Three members of the Hopewell Valley Regional School District’s facilities and grounds team were honored Monday night for stepping in to save a man’s life earlier this month near Stony Brook Elementary School.
At the Dec. 15 Board of Education meeting, Austin Aycock,Angel Torres, and Anthony Mari were formally recognized for their actions on December 1, when the team was out placing snow-removal markers near the school and witnessed a roofer collapse at a nearby construction site.
The new Director of Facilities, Bill Van Syckel, recounted the incident for the Board, explaining that the employees immediately stopped and assessed the situation. A coworker of the man was attempting CPR, but the effort was not effective. According to Van Syckel, Aycock, who is CPR-certified, “took charge of the step in. And he administered CPR for multiple minutes and essentially kept this gentleman alive until EMS arrived.”
Van Syckel said that after EMS arrived on the scene, they used an automatic defibrillator on the patient and first responders later confirmed that the man survived. “He is alive today. He’s going to celebrate the holidays with his family… and they are firmly convinced that he would not [be] had it not been for these three gentlemen stopping, pulling over.”
Board President Anita Williams Galiano praised the employees’ actions as reflective of the district’s values. “As a community, we depend on you in so many ways, and you all stepped in in the way you did… You all are tremendously appreciated. You’ve lifted and elevated kind of a spirit of who the Hopewell Valley School District is.”
Board Member Mark Peters, who shared that CPR once saved his own life, also commended the staff. “That person will not be alive if you guys didn’t step in and do what you did. You should be really proud of yourselves.”
Aycock said that he had been certified in CPR for the past few years and got certified right out of high school. He said it was just something he did because it was good to have the certification.
Superintendent Dr. Rosetta Treece thanked the crew referring to them as angels.
