Covert Elementary School leads fight against premature birth

Annual WonderWalk touches local lives

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Darren Raymar, principal of William S. Covert Elementary School, was on an airplane nearly eight years ago when his niece, Sami, was born prematurely.

His sister-in-law, who had been in the hospital for several weeks after experiencing pains just a few months into her pregnancy, went into labor much earlier than expected. “I was at the airport getting ready to go to Greece for a two-week vacation, and my brother called and said, ‘She’s having the baby tonight,’” Raymar recalled.

Although rattled by the situation’s uncertainty, he decided to go on the trip. After Raymar reached his destination, he received a message from his brother: “You have a niece.”

Born at 25 weeks — about 15 weeks early — Sami weighed just 1 pound, 11 ounces. At one week old, she underwent surgery for necrotizing enterocolitis, a condition characterized by damage to the intestinal tract. After 98 days in the neonatal intensive care unit, Raymar said, Sami went home a week before the day she was due.

Now a 7-year-old at Birch School in Merrick, she has grown to become what Raymar called “the smartest little second-grader I know.”

“She’s a totally healthy, normal [girl],” he said. “She’s short,” Raymar added, before quickly qualifying the statement with a laugh. “I’m short. She’s not any shorter than anyone in my family!”

More than 100 students, teachers and parents gathered on June 14 for Covert’s fifth annual WonderWalk, which benefits the March of Dimes, a foundation that focuses on preventing birth defects, fighting premature birth and finding its causes.

“We’re a very unique school,” said Raymar, who has woven philanthropic events into the school’s fabric since taking over as principal 18 years ago. Named the Rockville Centre Herald’s Person of the Year in 2015, he created the Raymar Children’s Fund more than a decade ago, which collects money for charities and residents in need. “We’ve come together on this because it’s near and dear to my family,” he said.

Behind the school, purple-clad students walked — many skipping, jumping and dancing — as DJ Ronnie blared feel-good classics by Justin Timberlake and Bruno Mars, which some of the children knew by heart.

Leading up to the WonderWalk, students collected donations from family and friends, and Covert’s Parent Teacher Association sold purple sunglasses and pre-sold Ralph’s Italian Ices, which refreshed many during the march’s afternoon heat. The participants raised more than $3,000 for the March of Dimes this year, and Raymar said that in a previous year the event brought in more than $6,000.

Each year, in an effort to further connect the cause to the school, the walk highlights a Covert student who was born prematurely. Olivia Grace Tortorella, a fourth-grader who was born at 33-plus weeks — weighing 4 pounds, 13 ounces — is now a healthy 10-year-old, but she fought to survive as an unborn baby.

Her mother, Stephanie, said she had immediate labor pains after finding out she was pregnant, and doctors discovered a uterine abnormality a few months later that made it hard for the baby to move, breathe and grow. “I wasn’t allowed to drive; I wasn’t allowed to work,” Stephanie recalled. “My only thing … to do was keep my daughter inside and healthy, and that’s what I did.”

She began seeing the doctors every day, sometimes twice a day. “Each day that I went to the doctors, we didn’t know what we were going to find out — if Olivia Grace was breathing, if she was moving,” Stephanie said, “so it was really emotionally and physically hard on everybody in my family.”

On the day Olivia was born at Winthrop University Hospital in Mineola, nurses rushed into Stephanie’s room after monitors started going off. Olivia’s heartbeat was declining, and the nurses told Stephanie they needed to deliver her, or she wouldn’t survive.

At birth, the umbilical chord was wrapped around Olivia’s neck twice, Stephanie said, but she was healthy. “I remember the doctor saying, ‘Oh my God, she’s a miracle,’” she recounted.

Stephanie said she was happy to see Covert donate to the March of Dimes. Though Stephanie feels fortunate that Olivia is healthy and is willing to share her experience, she hopes the donation means there will be one fewer premature birth next year.

“For her to be able to go through that and to see what she accomplishes every day and knowing that she can just survive anything, it’s really emotional and inspiring because it’s like, ‘You’ve got this girl,’” Stephanie said of her daughter. “I know she can do it, because she lived when she wasn’t supposed to be able to live and fought for her little life that she wasn’t even aware that she had.”