The Athletics Department created a new way to recognize their athletes, the Student Athlete of the Month program.
The collaboration between the Athletics Director, Ms. O’Sullivan, and coaches initiated talks at the end of last year about how to give more recognition to student athletes.
For the student athlete of the month program, coaches of each sports team pick an athlete that showed both great athletic and academic performance.
At the end of the fall sports season, senior Jazzlynn Villar was named one of the student-athletes for the girl’s volleyball team. Villar was the captain of the girls team and was luckily nominated to be October’s student athlete. She initially wasn’t aiming to be honored as a student athlete but after nomination felt accomplished.
Villar said, “I put my education before sports first. I missed like four practices because of college. I usually do my work in school.”
Ms. O’Sullivan and the coaches sat down at the end of last year and discussed what they did well and what they could improve.
“One thing that we were talking about was like honoring the kids as the seasons are going and not waiting till the end of the year,” said Ms. O’Sullivan. The coaches wanted the students to work towards being better at the student part of the student-athlete.
As Villar prepares to leave Pace High School, she gives a piece of advice for the new freshman entering the school and new student athletes.
“Put your education first. No matter how much your coaches are pushing you to be the best athlete, you have to balance [between] your education with your sport,” she said.
