Matthew Capeletti wants to make sure all struggling students have a shot at winning the Nobel Prize. To keep his classmates -- and students across the country -- from giving up on schoolwork they don't understand, Matthew, a senior at William T. McFatter Technical Center in Davie, created a free Web-based service called TutorChatLive.com. The site provides unlimited tutoring in math and science -- and almost any other subject.
The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation on Wednesday announced a $205,000 grant to help connect former Silver Knight Award winners with each other and the community.
Silver Knight recipients and their families wrote in to the Miami Herald to share their thoughts on what the award has meant to them and how it shaped their lives.
When he was growing up in Margate, Daniel Bernard Roumain, 36, did two things obsessively: He practiced his violin and he listened to his family's stories about life in their native Haiti. "I absorbed from that just as much as I did from the records I listened to," he said.
Nancy Franks McCue marked a series of firsts before retiring from the North Miami police department in 2000: the first female office, sergeant, lieutenant and commander. But her ''firsts'' started at Hialeah High School, as the school paper's first female Boys' Sports Editor. And in 1962, she became her school's first Silver Knight winner.
SILVER KNIGHTS
She danced in Spain under the name Helena Alonso -- but she didn't know a lick of Spanish. Today Lynn Paisley teaches Spanish and journalism at MAST Academy.
At age 2, Trine Engebretsen became Florida's first liver transplant recipient. She has made a lifetime commitment to helping others receive organ replacements and encouraging others to donate.
Art: Michael Gelfo, Southwest Athletics: Michael Fortier, Miami Citizenship: Russell Bizette Jr., Southwest Drama: Julius T. Lee, Booker T. Washington
Before winning the Silver Knight in foreign languages, Nadeige Laleau, nee Elusma, doubted she would live to see her 18th birthday.
MIAMI-DADE COUNTY Art: Myra Rosen, Gulliver Athletics: Terri Snyder, Sunset Business: Jeanne Belin, Palmetto Drama: Juan Martinez, Miami
On Aug. 15, 2007, an 8.0-magnitude earthquake struck off the coast of Peru, leveling swaths of the port cities of Pisco, Ica and Chincha. Hundreds of people were killed, thousands left homeless.
Jeff Lynn has always had a passion for the arts, and now he is the administrative and development coordinator for the Art and Culture Center of Hollywood. He has also coordinated preview screenings of 100 films in 30 days at the Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival.
Irvin Lustig is one of the original developers of software used to run major airlines, telecommunications companies, manufacturing, transportation, financial services and the U.S. defense program. In some sense, he says, his software touches you every day -- you just never knew it.
Miami-Dade Art: Matthew Mornick, Coral Reef Athletics: Michael Hepburn, Miami Central Business: Jeffrey DeMott, Homestead Drama: Sarah Graber, Palmetto
SILVER KNIGHTS PROFILES
David Heffernan was goofing around with some buddies in the audience during the presentation of the Silver Knight award for athletics in 1980. The Columbus High senior didn't think he had a chance to win.
Colleen Grady can pinpoint the moment her life changed. It was September 2000. Grady, an attorney for an international law firm, was vacationing with a friend in Cambodia.
Ana Maria Rodriguez and her daughter, Annette, have each won a Silver Knight. Today, the awards sit proudly side by side in the family room. But there's room for more.
Annette Rodriguez 1999 Mathematics Our Lady of Lourdes Academy Q: What drew you to win the award in that category? A: Both my parents are really numbers oriented. My mother's a math teacher and my father's a CPA. My mother was actually my math teacher at St. Agatha. She probably had some influence.
Every morning before heading off to work, Yazmany Arboleda glances at a small white notecard he keeps in his sock drawer. Scribbled down is a note he wrote to himself two years ago, when he first moved to New York: I want to be the most influential artist of the 21st Century.
SILVER KNIGHTS PROFILES
Every morning before heading off to work, Yazmany Arboleda glances at a small white notecard he keeps in his sock drawer. Scribbled down is a note he wrote to himself two years ago, when he first moved to New York: I want to be the most influential artist of the 21st Century.
In addition to running his own business, David LeBatard has been a diplomatic representative to South Africa, Mozambique and Swaziland through Rotary Club International.
Paul Steinhardt, who won the 1970 Silver Knight for General Scholarship and is now the Albert Einstein Professor in science at Princeton University, will discuss Endless Universe: Beyond the Big Bang, at 6 p.m. Sunday at Books & Books, 265 Aragon Ave., Coral Gables.
MIAMI-DADE Art: West Lamy, South Miami Athletics: Sandra Carolina Alvarez, Coral Gables Business: Christian Asmar, Miami Beach Drama: Justin Anthony Koren, Coral Reef
SILVER KNIGHTS PROFILES
He says he relishes obstacles. The first came at age 6, when he left his native Rio de Janeiro for the United States not knowing a word of English.
Alex Annunziato heads Florida Highway Patrol's Miami Canine Unit and has run for Miami Beach City Commission. And he's a dad, two times over.
Aisha Ayoub is a program manager for Microsoft in Seattle. She spends her time working on the newest and yet-to-be released products that Microsoft Windows has to offer. No, she didn't work on Microsoft Vista.
Miami-Dade Art: Charlotette Jarrett, Michael Krop Athletics: Amanda Estevez, Florida Christian Business: Stephanie Fink, Coral Gables
SILVER KNIGHTS PROFILES
When Gary Eisenberg won a Silver Knight Award for Citizenship ''many moons ago,'' he said it was as if time stopped. There, presenting the awards at the 1970 ceremony, was astronaut Alan L. Bean, fresh off the 1969 Apollo 12 space mission. Eisenberg was awestruck, thinking about how special the awards must be if Bean was there to recognize the winners.
Something wasn't quite right about the photograph of the class of 1970 Silver Knight winners. Standing front and center: a cute little boy in double-breasted suit, complete with a pocket handkerchief, holding a trophy and certificate. At 4-feet tall, he didn't come close to reaching the shoulders of the teenage winners around him.
SILVER KNIGHTS PROFILES
Long before he argued in front of the Supreme Court or wrote speeches for the vice president or went to Harvard (magna cum laude, national debating champion) and Harvard Law (cum laude, Law Review), and years before he won the 1966 Silver Knight Award for speech and debate, Joel Perwin could not get a word in edgewise at dinner.
