Dinardo & Lee Scholarships Established

Police and Firefighting

Memorial Scholarships Named for Marc DiNardo ’89 & Mark Lee ’77 established under

Hudson Catholic Scholarship Program

We recently sent word to our heroes of law enforcement and firefighting of the establishment of two scholarships to honor the memory of alumni who gave their lives in the line of service. The Hudson Catholic Scholarship Program is proud to build on the recent unveiling of the Honor Roll of Highest Sacrifice, a plaque that now displays in the school lobby, in remembrance of those six alumni who perished in police, fire or military service.

We told alumni members of the law enforcement profession and the Class of ‘89 about the inaugural Detective Marc Dinardo ’89 Police Memorial Scholarship award. And we told alumni members of the firefighting profession, First Responders, and the Class of ’77 of the inaugural Captain Mark Lee ’77 Firefighters Memorial Scholarship award.

There are never enough ways to honor our heroes of these professions. And then there are those who have made the ultimate sacrifice in protection of our communities, such as Marc Dinardo '89, End of Watch July 21, 2009 and Mark Lee ’77, Last Alarm May 9, 2014.

The establishment of lasting scholarship awards will each be made to a child of a law enforcement and firefighting professional, who attend Hudson Catholic. Preference will be given, of course, to the children of fallen members of these professions.

We are appealing to alumni in these professions and classes, in particular, to support these awards in providing the gift of education to students whose family members serve and protect our communities. But these awards are open to all who would choose to support them.

When we have accumulated $2,500 in the Police Fund, and $2,000 in the Firefighters Fund, student recipients will be awarded. We’ll then start over until we reach those levels again. In this manner, we can make these perpetual awards.

And may perpetual light shine on Detective Dinardo and Captain Lee.

You may honor their memory and sacrifice by donating at hudsoncatholic.org/hcsp, selecting the Dinardo Award or Lee Award from the menu of Hudson Catholic Scholarship Program awards.

St. John Baptist de LaSalle, Pray for Us. Live, Jesus, in our Hearts, Forever!

The late Jersey City Police Dept. Detective Mark Dinardo '89

The late Jersey City Fire Dept. Captain Mark Lee '77

Wall of Honor Pantheon

Begins to Rim the Gym

With North Wall full, we've started on the South Wall

Hawk Athletic Royalty on Display

Inductees joined by Wall mainstays, L.to R., Pat Verney, Bruno Bisiachi, John Cruitt, Al Long, Katria Stewart, Eileen Higgins - sister of the late John Higgins, Paul Lenczuk, Cory Robinson, Frank Becht

The Gym was filled and looked as good as it ever did! The event's Gold Sponsor was Aegis Insurance Services whose CEO is our very own Hawk, Bill Cullen '72.

The 40-year dynamic duo of Paul Lenczuk and Frank Becht.

In The Lenten Season,

A Message of Hope

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1G7TygL18t87XIxoVSkBDjJf4eDv8vppb/view

Our Peer Ministers invite you to view their short video at the above URL.

Copy and paste it into your browser.

Our current group of Peer Ministers, under the tutelage of Faculty Advisor, Mr. James Falconer, have produced a short video containing a powerful Lenten message.

Down through the years, the Hudson Catholic 'Peer Ministry' group has served as an incarnation of the loving heart and serving hands of Jesus.

Peer Ministers are students of integrity who have been accepted into a unique group whose focus is on prayer, liturgy, and service to the school and local community, whether it be creating a special prayer service for the school or helping in a soup kitchen.

After viewing the video, tell us about how it made you feel in a note to advancement@hudsoncatholic.org.

It's here! Our annual day of giving on La Salle Day, the feast of St. John Baptist de La Salle! Our Goal is $12,500 in 24 hours, to turn that into $25,000 from a Challenge Match by an anonymous alumnus. Give for the first time, give a gift no matter how small, give as generously as you are able, because it all adds up to a distinctive gift on a distinctive day for Hudson Catholic.

