Five Clarkstown High School Seniors Receive Scholarships from New City Rotary

Five Clarkstown North and South High School seniors received $1,000 scholarships from the New City Rotary Club on Monday. Bart Silverman, chairman of the New City Rotary’s Academic Scholarship Committee, awarded the presentations to: Brian Rinciari, Kelly Carlyle, Samantha Wettje and Sylvan Tsai.

Madelon Berger awarded The Harris Berger Scholarship in memory of her husband, Dr. Harris Berger, to Esteban Guijarro. After graduation from Clarkstown South, Guijarro will attend Harvard University.

Rinciari, is graduating from Clarkstown North and will attend Penn State University and has joined its Army ROTC program.

Carlyle and Wettje are both graduating from Clarkstown South. Carlyle will attend SUNY Plattsburgh and Wettje is enrolled at SUNY Binghamton.

Tsai will graduate from Clarkstown North and will attend MIT in the fall.

Silverman highlighted some of the teens’ accomplishments and community service in addition to their academic strengths. Wettje organized the Hoops for Hope basketball fundraiser, was the girls’ basketball team captain and played varsity softball for four years.

Tsai was also involved with Hoops for Hope and served as editor and chief of Chaos, the science magazine of Clarkstown North.

Carlyle is the president of Interact, the ’s high school affiliate. She ran varsity cross country, winter and spring track and volunteers at a soup kitchen.

Rinciari is a member of Interact, was captain of the junior varsity lacrosse team, ran track and was named most valuable running back.

Berger spoke about Guijarro’s interests including studying the violin and viola, playing in two orchestras and volunteering with the ambulance corps. He will study pre-med at Harvard with a specialty in surgical oncology. Berger asked him to “treat patients with dignity” as her late husband had done.

 Silverman said the committee had a difficult job of selecting candidates because many applicants had outstanding qualifications.

“The students we interviewed are really exceptional,” he said. “We all walk out of the committee meeting each year and say ‘we’re underachievers’.”

The mission of Rotary is community service, locally, nationally and internationally. New City Rotary has about 70 members. Rotary's motto is "service above self."