creative writing. “I’ve always been so STEM-oriented,” she explains. “But creative writing was probably one of the best classes I’ve ever taken, and it showed me a lot about how I can be creative.”
A key factor underlying Malaya’s growth has been the support of the Williston community, says her mother. “Malaya is mixed race—my husband is Filipino—and going to Gilmour, there were very few people of any different ethnicity besides white. At Williston, Malaya’s group of friends is from all over the world.” Sending her daughter so far from home was not easy, she adds, but “seeing how happy she is, and thriving, I know we made the right decision.”
What made all this transformation possible, Shelly points out, is Williston’s financial aid program. Shelly works as the bookstore manager in the public high school that Malaya attended for ninth grade, while her husband, Vincent, is a physical trainer. Williston’s support not only helped the family with tuition, but allowed Malaya to repeat her junior year. “Getting another year of high school has been one of the best decisions I’ve made,” says Malaya. “It gave me extra time to be with my friends, to take extra classes that I didn’t think I was going to get to take, and to really push myself.”
After graduation, Malaya will be heading just down the road to attend Amherst College—a school that she previously had not even considered—where she hopes to study “something between engineering and computer science,” and, of course, play hockey. “I’m so excited,” she says. “I know some girls who are on the team now, including Williston alumnae, and other girls I’ve played with in the past.”
And while Amherst may be the last chapter of a hockey story that began all those years ago, Malaya and her family are OK with that. Williston has helped her achieve goals that aren’t on a scoresheet. “We always knew she would go to college,” notes her mother. “But I don’t know that she would have gotten into the college that she wanted to go to without Williston.”
