By Julie Faryniarz
Walking into the vast Greenwich High School Student Center I was once again filled with an overwhelming sense of happiness and anticipation. It would soon be time for the Greenwich High School AVID Class of 2022 Graduation Celebration honoring thirty-seven students who will all be attending college this fall.
Remember, AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) is an internationally recognized college-readiness system designed to close the achievement gap and promote equity and access in education. AVID was brought to the Greenwich Public Schools by the Alliance in 2008 and we started celebrating AVID graduates in 2013.
Missy Brown and Franny Bittman the two AVID 12 teachers along with Frank Kovac (AVID 9 teacher) and Judy Nedell (AVID District Director) were busy setting up 50 tables for the AVID grads and their families to sit and enjoy a nice dinner. There was also a podium and microphone for the elected speakers to reminisce with their classmates and for the AVID teachers to share inspiring messages and memories about their journeys with their students, beautiful 10×14 black and white photos of each graduate taken by Ken Alcorn (AVID 9 teacher), and a screen to display the culminating slide show. I had with me thirty-seven $250 gift cards from the Alliance for the students to use in their college bookstores, ice cream and all of the fixings for sundaes, and huge boxes of college dorm supplies donated by OCM for every student to take with them.
As I knew they would, students arrived smiling with their joyful families – mothers, fathers, cousins, grandparents, and siblings – because tonight was all about them. We were there to celebrate the academic achievements they reached, during the most exceptional of times, in their four years of high school.
Ashley Sierra, AVID speaker, shared this with the audience, “While my freshmen year may have been a very chaotic one, the only real maturity I had was knowing AVID was something special that I should want to stay in and would be worth it in the long run. [I am] standing [here tonight] among a diverse group of amazing people, each with merits and differences of their own, yet united and made whole by AVID.”
Academic milestones were also celebrated at the party I attended for the GHS Class of 2022 Innovation Lab graduates. A tight knit group of thirteen students sat laughing together at the Greenwich Water Club recapping their funniest InLab experiences. Parents sat with the InLab teachers, at other tables, and shared stories about how Innovation Lab truly helped their students grow and dive deep into content that was really interesting to them. These college bound students will be taking the project-based learning skills they learned in InLab and will be prepared to collaborate, research, and design in the coming years with their classmates and professors.
Celebrating college graduations of students who were part of the AVID program also creates quite a buzz at the Alliance. It is so incredibly rewarding to see students who once thought college was not attainable graduate with honors and begin their promising futures. Tiffany Ferreria, is one of these students, and when we met for lunch she proudly shared her Fordham University graduation pictures wearing her cap and gown and holding her diploma.
Julie Faryniarz is the Executive Director of the Greenwich Alliance for Education
She is the mother of 3 GPS graduates
YWCA Greenwich Women Who Inspires Honoree
Former, PTAC President