Click on this link and follow the landing page instructions to make your gift.

https://hudsoncatholic.org/givingday

--or--

Scan the code below to get there.

Klapouchy ‘bears’ it

Raises $2,175 in Polar Plunge

John Klapouchy '80 also bared it and maintained a long streak of annual March plunges into the frigid North Atlantic in the 15th Annual Ancient Order of Hibernians' Polar Plunge for Catholic education in Sea Girt, NJ, and once again in support of Hudson Catholic. Thank you, John! And nice shirt!

Houston……we have great news

(no problem at all)

Our long-time benefactor, The Scholarship Fund for Inner-City Children, has made a tradition of sending Hudson Catholic students to Space Camp in Huntsville, Alabama. This year continues the trend, started several years ago, with scholarships to Advanced Space Camp awarded to juniors Ashley Batista and Donna Alvarez, pictured at left with Assistant Principal Mrs. Sarah Degnan-Barbi. The scholarship covers the $1,500 tuition and airfare.

Mr. Phil Gazzale said: “These are two great students who will benefit greatly from the experience.”

Activities include training like an astronaut on the 1/6th Gravity Chair and the Multi-Axis Trainer; designing, building and launching a team rocket, and safely recovering its payload; learning team-building skills on the Space Camp Challenge Course; experiencing neutral buoyancy while SCUBA diving in the Underwater Astronaut Trainer; and flying jet aircraft simulators.

“I want to thank Mr. Gazzale and Ms. Maderal for recommending me,” Batista said. “This is going to help me with college because I’m thinking about Engineering as a major.”

Batista and Alvarez join a growing list of Hudson Catholic students who have been invited to this camp. Last year Naomi Fernandez, Samantha Fernandez, and Zachary Fernandez earned the honor. The year prior, Xochilt and Jazmin Turijan were honored but their attendance was pushed from 2020 to 2021 for obvious reasons. In 2019, it was current senior Juan Tierra.

They should all remain aware that a Hawk alumnus, Matt Giambusso ’98 is working at Ad Astra in Houston helping to develop the prototype rocket that may one day carry our Space Campers not only into space but on their way to Mars!

Annual Fund Update

Our Alumni and Friends are humbling us with their generosity. We are now at 63% of the journey to our goal, having received $156,512 in gifts and donations through March 31st. Next up is Giving Day, which we expect to propel our results well forward in April. With 3 months to go in the school's fiscal year, stay tuned for the monthly results as we edge our way forward to the goal line. BE THE HAWK!

54 Graduating Classes

by the Numbers

Our 54 graduating classes have produced 7,685 alumni. We have lost 367 of our classmates throughout the years, God bless their souls.

The largest class was 1969, the only class with over 200 graduates. 1977 and 1984 nearly made it, at 198 and 196. The smallest class was 2012 with 87, stemming from the enrollment crisis in 2008. Among the nine graduating classes since then, no graduating class has been smaller than 112, and 2021’s class of 142 has been the largest since that time.

Ongoing efforts to increase our ability to communicate with our 7,318 living alumni have resulted in the accumulation of many more email addresses than we had a year ago. With 2,935 email addresses, this newsletter reaches 40% of all alumni.

We would like to keep up the pace and focus on asking you to share email addresses for your classmates at advancement@hudsoncatholic.org or encourage them to go online to hudsoncatholic.org/stay-connected to update their personal contact information.

In doing your part to help the cause, it might be helpful to know that, as might be expected, our more recent classes, in the '20s and ‘10s, have the highest percentage of email contacts, at 80% and 57%, respectively. The two classes of the '60s are at 55%, and the '70s are at 43%. The decades of the '00s, '80s, and '90s have the most ground to make up, with email contacts at 31%, 33%, and 37% of class members. So, come on guys, let’s pick it up!

Not only will increased numbers of email addresses enable us to communicate with more of our graduates, but from a fundraising perspective, if we are able to reach more people, we can encourage their support of Hudson Catholic, therefore stand to increase total donations and gifts for the benefit of the young men and women entrusted to our care.

