Hawthorne High School senior, Daniel Chatten, is the official valedictorian for the graduating Class of 2013.
Throughout high school, Chatten has managed to maintain impressive grades in addition to participating in many extracurricular activities. For example, while achieving high marks in challenging classes such as AP Biology, Honors Physics, AP Calculus, and AP English throughout his senior year, Chatten also managed to participate in the school plays, recreational soccer, church activities, and youth group. Chatten was also a member of the bowling team, which won the state championships this year. Last year, Chatten also took AP Chemistry and AP U.S. History II.
In order to achieve and maintain his high grades, Chatten said, “I just make sure to do all my homework assignments. I don’t study much, but I study enough in order to understand the material.”
Chatten plans to continue his education at Rutgers University in New Brunswick where he will major in chemical engineering. Chatten chose Rutgers because of the generous scholarship he was awarded, because it has a top engineering program, and because he has a lot of friends going there and who live in the surrounding areas.
Interestingly enough, being valedictorian runs in the Chatten family. His brother, Matt was the valedictorian for the HHS Class of 2011. When asked if there was a lot of family pressure for Chatten to follow in his brother’s footsteps as valedictorian, Chatten said, “No. My parents just want me to do my best. I’m the only one that puts pressure on myself.”
Chatten found that this pressure paid off. During the first week of May 2013, Chatten and fellow classmate, Matt Fenkart, were called down to Principal Barry Cohen’s office. Once they sat down, Cohen delivered the good news: Chatten was the 2013 valedictorian and Fenkart was the 2013 salutatorian.
Cohen informed the two boys that they should be very proud of themselves especially because the overall GPA of the Class of 2013 is much higher than previous classes. Cohen also informed the two boys about the annual brunch held in June to honor all the valedictorians and salutatorians from Passaic County high schools.
Fellow senior classmate Michelle Pasquale said, “Chatten is a good friend of mine, and he truly deserves to be our valedictorian. He is going to do great things in his life – I know it.”