If you’ve been concerned about the members of the Catasauqua High School Class of 2020 and wanted a way to help them feel special, Heather Montanez has your answer.

Montanez, stepmother of CHS senior Marissa Montanez, recently started the Catasauqua Class of 2020 ADOPT A SENIOR Facebook page.

Montanez noted she was finding similar groups for the Whitehall-Coplay and Parkland school districts and wondered why there wasn’t one for Catasauqua.

“I’m thinking, ‘Wow - these schools are massive, and they have like 500-900 kids in a graduating class. How are they doing this?’” she said.

Montanez firmly believed if those larger schools were able to make it happen, it should be no problem for the much smaller class size at CHS.

She reached out to the high school’s Facebook page about the possibility of implementing something, and she was directed to CHS Principal Adam Schnug. Schnug told her those groups were parent organized and not run by the school. Fueled by this information, she put a call out on her own Facebook seeking assistance from other parents.

“My friend Jessica Silva commented, ‘Let’s do this. I’m in.’ So we did,” Montanez said.

She noted it was a challenge at first to get the word out and connect with other CHS parents.

“The first four days were a little rough,” Montanez reported. “It really didn’t get moving until Leslie Estrada started helping us get the word out. She was a great asset to our group!”

Estrada is a Spanish teacher at CHS and serves as the district’s community outreach liaison. With Schnug’s support, she reached out to Montanez to offer her assistance.

“We made some adjustments to the page so the Facebook group would be private to keep our students safe but discoverable so Catasauqua community members could request to join,” Estrada said. “Heather (Montanez) has been great at keeping student information private and connecting community members with parents of seniors so their information is kept safe.”

According to Montanez, they opened the group May 16, and as of May 27, there were more than 300 members.

The adoption process begins once a friend or family member nominates a senior student. Other members of the group can then comment on the post, indicating their interest in adopting the student. The commenter is directed to privately message the family member or friend who made the post to confirm their intent to adopt.

Once Montanez receives confirmation a safe adoption transaction was agreed upon, she marks the student as “adopted.”

The original poster can then share information about the student, such as favorite snacks or hobbies to whomever adopted them. The gifts are delivered or dropped off at the student’s home, following all social-distancing requirements.

According to Montanez, all personal information, including addresses and phone numbers, is being exchanged through private messages to protect the safety and security of the students and their families.

Montanez is urging families to share photos of the seniors with their gifts to the Facebook group, whose members may enjoy seeing the success of the initiative.

The Facebook group is open and available for community members to join.

Montanez and Estrada were both excited at how quickly the group grew in popularity and how rapidly the seniors were being adopted.

“We didn’t even get enough time to tag their mention or get through the whole post when adopters were commenting, ‘I want them!’ It was very exciting to watch,” Montanez said.

“Students are being adopted the second they’re nominated,” Estrada reported.

According to Montanez, there have already been approximately 60 seniors adopted, as of May 22. She said more than half of those students were adopted more than once. She was very excited about that number since the group had only been in existence about a week at that point.

“Our goal is to get everyone adopted at least two times,” Montanez said.

She noted they increased expectations due to the high level of interest.

“Our fan base is so high - we couldn’t give them enough kids,” she added.

Montanez is determined each senior get a gift, ideally two, so she enlisted her stepdaughter Marissa’s help in getting names of every senior student. Some members of the group have searched through the yearbooks from past years to assist in identifying anyone who has not been nominated yet. For those students, Montanez plans to put together unisex gift bags and gift cards.

Montanez reported she wanted to give the seniors the big moment they deserved. Due to COVID-19, the school is forced to change the traditional graduation ceremony as well as other end-of-the-year events.

“They’re not having their senior year fulfilled in any traditional way, so this is going to help them get a little happier about being a senior again,” she said.

Montanez encourages other community members to get involved to celebrate the Class of 2020 and their accomplishments.

“We need and want as much positive energy to share with them right now. They have been dealing with so much,” she said. “They all work hard, they are all in this together and they all deserve the same attention.”