Be The Hawk! Flood us with those email addresses!

In the Continuing Story of Hawk Legacies

Uncovered

After careful investigative work, the Legacy Sleuths found

The Tolan Washingtons - Tolan Sr. ’79 and Tolan Jr. ’08.

Newest

Freshman Craig Chowanec is a top academic scholar.

Dad, Walter, is Class of 1990.

Welcome, Craig! Congrats to proud papa Walter!

A Variation on a Theme

New on staff this year is Guidance Counselor James Sweeney.

While getting to know James, we learned that while he is not an alum, he is indeed the son of a Hawk alum, Kevin Farrell ’78.

Blast From the Past

Who are these people?

We're not exactly sure who these fresh faces are and from what year this was pulled. But if you know, please tell us by sending information to advancement@hudsoncatholic.org. The photo and write-up appeared in a 1985 version of Accipiter but did not give attribution to the original source, suspected to be The Commentator or The Hawk yearbook.

Alumni Spotlight

Eye on the Prize. Bernadette Matutino ’21 is a first-year Marketing major (Minoring in Graphic Design) at Rutgers Business School.

Health Care Squared. Jason Busacco ’89 is an Environmental Health & Safety Project Manager at Mt. Sinai Hospital in New York City.

More Peacock Connections. Jim Spanarkel ’75, seen at right with on-air partner Ian Eagle, and below left, with brother John Spanarkel '77, 3rd from left, and Jersey City friends, was featured in an article in the Asbury Park Press titled ‘Nothing Short of Serendipitous’ for doing a great job broadcasting the St. Peter’s Peacocks’ historic run at the NCAA’s March Madness. Jim’s teammate at Hudson Catholic, Mike O’Koren ’76, also received some press on the morning of the SPU-North Carolina East Regional Championship Game for the right to advance to the Final Four, in an NJ.com article titled ‘Blood or Family? For Jersey City great, Saint Peter’s-North Carolina is a win-win deal’ which put the question to him about whether he can root for both teams. Mike unequivocally said “Yes!” Mike made it down to Philly for the game, along with HC Board member Pat Dunne to his left and friend Mike McCarthy to his left. Mike's classmate, Jack Cullen '76, in foreground, came north from Rockville, Maryland to meet up with them. Nice Jersey City contingent to support our home town university -- Harvard on the Boulevard!

From fighting the Enemy to fighting for the Environment. Jeff Ramos ’97, USMC was a Corporal in the U.S. Marine Corp, signing up following graduation from Hudson, along with Edgar Cinense ’97. Jeff served through 2005 in a reserve unit artillery company as part of the 3^rd Battalion that provided heavy fire communications support from Scotch Plains for combat troops on the ground in Iraq, and liaison support, linking Marine detachments. This unit was activated and deployed to Iraq shortly after Jeff’s discharge in 2005. Jeff entered the environmental science field on a recommendation from another marine in his unit, specifically wastewater treatment plant operations, and was part of a remediation team that worked on the biggest landfill on the East Coast -- the Freshkills Landfill Treatment Plant in Staten Island NY. Other remediation projects included the Exxon Bayonne Terminal Project, and the PSEG Treatment Plant in Paterson.

My 5 Sons. Vito Gigante ’92 has been serving Hoboken as a Police Detective for the last 20 years. He recently took on a new adventure in owning and operating IL Mulino Ristorante in Dumont NJ. He and his wife Melissa have 5 boys. While Antonio runs the family business, Vito is exploring his options, Vincent is a professional boxer as well as a huge social media influencer, and 6 and 7 year old Marcello and Alessio are playing soccer and boxing. Vito claims he is living the American dream!

Midnight Man. Sean Kelly ’79 is a Retired Captain from the Weehawken Police Dept. and was an EMT and paramedic for a combined 19 years, spending most of his career on the overnight shift.