Ryan Lavender is a remarkable young man who consistently demonstrates his commitment to academic, athletic, and extracurricular excellence. Ryan’s extracurriculars include Upbeat and Interact Club. He was hand-selected to kick off the BHS chapter of Best Buddies. Among his many awards and honors, he has been selected as this year’s CAS-CIAC Scholar Athlete, an All-Academic Scholastic Athlete, received the Daughters of the American Revolution Good Citizen Award, has been inducted into the Rho Kappa and National Honor Societies, and received the Seal of Biliteracy in Spanish. He gives back to the community as a volunteer coach for the annual BHS Powder Puff football game, as a flag football youth coach, and helps at Berlin Little League clinics.  His athletic accolades include being named captain of the BHS varsity football team that went on to earn a Class M state championship earlier this year as well as being named to All-State and All-Conference teams.  Ryan is also on the baseball team and enjoys basketball, bowling, golf, and fishing.  He plans to attend JUCO at Polk State College in Florida where he will continue his baseball career, with a future goal of continuing at a four year college. 

Nina Welch’s intelligence, leadership, and ambition have left an indelible impression on the Berlin High community, especially her humility and genuine desire to make a positive impact in the world.  Inspired by the experiences of her mother, a teacher in New Britain, she is challenging educational inequity with the founding of Literacy for Life, a nonprofit focused on promoting literacy in schools. Since inception, Literacy for Life has donated over 35,000 books to more than 15 schools in New Britain, Hartford, and New Haven. Additionally, Nina runs a book club at Northend Elementary School in New Britain to foster a safe community and love of reading. She has worked on the BHS anti-malarial independent study in collaboration with UConn to harvest photo-reactive chemicals from plants. She founded the BHS Science Tutoring Center to provide students with access to one-on-one help for all science curriculum. Nina is captain of the BHS varsity swim team, earning All-Conference recognition, and is also a member of the BHS Redcoat band, jazz band, Model UN, and has been inducted into the National Honor Society and Rho Kappa National Social Studies Honor Society. She plans to study Chemical Engineering in the Honors program next year at UConn and hopes to add a double major in Management, with a future career balancing her love of science and engineering with her passion for business.