Sisters Academy of New Jersey Graduates the Class of 2016
Asbury Park, NJ (PRWEB) June 28, 2016 -- On Wednesday, June 8, 2016, Mercy Center’s Sisters Academy of New Jersey Class of 2016 received their diplomas at the sixteenth annual commencement ceremony.
A joyous and inspirational evening, the graduates heard from two midshipmen from the United States Naval Academy who are in residence at Sisters Academy for the month of June. Midshipman Dominique Adams told the graduates, “I look at each of you and see America’s future. Understand that you have the power to set an example and make a difference in the world, no matter your age. As we say in the Navy, I wish you young ladies fair winds and following seas.”
Midshipman Natalie Stahl urged the graduates “to learn to forge your own path and ignore those people that tell you to fall in line. If you want something, don’t let anyone stop you. Your goals are just that, your goals and only you can attain your goals. Only you can persevere to make your goals a reality.”
The Alumna Address was given by 2012 Sisters Academy graduate Withney Barthelemy, who recently graduated from Mercersburg Academy and has been awarded a full academic scholarship to Wellesley College as a member of the Class of 2020. Miss Barthelemy shared her experience of finding a home at Sisters Academy, stating, “The embracing community of Sisters Academy made the obtainment of the experience of a sense of home easy. Here you are respected and cared for as an individual.”
Citing Virginia Woolf’s “A Room of One’s Own”, Withney encouraged the graduates “to utilize the values and skills of this wonderful school and go out and make a room of your own.”
Principal Sister Mary Louise Miller and Mercy Center Executive Director Sister Carol Ann Henry presided over graduation and conferred diplomas and Honors Presentations to the following 2016 graduates:
Jensine Benoit
Shantal Sarai Ferrer Escamilla
Gabriela Flores
Juvene Cierra Jean
Frantzline Immacula Jeanty
Lucibel Lopez-Dominguez
Joanna Marcellus
Monserrat Merino
Krystian Surice Newsome
E’Niah Vernell Preston
Mercy Center is a sponsored ministry of the Sisters of Mercy of the Americas, Mid-Atlantic Community. Located in Asbury Park, NJ, Mercy Center provides the chronically-underserved population of Monmouth County with vital social and educational services.
Founded in 1997, Sisters Academy of New Jersey is a program of Mercy Center. It is an independent middle school for girls, grades five to eight, that helps empower young women to break out of their community’s cycle of poverty to go on to fulfill their new vision of themselves and their futures.
Amanda McConnon, Design 446, http://www.design446.com, +1 (732) 292-2400, [email protected]
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