__________________ SEAFORD _________________
SEPTEMBER 8, 2022
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INS FOR IDE TH SCHSEASOE FUL EDU N L LE
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Dominick Novello
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Vol. 70 No. 37
Seaford’s talented athletes
High School Preview - Inside
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202 2 HIGH SCHO OL SPORTS PREVIEW
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SEPTEMBER 8 - 14, 2022
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Quattrocchi joins Wantagh Reading specialist succeeds Scolieri as middle school’s assistant principal By MICHAEl MAlASZCZYK mmalaszczyk@liherald.com
Tim Baker/Herald
Back to school at St. William the Abbot Incoming eighth-grader Maggie LaLota was all smiles — along with fellow students and teachers — at St. William the Abbot Catholic Church’s back-to-school celeberation in Seaford.
A new era has begun for Wantagh Middle School, as literacy expert Rachel Quattrocchi is beginning her first year as assistant principal. Quattrocchi is replacing Stephanie Scolieri, who has served as assistant principal for the past eight years and has accepted the position as the district’s director of human resources. Quattrocchi said she believes she is qualified and ready to take on her new position. She previously worked in Plainview schools for 12 years as a reading
specialist before coming to Wantagh. Although this is her first administrative position, Quattrocchi said she is no stranger to working alongside school leaders. “When I was in Plainview, I worked very closely with our administrative team,” she said. “It was not in an official capacity, but I took on a lot of initiatives and spearheaded a lot of things.” When she found out that Scolieri was leaving the post, Quattrocchi applied for it, and said she fell in love with Wantagh during the interview. “I first met the principal, Anthony Ciuffo, and Stephanie Continued on page 12
Students got soup-to-nuts summer enrichment program By MICHAEl MAlASZCZYK mmalaszczyk@liherald.com
Children from Wantagh and Seaford who attend Levittown schools were treated to an “enriching” summer of 2022. After enduring two summers without any enrichment programs in 2020 and 2021, Levittown district officials felt it was necessary for the programs to make a strong comeback this year, according to Todd Winch, superintendent of Levittown schools. “We hadn’t done anything in two summers, and then in March, when things all of a sudden returned to normalcy, we
knew we had to make this one special,” said Winch, who recently took over for retiring superintendent Tonie McDonald after having served as assistant superintendent for instruction in Levittown. Winch added that the district has had a high demand for summer enrichment in recent years, but this year Levittown received additional funding through grants to make the summer enrichment program even more successful. Levittown used a grant from the American Rescue Plan to slash the cost of enrollment for those in the program. “We were able to subsidize the
cost of our usual programs by about 50 percent,” Winch said. The programs include Camp Invention, a two-week-long, halfday program for elementary school students, with the focus on science, technology, engineering and math. In addition, Levittown partnered with Scope Education Services, the Board of Cooperative Educational Services, or BOCES, and Caumsett S t a t e P a rk f o r s o m e o f the enrichment programs. “We, of course, have the traditional summer programs as well,” Winch said. “The usual kickball, reading programs, all that. But we wanted to provide a plethora of things for them to
choose from.” Some of these programs took students on adventures all around the island. The marine biology program, for example, was conducted at Caumsett in conjunction with BOCES, allowing students to explore the North Shore coastline, examining the diverse flora and fauna inhabiting both the
water and the land. They learned how to fish, and explored a salt marsh to learn about Long Island’s glacial history. The students also canoed upstream to a freshwater pond and learned about its unique ecosystem, culminating with a trip to the Long Island aquariContinued on page 17