Between drugs, alcohol and violence, Derby High School students Michael Elliot and Larry Cote were — by their own accounts — headed for self-destruction.
Last week, Elliot and Cote were among 22 city students recognized for their positive influence on the student body and in the city.
How It Happened
They didn’t know each other until their paths collided one day last fall, at an anti-violence presentation at Derby High School.
At the end of the ‘Rachel’s Challenge‘ anti-violence assembly this past October, organizers urged students to come up to speak.
Elliot, a sophomore, was first.
“It’s amazing how much this book saved my life,” he said, showing classmates his Bible. “I got arrested a few times, for fights, for stealing. I beat up a man for a soda once. But most of what I did was just to impress other people, for peer pressure.”
When Cote heard that, he knew he had found someone to identify with.
Cote, a junior, had recently helped his father get sober after years of heavy drinking. His father’s drinking had affected his life, he said, as he himself fell into alcohol abuse and drugs.
“A lot of people fall down and can’t get back up,” he said. “We got back up.”
There was silence in the room — rare for a high school assembly.
Students had responded to Cote and Elliot in ways Youth Services Bureau Director John Saccu had never seen.
Saccu knew he had found something special.
After word got around about these two powerful speakers, calls started coming in to Saccu for Cote and Elliot to tell their story to others.
Recently, the students spoke at a parents’ conference on drugs and violence in Fairfield.
Nearby public and private schools have already contacted the two about speaking at assemblies in the fall.
“We did see a lot, so we can tell other people what we saw,” Elliot said. “We came from a hard life, and we both came up and rose from that. Kids don’t often come back from that. They end up on the street, in jail or dead.”
Read coverage of that first school assembly here.
The Awards
At the awards ceremony last week, Saccu cited Elliot and Cote for “motivating students of Derby to have the courage to overcome adversity.”
The other 20 recipients of the Mayor’s Youth Awards included scouts, religious youth group leaders and community volunteers from each of Derby’s four public schools.
Colleen Holt, Derby High School’s salutatorian, was one of the other award recipients.
Saccu joked that Holt runs the school, leading the membership of nearly a dozen school clubs while maintaining her 4.04 GPA.
As a volunteer with the Valley United Way, she’s logged hundreds of hours at donation drives.
Even with a blown tendon in her ankle, she’ll find a way to make it on stage for her 15th dance recital this month, and still went to the prom, Saccu said.
That attitude of responsibility and perseverance will follow Holt to the University of Connecticut in Storrs this fall, where she will attend on a full four-year scholarship.
This was the second year the city gave the awards to students.
The Recipients
Receiving Youth Awards were:
Matthew Markoya,
Aron Zamfino,
Jack Peccerillo,
John Dytko,
Christopher Flanigan,
Anastasia Echevania,
John Benanto,
Deon Evans,
Noah Yates,
Ashley Glovna,
Desantila Gjata,
Elia D’Onofrio,
Lisette Garcia,
Jenna Cripps,
Zachary Volo,
Mollie Kane,
Colleen Holt,
Tyler Stankye,
Shayla Mitchell,
Stephanie Dytko,
Michael Elliot,
Larry Cote