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Franklin square/elmont
DECEMBER 30, 2021 - JANUARY 5, 2022
VOL. 24 NO. 1
A singular focus on young people
By Robert Traverso
rtraverso@liherald.com
C Herald file photo xx/Herald
xx Covid-19 vaccine came to the The Elmont community. Page 0
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Melissa Koenig/Herald xx/Herald
An Elmont doctor was charged xx with murder.
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Santa’s wonderland brought many xx and varied gifts.
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ounseling a student at a local school. Making sure Covid-19 protocols are followed at a holiday party for children. Coordinating with key players in the community to plan events for students. What is Pat Boyle’s favorite part of being executive director of Gateway Youth Outreach? The unpredictability, he said, that comes with each day of leading the community-focused organization, which organizes programs for the youth of Elmont. “The beauty of my job — and I’ve said this to people a thousand times — is when I stand every single morning with the key in my hand getting ready to open that door, I never know what’s on the other side,” Boyle, 63, said. “I enjoy everything I do. There’s nothing that I do that is higher up on the ladder than another.” Boyle’s work may be unpredictable, but its purpose never changes: Each day he is focused on serving Elmont’s young students and children. For that dedication to the community, the Herald is proud to name him its 2021 Person of the Year. Boyle, who lives in the Bronx, has worked for GYO since 1989, six years after the organization was created. He has been a social worker for nearly 50 years. Most of his work over the decades has taken place in local school districts, with individual students and with hundreds of children collectively in a wide range of programs. GYO’s cornerstone is its afterschool program, which is usually offered in every Elmont school and serves as many as 800 kids each day. It
HERALD PERSON OF THE YEAR
provides students with homework assistance as well as free snacks and a chance to spend time with their friends outside class, explained Mary Jane Havrylkosf, who has worked for the organization’s payroll department for four years. “In that extra three hours a day,” Boyle said, “we’re trying to fulfill the needs of the community, whatever they might be.” For now, the after-school program is being offered only at the Dutch Broadway, Covert Avenue and Gotham Avenue school, while the Clara H. Carlson School, which is usually part of the program, is closed because of staff shortages resulting from the current spike in coronavirus cases. The program recently retur ned to in-person meetings after going virtual last year.
Students under stress
PAT BOYLE
I‘
enjoy everything I do. There’s nothing that I do that is higher up on the ladder than another.’ PAT BOYLE
“They’re not growing up normal,” Boyle said, summing up his concerns that students are feeling many of the effects of the pandemic. “He is very caring,” Carol Reyes, GYO’s program coordinator, said of Boyle, emphasizing that she is struck by his single-minded focus on the children it serves. Boyle stressed that while GYO was created to serve at-risk children, he believes that all children are at risk. They are constantly faced with challenging decisions, such as whether or not to use drugs and alcohol, he said, and it is GYO’s job to help them develop the ability to meet those challenges, even as youngsters. Continued on page 4 Herald file photo
Pat Boyle, the Herald’s Person of the Year.