Alyssa Moore, Stephanie Afonso, and Maverick Huber have known each other since childhood.
The ties that bind Alyssa Moore, Maverick Huber and Stephanie Afonso are long and deep and woven through the fabric of their lives since childhood.
All three graduated in 2020 from Ludlow High School and entered Elms College as first-year students the following fall. Now all three are poised to graduate May 18 in the college’s 93rd commencement at the MassMutual Center. They will be among the estimated 270 undergraduate students receiving bachelor’s degrees.
Alyssa and Maverick played on the same peewee soccer team. Maverick and Stephanie had the same math class in 6th grade. There is one more thread tying them together. Each was named co-valedictorian for the Elms Class of 2024.
Class valedictorian is an honor awarded to the graduating senior with the highest cumulative grade point average over four years. This year, in a twist, Elms finds itself with seven co-valedictorians as a result of a seven-way tie for the highest GPA. This itself is unprecedented over the previous 92 graduating undergraduate classes.
For three of the seven to hail from the same high school in the same town of 21,000 residents, and to have personal histories so intertwined is even more remarkable.
“It’s definitely not something you see every day,” Alyssa said. She said she has known Maverick and Stephanie for most of her life.
“We all kind of came from our separate paths, but then we’re still together at the end” – Alyssa Moore
Maverick first learned they were all sharing the honor after attending a commencement planning meeting for the co-valedictorians and saw Stephanie and Alyssa already there.
“I was like, ‘Oh, it’s the three of us!’ and it was cool.”
Seeing them there, Maverick said, was both a surprise and not a surprise.
“I always saw them doing great with school, and we all were in the same honors and accelerated classes in high school,” Maverick said.
Stephanie, recalling that same meeting, said she was also surprised and left to wonder about the improbability of it all. “I kept thinking ‘Wow, we really came up together.’”
Though the three have similar histories, they came to Elms with different interests, took different majors and now have different goals post-graduation.
Stephanie is a double major in History and English with a writing concentration. She is applying for graduate school for a master’s in either history or museum studies, and has aspirations of becoming a published author. She credits her professors with helping her channel her interests in history and creative writing.
Maverick is a double major in computer science and computer information technology and security. Originally, Maverick wanted to go to Elms to become a math teacher but then decided instead to major in psychology. However, a data management course opened their eyes to the field of computer science and data management, and they changed majors. Maverick wants to go to graduate school but not right away, planning instead to seek work in the data management field.
Alyssa has one major, nursing, but three minors in biology, math, and bioethics and medical humanities. She has accepted a job offer to be a medical ICU nurse at Hartford Hospital. She has also enrolled in Elms’s online Master of Nursing program.
Each spoke of being attracted to Elms as high school seniors for its academic reputation, but also its small size. The buildings were not spread far apart like other schools, everyone seemed friendly to everyone else, and with small class sizes the professors would be certain to know the names of their students. In that way, it was kind of like Ludlow High School.
“We all went from a small school to a small school,” Alyssa said. Each said they made the most of their Elms years by through a myriad of activities beyond their academics. Alyssa and Stephanie were members of the Elms Honors Program during their four years. Alyssa was also a member of the women’s volleyball team for four years and credits it with giving her an outlet to escape any academic pressure. Stephanie was involved with the Campus Ministry, was a student representative on the curriculum review committee, and a member of the editorial staff of Bloom, the student arts and literature magazine.
Maverick was involved in the Dorothy Day First Year Encounter program, worked in the computer lab and as a tutor with the Center for Student Success. They also served on the selection committee to review candidates for a data analytics faculty position.
“With it being a small campus, you are able to do so much more (than at a big college). I feel I have a lot more of a voice.” – Maverick Huber
The other co-valedictorians are elementary education major Catalyna Alexopoulos of Longmeadow, psychology major Rahmia Johnston of Newton, Conn., Nursing major Elise Paier of West Springfield, and Computer Information Technology & Security, and Computer Science major Julio Rodriguez of Springfield.
