Life Skills students are royalty at Lindenhurst prom

Chantal Mollette, an 18-year-old senior at Lindenhurst High School, explained how she felt when she learned she was a candidate for prom queen.

“Once I heard I was actually nominated, I was shocked…I was really nervous,” she said.

That reaction wouldn’t be unusual for most people in her position, but unlike many students at her school, Mollette is in the Life Skills program, part of the school’s special education curriculum.

“I had butterflies,” she continued, “but once I got my makeup done for today I was all good!”

The inclusion of Mollette as a prom queen candidate — and of Kevin Kubiak, an 18-year-old Life Skills senior student chosen as a candidate for prom king — was a first for the school.

“It was the students who came up with this,” said Rhonda Matera, who, with fellow Lindenhurst High School staffer Sara McGuire, supervised Chantal, Kevin and other Life Skills students at the prom at Russo's on the Bay in Howard Beach, Queens, on June 1. “And our kids were so excited… they kept saying how great it felt to be included.”

“I feel lucky,” said Kubiak.

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When the time came to select the prom king and queen, the evening was at its height. The emcee stopped the more than 500 guests from their dancing and created a space down the middle of the dance floor.

Art teacher and student adviser AnneJeannine Cuozzo took the microphone and announced the candidates, all of whom received sashes declaring their spot on the 2017 prom court. Neither Mollette nor Kubiak won the respective crowns, but both wore wide smiles throughout the pronouncements.

“This is a wonderful thing,” Cuozzo said about the inclusion of the two Life Skills students as prom royalty, “but I’m not surprised. The seniors came up with this idea themselves; they wanted to know what they could do for the Life Skills students… they all have such great hearts. Like I said, I’m not surprised in the least.”