Western Middle School Unveils Plaque in Memory of Steven Sudell

A plaque was unveiled above the kind­ness rock gar­den at West­ern Mid­dle School in ded­i­ca­tion to Steven Sudell on Tuesday.

Bar­bara Jacowl­eff, who taught an advi­sor base class that ded­i­cat­ed their com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice for Steven, described what the kind­ness rock gar­den means for West­ern Mid­dle School.

“The rock gar­den was cre­at­ed as a trib­ute to Steven but also in an effort to keep his lega­cy of com­pas­sion alive,” Jacowl­eff said, adding that the gar­den rep­re­sent­ed who Steven was as a per­son and will help the Town remem­ber him.

“We want Steven to be remem­bered as some­one who rep­re­sent­ed the heart of West­ern Mid­dle School and exem­pli­fied com­pas­sion,” Jacowl­eff said.

The kind­ness rock gar­den was put in front of the school to encour­age peo­ple to be kind to each oth­er and set the tone for the day as stu­dents walked in.

Jacowl­eff said that before she met Steven, she asked the class what they want­ed to do for their com­mu­ni­ty ser­vice and every stu­dent in the class want­ed to raise mon­ey for him. This led to the Steven Sudell Sprint, which raised $8,000 in three weeks.

The class also sold war­rior t‑shirts through­out Green­wich with the help of assis­tant teacher Nicole Pin­cus, which raised $4,000 for Steven in three weeks.

Jacowl­eff said the community’s over­whelm­ing response was what her real­ize how spe­cial Steven was. She also cit­ed an instance when a girl at West­ern gave her a let­ter to give to Steven when he was under­go­ing treatment.

Jacowl­eff read the let­ter before pass­ing it along to Steven. She said the let­ter described a time in ele­men­tary school when the girl had felt like an out­cast and sat alone at lunch. She said Steven noticed this and went to sit with her at lunch. With­in a few months that stu­dent had a table full of friends to sit with.

Jacowl­eff said Steven not only dis­played tough­ness, but also was car­ing for every­one else, evi­dent in his fundrais­er sell­ing socks and cre­at­ing draw­ings to bright­en oth­er people’s days.

“When Steven was bat­tling can­cer, instead of lay­ing in bed feel­ing sor­ry for him­self he was rais­ing mon­ey,” Jacowl­eff said.

Steven’s close friend Jack Ryan spoke at the unveil­ing and said the gar­den and plaque rep­re­sent­ed the way that Steven treat­ed every­one around him.

Steven’s moth­er Amy Sudell said that it meant a lot to her that the whole school ral­lied around the fam­i­ly. She also said that she hopes that the gar­den can make days eas­i­er for stu­dents as they walk into the school.

The bronze plaque in the front of West­ern Mid­dle School was paid for through fundrais­ing, which Jacowl­eff not­ed was a reflec­tion of the Town’s con­tin­ued sup­port of the Sudell family.

“It’s a tes­ta­ment to how well-loved the Sudell fam­i­ly is in the Town of Green­wich,” Jacowl­eff said.