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HERALD Court Street holds concert
District 24 students excel
LIJVS honors Juneteenth
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VOL. 36 NO. 25
JUNE 19 - 25, 2025
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A scout helps a garden grow By ANGELINA ZINGARIELLO azingariello@liherald.com
Courtesy Michelle Tritschler
Kevin Tritschler with one of the community garden planter boxes early in its construction.
Kevin Tritschler, a senior at Valley Stream South High School, recently completed his Eagle Scout project by building two planter boxes, two compost bins and weather-resistant educational signage for the Valley Stream Beautification Committee’s new community garden. “I’ve just found that litter cleanup is, besides being good for the environment, a fun pastime for me to partake in the long run — even if I forget to bring gloves sometimes,” Tritschler, 18, member of Franklin Square Boy Scout Troop 485, said. “Since then, I really became interested in sanitation and environmental conservation, even if I never had a lot of opportunities to act on it, which is why I was really excited to be given the chance to do an Eagle Scout project, because that actually gave me an opportunity to act on it.” Tritschler’s project spanned more than a year from concept to completion. It began with a different proposal: installing litter
cleanup stations in parks throughout Valley Stream. He submitted that plan to the village of Valley Stream early last year, but it was rejected over concerns about the longterm maintenance and management of the stations. By August, Tritschler had come up with a new plan to work with the Valley Stream Beautification Committee, an organization he had previously worked with as a member of Valley Stream South’s Key Club. The group had long been working on establishing a community garden on East Hawthorne Avenue, drawing inspiration from similar projects in nearby towns. It members were enthusiastic about integrating Tritschler’s efforts into their plans, and this time the beatification committee and the Theodore Roosevelt boy scout counsel approved his project. He raised over $1,000, which was used to buy materials for planter boxes, compost bins and signs. After completing them, he had around $54 remained, which he spent on a poster board presentation to document ConTinued on page 4
Four students earn United for Change scholarships By KEPHERD DANIEL kdaniel@liherald.com
O c e a n s i d e H i g h S ch o o l seniors Ameerah Maignan and Abigail Medouze and Valley Stream North High School seniors Adaobi Okammelu and Richmia Erisnor were awarded scholarships for their college education by the United for Change Association on the Oceanside Schoolhouse Green on June 11. In the wake of George Floyd’s murder in Minneapolis in 2020, during a nationally televised memorial service on June 4, the president at North Central University Scott Hagan, challenged viewers to take meaningful action against systemic inequalities. Lifelong Oceanside resi-
dent and former School Three Principal Tom Capone was moved by the call, and immediately reached out to his former colleagues. Capone, along with a group of retired Oceanside educators, including retired teacher and Oceanside historian Richard Woods, former district math chair Rhonda Eisenberg and retired administrative assistant Michelle Cadogan, formed what they called the Say Their Names Association, which has since transformed into the United for Change Association. “When things were very tumultuous in our country, I began to think about, what can we do to try to bring about some kind of a change ourselves, because there seems to be a dis-
parity or a shift or a gap that exists between one segment of our population and another segment,” Capone recalled. “The Black and African American segment of our population seems to be not in the place where they should be right now, and how can we try to bridge that gap or minimize that gap?” Since 2020, the organization has expanded its reach from just Oceanside to a total of 21 school districts in Nassau and Suffolk County, creating a scholarship program to recognize and support Black and African American students making positive changes in their communities. It awards $1,000 scholarships, and the team of educators has given out over $86,000 in scholarships since 2020. It presented them to
16 students this year. “Giving them a check is one thing,” Capone said “but acknowledging and celebrating in front of their parents or classmates and friends, that’s something that we think they’re going to hold on to for a long, long time.” The acknowledgment has not, however, taken place in front of Oceanside honorees’ peers. Since the scholarship’s inaugural year in 2020, the presentation
has been held on the Schoolhouse Green, separate from the school district’s annual honors awards night, at which students are presented with scholarships from over 100 groups and organizations. “We go to all the other schools that submitted, and where schools where students were selected, we were invited to present these awards at their awards program,” Capone said. “We’re ConTinued on page 2