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Voice of the Graduate - Angelina Calabrese

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Angelina Calabrese reflects on how St. Edmund Prep formed her into a women for others through her experience on the Emmaus Retreat and charitable outreach efforts.

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There are many words that I could have used to describe Angelina. As I was thinking about what to write I landed on two, resilient and selfless. I think it is clear that nobody here can question her resiliency. In June of her freshman year she went through something that nobody should have to endure. After losing her father it would have been very easy for her to shut down and give up, but she didn’t. She showed up for school in September her cheerful self, ready and willing to take on the challenges of her sophomore year. That September was my first year as dean, and she spent many periods in my office whether it was to have a laugh, a cry, or to just sip some tea.

It wasn’t until her junior and senior year where you really started to see her selflessness. After going on the first Emmaus retreat after Covid she was chosen to be a retreat leader and was truly a woman for others.  She was a 4 year softball player and when she wasn’t on the field she donated so much of her time around the building whether it was at school events or games.

Her greatest accomplishment was putting together a fundraiser in the memory of her father where all donations will benefit Beyond the Badge which helps fight mental health within the police officer community. By the way, that will happen on June 16th at Bergen Beach, so come support! It is my pleasure to introduce to you Angelina Calabrese.

From a young age, I knew I was attending high school at St. Edmund Prep. Being the youngest of four, and having other family members and friends attend SEP, I knew these walls on Ocean Avenue would become my second home. As I walked in on the very first day, almost every faculty and staff member said to me “omg another Calabrese” or “there's another Calabrese? I thought there were only three.” I still walk around here today and my name to everyone is “little Calabrese” or just “Calabrese” and sometimes I even get called my siblings name.
 From the first day I stepped in this building, I knew this was a place where I can grow and succeed. One of the greatest experiences I have had here at the prep, was attending the Emmaus Retreat my junior year, and ultimately becoming a team leader senior year. After attending a retreat with my Emmaus seventy one sisters led by Mr. O’Donnell and Mr. CP, I became more aware of not only my relationship with myself, but with God and others. I knew I could be a leader not just for the following year's retreat, but out in the world. Emmaus showed me that there was so much more I could do for other people.

After losing my dad unexpectedly to his unknown battle with mental health at the end of freshman year, I wanted to help people who were fighting in silence just like him. The end of my junior year I came to Ms. Johnson and Mr. Romano with a ripped up blue notebook and said “I have a fundraiser idea, can we find a way to put this together?” My pitch was to have a faculty-alumni vs student softball game raising money for a mental health charity. The stigma in mental health is way too big. One in every four people you see everyday suffers from a mental disorder. I wanted to help make a change and make a difference in someone’s life. After speaking to faculty, teachers, and coaches this was an idea everyone wanted to run with. This upcoming June 16th, St. Edmund Prep will be having its first Mental Health Awareness Charity Event, “Eagles Fight the Stigma”, remembering my dad detective Joseph Calabrese. All proceeds will be donated to Beyond the Badge New York and to SEP The Detective Joseph Calabrese Memorial Scholarship. This will be a fun day with raffles, food, music, family and friends to turn a bad situation into something good. Thank you to Ms. Johnson for helping me every step of the way with this project, and most of all believing in me that this was something I can pursue. I will always be thankful to have someone like you as a part of my highschool experience. Nothing would be possible without you.

I will always be grateful for St. Edmund Prep, for its greatest gift of the Emmaus program, for giving me the privilege of having the greatest teachers who became friends and friends who became family. It feels like yesterday I walked into the freshman brunch and Mrs. McGinnis gave her iconic speech about being bold and uncommon leaders, how eagles fly into the storm and how these will be the fastest four years of our life. I thought of how crazy that sounded, but here we all are almost four years later finishing out our time here. I know these doors on 2474 Ocean Ave will be a place I could always call home.

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Voice of the Graduate - Angelina Calabrese

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