ASP: A Place of Joy, Laughter, and Fun!

By Maahum Alvi, Co-Editor

May 22, 2025

Join Peer Alliance after school in B110 every Thursday to enjoy activities at the After-School Program meetings!

Featured Teachers:

Ms. Fallon
Mr. VanHorn
Mr. Romano
Mrs. Lyons
Ms. Mazetta

Featured Paraprofessionals:

Mrs. Zitz
Ms. Sblendido
Mrs. Pedaballe
Mr. Calorusso

Featured Volunteers:

Arden Friedman
Brittany Koppelman
Caitlyn Foley
Amina Gul
Vania Khan
Maahum Alvi

Featured ASP Students:

Meaghan Chan
Gabriella Ciaglia
Steven Colon
Michael Giuseffi
Greg Greicius
Michael Imbriani
Jaden Jackson
Miranda Ledbetter
Denise Jones
Hayden Marks
Gabrielle Marronaro
James Montijo
Gisele Quezada
Thor Santos
Max Sliwa
Dan Tacopino
Brian Townsend
Giancarlo Troiani
Ethan Victor

Featured Alumni:

Spencer Friedman

Thank you to everyone who made this video possible!

Transcript:

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Every Thursday, the After-School Program and Peer Alliance get together in room B110 to have a great time. Their mission statement? To make sure all students in our school feel included in the Boro community.

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Ms. Fallon, ASP teacher: Teaching students social skills, how to interact well with others. It also helps our leaders learn to interact well with each other and our students, and how to help plan. A lot of life skills are happening and everyone just has so much fun. And it’s just a passion of mine so I’m so happy to be with the students every week.

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Mr. VanHorn, ASP teacher: Best part of ASP is definitely hanging out with the students, it’s a lot of fun. I enjoy seeing them socialize and being a part of facilitating that. Really, to me, it kind of just brings that intrinsic value of like, “Hey, this is that aspect of a lot of their lives that they sometimes may lack a little bit.”

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Mr. Romano, ASP teacher: The favorite part is just being in a place where, you know, you can laugh, you can be yourself, and the people there are genuine. So you always know what they’re thinking and it’s better that way.

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Alongside the incredible teachers, volunteers from the Peer Alliance plan activities and come help out.

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Arden, Peer Alliance president: It really makes me feel so happy how they’re so excited when I come. They’re greeting me like, “Hi! Hi, how are you? Oh my God, you’re back!”. It makes me feel so special and, whenever I walk in, I have a smile on my face. It just brings me so much happiness to see how they are.

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Brittany, Peer Alliance president: My favorite part of ASP is just communicating with the students and talking to them about- whether it’s their day or the activity that we’re doing.

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Peer Alliance was started by Arden’s brother, Spencer Friedman, who graduated FHS last year. Before high school, both Spencer and Arden had been “peer buddies” for a student with autism. When he got to high school, Spencer decided to start a similar program here at Boro. In the summer between his freshman and sophomore years, Spencer reached out to Mrs. Lyons to help him make his idea an official FHS club.

Mrs. Lyons, Peer Alliance advisor: And it was the summer of COVID, right before we were returning back, and he asked me if I would be interested, in the fall, in advising a club in order to help students with disabilities become more active in our school community. So, things like Trunk-or-Treat or Battle of the Classes so that they would have the information that they need to attend and when they participate be able to participate more fully.

The students enjoy coming to ASP every Thursday, hanging out with their friends, doing fun activities, and more.

Mrs. Lyons: My favorite part is hearing all the enthusiasm for different ideas of things our students in Peer Alliance would like to facilitate in the After-School Program that meets every Thursday. So, students come to our meetings and they have all these ideas and they, like, get excited about running the activities. And I think that would be my favorite part.

Mr. Romano: This is a time that I can be with the kids in a different setting in school, where they can kinda let loose a little bit, have fun. They were doing the Valentines’ Day cards. We do sports, we do a lot of things. We do talent shows, we joke around. I get to be in a situation with the kids that [is] more free and it’s fun. We laugh a lot. It’s a good way to spend your time, I would say. And I’d say that’s a good reason why I’m here.

Mr. VanHorn: Camaraderie. Hands down, camaraderie and just having the students hang out with each other and building those bonds, whether it’s with Peer Alliance or teacher-led activities. We were just having another student come up to us with suggestions of doing kickball or hockey, so we’re gonna get that started once the training seasons for all the sports are done. But having everybody get together and have fun is really, you know.

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Being a part of Peer Alliance and ASP is a great experience, so why not join today?

About the Contributor

Maahum Alvi, Co-Editor

Maahum is a sophomore in the Computer Science program at Freehold High School. This is her second year writing for The Colonial, and she loves writing fictional stories as well as about school life. Aside from being part of the Newspaper Club, Maahum is part of the Yearbook Club, Robotics Club, Tutoring Club, and Peer Alliance. She is passionate about literature, photography, computer science, teaching, and spending time with her siblings. She plans to pursue a degree in Computer Engineering and apply it to helping others.