West Hempstead’s 2025 Valedictorian and Salutatorian

West Hempstead’s Victoria Covino, 18, and Madison AbiAoun, 17, were named Class of 2025’s Valedictorian and Salutatorian, respectively. This accomplishment recognizes their academic excellence, dedication, and character throughout their high school careers. Both Covino and AbiAoun will be recognized at West Hempstead’s Senior Awards Night and will address their fellow graduates during their Commencement Ceremony in June.

Q: Can you tell me about what classes you take and what you’re involved in at school?

Covino: I've taken eight AP classes throughout high school. Currently, I'm in AP Calculus, statistics, government and literature. I'm also in AP Art. Madison and I are part of Virtual Enterprise, which is a class at school where we basically start up our own business from scratch and we sell a business with fake money and fake products. So we both have leadership positions. I'm the CMO and Madison is the CSO. 

I'm involved in numerous activities and clubs. I'm the class president of our class. I'm also a cheer captain. I'm also involved in the national honor society, foreign language honor society, and art honor society. I'm part of athletes helping athletes, peer mentoring, SADD, and a bunch of other clubs throughout school.

AbiAoun: Throughout the years I took six AP classes in total, but this year I'm taking AP Calculus, AP Statistics, and AP Literature. Then all the other classes that are in the main curriculum are advanced or honors, and then outside of that, it's just electives that I like.

I'm also part of SADD, peer mentoring, athletes helping athletes. The sports I do are soccer and track. We're both a part of the leadership club and just a whole bunch of other clubs and stuff. 

Q: Tell me about what drives you?

AbiAoun: I guess what drives me is personal motivation. I think I've just always had, like, the ambition to do something better. Like, in a way, I never feel satisfied. Also, I guess academically, a piece that comes with it is just making my parents proud.

Covino: Definitely similar. Like, when I work and when I do stuff, I always strive for perfection. I don't do stuff halfway. I always try and do it. 

I think it's also more of a personal feeling, where I like to feel accomplished. I also want to make myself proud. And, like how Madison said, I want to make my parents proud, and just really show off all the hard work and dedication that I put in and that my parents have as well. 

Q: What are you most proud of during your time at school so far? 

Covino: Definitely this. I mean, I’ve had various accomplishments, but I feel like Valedictorian is the greatest accomplishment so far. Because it’s really shown that not only do I work really hard, but it shows off that throughout my four years of high school, that I can get honored and recognized for that. So it’s really cool.

AbiAoun: Yeah, I was going to say the same thing. Because Salutatorian and Valedictorian, they’re positions where it’s not biased, it's kind of concrete. It just shows, like Victoria said, that we put in the dedication and this is just recognizing our dedication and what we put in throughout the years.

Q: How did you guys feel when you learned that you were Valedictorian and Salutatorian?

Covino: I was ecstatic. I was really happy. After they called our parents, my mom was hysterical crying on the phone, so then I started crying. I was just really happy and it was like a relief, to know that what I did and put a lot of hard work into, it really paid off.

AbiAoun: I was super happy. I don’t think my parents expected it, so that was a fun surprise.

Q: Where do you plan on attending school next fall? What do you want to study?

AbiAoun: Yeah, along with the bit about Virtual Enterprise from before, it's a really good class. Because Victoria and I have talked about what we want to do in college, and, I don't know if it's changed for her, but we both want to go into certain careers in business. So with VE, it's really nice. I personally want to do finance and then maybe minor in business management, but I'm attending Temple University in Philly. 

Covino: I'm still uncertain on where I wanna go to school. I'm still waiting to hear back from a few more places on decisions. But definitely like how Madison said, Virtual Enterprise really strengthened my love, my passion for business. So when I go to college, I wanna do business administration and I want to go into marketing and possibly minor in entrepreneurship. So yeah, definitely the business field.

Q: You get the opportunity to speak at your graduation. Do you have any ideas about what you would like to say?

Covino: Something that I wanna speak about is definitely the community. West Hempstead, although we are small, we are mighty. All the teachers, staff, classmates, everyone is very involved. Everyone is very loving and caring. The support system is really good here, so I definitely want to highlight that. 

And just also the hard work that we've all put in throughout our four years of high school. I mean, we’ve pretty much grown up together, we've been together since kindergarten. So we've really got to watch everyone flourish, and become adults that are now gonna go into college and the workforce, so it's pretty cool to see. 

AbiAoun: I’m not sure yet, but a theme that I think I want to do is presence. I feel like throughout my four years, it's just so hard to be present in the moment and actually enjoy things, rather than  thinking about past regrets or worrying about future problems. So I think that's going to be my overarching theme, presence. Because graduation and, especially this time of our lives, is super important and it's gonna be something we look back on a lot.

Q: Do you have any advice to share with underclassmen, or tips for academic success?

AbiAoun: Sleep. I really prioritize my sleep and I just think sleep's really good for everything, your physical, your mental. I don't think anyone should be staying up like a full night to get a test in. I know it's like a stupid thing, but sleep is very underrated and I think a lot of people don't prioritize that.

Covino: I would also say don't get mad at the results that you don't put in for yourself. Like the only way that you're gonna do something that you want to accomplish is by putting in the hard work. So if you don't do that, you won't be able to get the results that you want. 

And honestly, it just goes by really fast. I know four years seems like a really long time, but I can't even remember freshman year. So, just cherish the moments and the people you have here. Especially since we're so small, you really get to know every single kid and person at the school on a very personal level, so just cherish those friendships and memories that you have while you're all together.

AbiAoun: I would also say use your resources. I don't think enough people use the people around them, especially teachers, like extra help is free and not hurting anyone. 

Also, a piece of advice for underclassmen in general, is try to be open to new things and don't be scared. I think as a freshman I was very conscious of what other people thought and it limited me from doing certain things or trying new things. So yeah, I would just have an open mind.

Covino: Adding on to what Madison said, when you're doing something, do it for yourself, don't do it for other people. Do things that make you happy? Always put your foot out and step into a new door, try new things. Just how Madison was saying, join clubs that you might not think you like, start your own club if you want to. Just really put yourself out there and explore things while you're in a smaller space so you can really figure out what you wanna do in the real world.

AbiAoun: And be kind!