And the three finalists are…

Unrevealed. 

The Pascack Valley Mascot Selection Committee has chosen three mascot names after its meeting Wednesday afternoon on Zoom and in the PV auditorium, according to committee student representative Delia Collis. Collis and student representative Vasili Karalewich declined to reveal the three suggestions. 

The mascot nicknames will be sent to the administration before the student body can vote on its favorite mascot nickname, according to Karalewich. 

“We’re going to send [the nicknames] to the administration to be vetted first,” Karalewich said.  “Then, if any of them are flagged, we do have backups or the next best name that we picked [to present], but if [none are flagged] then we should be good to go.”

Although the meetings are not open to non-members or the press, organizers John Puccio, PV’s Assistant Principal, Shawn Buchanan, PV’s Athletics Director, Collis, and Karalewich made themselves available for questions afterward.

After discussing the results from a second survey sent out to the committee last week, the committee was able to narrow down its final three nicknames and discuss how it would like to present the nicknames moving forward. 

“As somebody who’s been a member [of the mascot committee], I’ve been really proud of all the committee has done,” Collis said. “I think the committee has done a really great job with going back to its groups and including the respective groups that [it is] representing.”

After the three nicknames are vetted by the administration and superintendent, students and staff will be able to vote on their favorite mascot name through an election. Collis said the vetting process will take “around a week or two.”

“I particularly am really impressed with the student involvement [within the committee],” Collis said. “It wasn’t unexpected because I feel like the involvement is so crucial in the school as a whole, but in general, I think I’ve been really impressed with [how the committee] has been really student-driven.”

The next mascot selection meeting will be determined as the vetting process takes place. 

While the committee does not have a specific date as to when it will present its final suggestion to the Board of Education, Karalewich said that there is a possibility it can share its final choice with the BOE during the next meeting on March 8. 

“I’m really happy that we got a lot of great representation from everyone in our group,” Karalewich said. “[The committee] is also a sample size of our whole school, so I’m confident that we’re all going to like our [new] mascot.”