In 2020, COVID was the story, and the inaugural Fundraising University New Jersey “Unsung Hero Scholarship Award” went to St. Joe’s of Metuchen’s Tommy Romond, who kept his team together on the field, despite being apart.
In 2021, the award goes to a Manville senior who helped keep his community together.
That community was, in part, his football team, but in greater part, the entire town of Manville, in the wake of the utter destruction caused by the remnants of Tropical Storm Ida back in early September.
Manville has been through many storms before, and too many to count in recent years, but the tiny Somerset County town probably has never seen a dynamo like Brandon Flores. He had teammates who lost everything. He helped them first, then it was on to anyone who needed assistance, moving out flooded items, passing out bottled water.

Just taking care of his community.
For his efforts, Flores receives the “Unsung Hero Scholarship Award,” a $500 scholarship coutesy of John Tuohy at Fundraising University New Jersey.
Click below to listen to Brandon Flores recall the night Ida hit Manville, and what he did for his community in the aftermath:
