St. Joseph HS student awarded Marisa Tufaro Foundation service scholarship

Growing up, Thomas Freda noticed his Uncle Paul didn’t have a whole lot of stuff to do.

“A lot of the time he was just sitting around at home,” Thomas said.

What he would come to understand, as he got older: Uncle Paul, like a lot of folks with developmental disabilities, lacked opportunities to engage in activities.

So when Thomas entered Saint Joseph High School in Metuchen, he decided to do something about that. Along with his older brother Eric and their friend Alessandro Pugliese, he founded “Falcons and Friends.” Under the auspices of the school’s Campus Ministry department, Falcons and Friends connects Saint Joseph students with community members of all ages who have developmental disabilities.

Since it began in 2019, Falcons and Friends has evolved into a major happening. Each month, roughly 30 guests (friends) gather with 70 students (Falcons) for sports, games and fellowship. They have Christmas and Easter parties, too. Fellow co-founders Eric and Alessandro graduated in prior years, so Thomas was fully in charge as a senior in 2021-22.

“He’s grown up in the program, he’s taken ownership of it and he’s elevated it,” said Tracey Coudriet, Saint Joseph’s director of campus ministry. “I’ve never seen anything student-driven take off like this.”

For his dedication to Falcons and Friends, Freda is one of three recipients of the 2022 Marisa Tufaro Memorial Community Service Scholarship. The $1,000 awards are bestowed by the Marisa Tufaro Foundation, a nonprofit that assists pediatric patients and other children in need throughout the greater Middlesex County area.

The foundation and scholarship’s namesake, Marisa Tufaro, was an Edison resident. Born with a complex cardiac defect that required six open-heart surgeries and a heart transplant, she lived 13 inspirational years before succumbing in 2017 to a rare form of cancer following a valiant battle.

The other scholarship recipients will be announced in the coming days.

Freda had a tumor removed from his right ear as a toddler. The surgery left him hearing impaired and unable to submerge his head in water.

“There’s some pain and discomfort, but I’ve gotten used to it over the years,” he said. “It’s not too bad.”

Freda plays on the Falcons’ varsity ice hockey team and owns a 4.5 grade point average.

“He’s always looking to create that team environment,” Saint Joseph ice hockey coach Ryan Carter said. “If our freshmen coming in need help, he’s willing to spend that extra time to help them understand what St. Joes is and even figure out that math problem in their homework.”

Running Falcons and Friends is his signature achievement. Freda helped shepherd it through the pandemic with virtual meetings and drive-by gatherings. Now they’re back in the school gym. Prior to meetings, Freda maintained email contact with both the Falcons and the friends, circulating schedule reminders and drilling down into the fine details, like making sure all the Falcons prepare their nametags.

At the gatherings he undertook the important task of pairing the friends with Falcons.

“Often when a student makes a connection with one of the friends, the friend will come back the next months and ask to be with the same student,” Freda said.

The initiative has been a hit all the way around.

“Falcons and Friends is one of the most popular things we do on campus,” Coudriet said. “It’s an amazing opportunity for the boys to step outside of their comfort zone. At first they’re very unsure; a lot of them have never been exposed to people with disabilities. By the end of the night they come up to me and say, ‘When’s the next one?’”

As for the friends? After the most recent meeting in early June, Coudriet said, “two of the moms asked if they could buy the boys pizza because their children love coming.”

In the fall Freda is headed to college at Penn State, where he will pursue a nursing degree.

“He’s a guy who is going to give back in life,” Carter said.

As for Falcons and Friends, it’s not graduating with him.

“I’ve got two guys who are juniors now who I’m going to pass the torch to,” Freda said.

Perhaps that’s the highest praise of all. Thomas Freda has created something that will outlast his time at Saint Joseph. It’s no longer his baby. It’s a community staple.

“It’s awesome, to see the growth of it,” Freda said, “and to see that it’s not going to stop.”

For more information on the Marisa Tufaro Foundation, visit https://marisatufarofoundation.org.  

This article originally appeared on MyCentralJersey.com: St. Joseph senior awarded Marisa Tufaro Foundation service scholarship