Muslim student calls Xaverian ‘home away from home’

Says Catholic school offers welcoming atmosphere

June 14, 2016 By Paula Katinas Brooklyn Daily Eagle

The school presented many awards to the outstanding students in the Class of 2016, including the Our Lady of the Narrows Academic Achievement Award. Photo courtesy of Xaverian High School

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Xaverian High School is a Catholic educational institution, but a student doesn’t have to be Catholic to enroll there.

The school, located at 7100 Shore Road in Bay Ridge, offers a warm, welcoming atmosphere to students of all faiths, according to a young scholar who graduated on June 4.

Mohammad Farraj, a Muslim, reflected on his years at Xaverian High School during a mass and reception held at the Basilica of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in Sunset Park the night before graduation.

“You see, it really doesn’t matter, and never will matter, how someone may think of himself as isolated from others. Regardless of race, religion or ethnicity, at Xaverian, you are accepted. It’s the home away from home that never has a closed door; for every person who enters, who walks through the same blue hallways as a freshman and gradually leaves through the brown halls as a senior, they’re family forever,” Farraj said.

Farraj, who received the President’s Award, one of Xaverian High School’s highest honors, at the school’s June 4 graduation ceremony, will be attending Stony Brook University in the fall.

The commencement exercises, which took place at Brooklyn College’s Walt Whitman Auditorium, featured speeches from two of the graduates who urged their fellow graduates to remember the lessons they learned at the school as they move forward in their lives.

Isaac Alexandre Jean-Francois, who won the coveted Principal’s Award and who will be attending Columbia University in the fall, offered a welcoming address.

“We must continue to seek personal, academic and intellectual growth as we go into college and beyond,” he said. “We must remember the people who, along our journey towards success, have taught us lessons we couldn’t learn elsewhere. Most importantly, we must use the lessons we learn to empower those around us and to create a better world for all. In doing so, we expand Xaverian’s impact far beyond the walls of 7100 Shore Road, out into a world that we will shape for ourselves.”

In his farewell address, Valedictorian Nicholas G. Duca reflected on his years at Xaverian and the sense of community the school fosters.

“We will take attitudes. We will take memories. We will take moments in time and hold them in our hearts as one single Xaverian class. In those things we take, we are no longer individuals, no longer even truly our own selves. We are parts of one single body moving towards one single goal, and that goal is to give opportunity to others so that can become who they need to be, and hopefully get that opportunity in return.” Duca said.

Duca, who won the school’s General Excellence Award, will be attending the Stevens Institute of Technology in the fall.

Xaverian President Robert Alesi, a 1978 graduate of the school, also addressed the graduates. The Class of 2016 had 212 members.

The graduates were awarded scholarships totaling $36.8 million, according to school officials, who said that the young men also earned acceptance to several of the country’s top colleges and universities.