Notre Dame Academy senior honored with Petrides Award (SI Live-- By Annalise Knudson)
STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. -- A Notre Dame Academy student was honored with the Michael J. Petrides Student Award for Excellence in the Mathematics and Science on Tuesday.
The award is named for Michael J. Petrides, a Staten Island educator who died in 1994.
Borough President James Oddo and members of the Petrides family and scholarship committee presented the award to Kathleen Coen during a ceremony at the Petrides Educational Complex, Sunnyside.
The annual honor is given to a graduating high school senior who excels in math and science. James Venditto of Moore Catholic High School was named first runner up.
Each Staten Island high school -- public, private and parochial -- is asked to submit a single nominee, and the honoree and runner-up are selected from that list.
"I am always impressed by our nominees," said Oddo. "The Petrides Award has been given to many remarkable students over the years, and this year is no exception. Congratulations to our winner and to all the nominees for being the best and brightest in our community."
Coen ranks in the top 5 percent of her class at Notre Dame Academy, and has taken 12 Advanced Placement classes.
Aside from her work in the classroom, Coen has been an active leader in the school's Girls Who Code Club for the last two years. And she has participated in the Girls Who Code Summer Immersion Program placement at Goldman Sachs.
The student won the 2017 Congressional App Challenge for her Steer Clear app, which works to combat drunk driving by helping users find free and safe rides with a designated driver at a party he or she is attending.
The summer before her junior year, Coen earned a fellowship at the Office of Naval Research. For the past two years, she has been interning for AECOM, a global engineering firm.
Coen is the captain of the Notre Dame Academy Forensics Speech and Debate team and is a member of the school's varsity swim team.
Also nominated for this year's Petrides Award were: Don Jonathan M. Codipilly, Port Richmond High School; Qi (Ella) Fan, Staten Island Academy; Timur Ibragimov, Staten Island Technical High School; Sabina Kraja, Michael J. Petrides School; Julia LoCascio, St. Joseph Hill Academy; Anastasia Maximenko, New Dorp High School; Batool Mulla, Susan E. Wagner High School; Emma, Newgarden, St. John Villa Academy; Priya Singh, Tottenville High School; Amy Tang, Ralph R. McKee Career & Technical High School; Olivia Tobi, Gaynor McCown Expeditionary Learning School; Cherilyn Uhm, Curtis High School; Jake Valensi, Monsignor Farrell High School; and Emily Wodzinski, CSI High School for International Studies