Community Corner
GALLERY: After Distinguished Four Years, Straight To College For All
Every one of the fifty accomplished students will attend a four-year college after graduating from Marine Academy of Technology and Environmental Science.
A group of bright and determined seniors from all over Ocean County celebrated an end to a shared four-year experience as students at the Marine Academy of Technology and Environmental Science (MATES) high school in Manahawkin yesterday afternoon. Every single one of these young people is college-bound, said the school's vice principal Dr. John Wnek.
In order to get into this specialized school at 195 Cedar Bridge Road, a school offering a demanding curriculum in all traditional high school subjects, in addition to heavy emphasis on marine and environmental science, these young people had to go through a rigorous application process.
Out of 350 applicants for the school year 2012-2013, MATES accepted 70, which is about average, according to Wnek, who was one of the school's original founders. The school is part of the Ocean County Vocational Technical School District, which also includes Performing Arts Academy, located at the Lakehurst Naval Air Engineering Station.
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"I remember tripping up the stairs to take my admission exam, then crying when I got my acceptance letter," Athena Jones, a resident of Brick, who is bound for University of Miami, told Patch as she waited in the hallway, minutes before the ceremony began. "How many times have we all in the past four years thought about transferring back to our home schools, because it would be easier? This is just so sweet."
"Choosing to attend MATES has been the best decision I have ever made," said Valedictorian Dylan Everett in a speech to his classmates, reminiscing about his first "loney ride" on the bus from Brick.
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"By this point, I am positive that we have heard about how remarkable we are more than 100 times," said Salutorian Sapna Syal. "But aren't we? Look to the students sitting around you. We have future physicians and surgeons among us -- yikes," Syal interrupted herself, laughing along with her audience. "We have future ambassadors, attorneys, engineers, artists and architects."
The 2012 crop of MATES graduates, the eight graduating class in the school's history, will go to diverse colleges from Stockton College, Carnegie Melon University, Rice University, Rutgers University, John Hopkins University, Northeastern University and Boston University, to Ivy League schools such as Columbia, Cornell and Brown.
