NORTH BRANFORD — Students who’ve demonstrated exceptional character SOARed to new heights at North Branford High School (NBHS) this semester with awards distributed in a new and interesting way to meet the school’s COVID-19 protocols.

Instead of holding a traditional assembly/award presentation ceremony, “...we held a SOAR-prise event, where we had a mascot and administrators surprise students in their classrooms to present the awards,” said NBHS Dean of Students Megan Lee.

NBHS principal Todd Stoeffler, assistant principal Gregory Gwudz and Lee wanted the day to be both memorable and significant for the NBHS students, despite the restrictions of COVID-19, said Lee. That included putting together a rather regal Thunderbird mascot who came out to help present the awards during the school day (with help from special education teacher and great sport Jackie Thurston).

On Nov. 25, students were alerted to the fact that something was up, and word spread pretty quickly once the awards started getting distributed.

“We did a morning announcement to tell everyone to get ready for some surprises. And then every (schedule) block, we played the eagle sound at random over the announcements. So they knew someone was coming; but they didn’t know where they were going. We were really trying to work with what we had and wanted to surprise the kids with something a little bit different,” said Lee. “Anything we can do to build excitement and bring joy to the kids is what we’re trying to do.”

The school's faculty and administration recently unveiled NBHS's newly-adopted SOAR vision program, which is geared toward supporting and building character in all of its students (formerly, the Circle Expectations program). The SOAR acronym supports the concept of students as Socially responsible contributors, Open minded engaged citizens, Achievement focused students and Resilient life long learners.

Dozens of students were nominated by their peers and/or teachers for this semester’s recognition. The 2020 fall semester SOAR awards were presented to 17 students in grades 9 – 12.

Freshman awardees for the fall semester are Patricia Mone, Sabrina Lin, Mia Yacono and Lars Peterson. Sophomores are Patrick Cucchiarelli, Edwardo Luciano, Mia Park and Paul Raffone. Juniors are Dakota Cooper, Regan Leete, Tara Salani-Bathija and Catherine Pollock. Seniors are Alexis Sorrell, Catie Dow, Karina Jassil, Kaila Manner and Summer Grave.

In addition, SOAR award winning teachers for the fall 2020 semester are Rebekah Polemeni and Alexander DeBrizzi.

A compilation of student photos from the day, together with all of the names of nominees and awardees from each class, is display now at NBHS.