JACKSON TWP — The proposal to rename the Seneca Valley Middle School after a 2000 graduate who was killed in combat in Afghanistan is moving on.

Jim Nickel, school board president, said at Monday's meeting that the board directed Superintendent Tracy Vitale to form a committee to look into the proposal to rename the school after Sgt. 1st Class Ryan Gloyer and report back at the board's voting meeting on Monday.

A group of students and one recent Seneca Valley graduate gave a presentation at the Jan. 23 school board meeting on why the district should rename the middle school after Gloyer, a Green Beret who was killed November 2016 while fighting enemy forces in Kunduz, Afghanistan.

Gloyer's father, a former classmate and a fellow soldier also spoke during the presentation.

Gloyer of Zelienople played several sports while he was a student at Seneca Valley, in addition to participating in chorus and the school musical. He went on to earn degrees in elementary education and psychology from Thiel College in Greenville before enlisting in the Army.

Nickel said two things in particular struck him about the students' presentation on Gloyer's life and personality: his persistence in reaching his goal of becoming a Green Beret and his ability to seemingly transcend and bridge social groups.

“There's so much that can come from the story of and the lessons of Ryan Gloyer and the life he led,” Nickel said.

The Rev. Reid Moon, a school director, also spoke favorably about the possibility of renaming the middle school after Gloyer. He said it would give the seventh and eighth graders, who are struggling with identity, a role model to point to who had a positive identity.

A relevant school board policy states that when requests are made to establish districtwide memorials, like naming a facility, the superintendent will select a committee to “address such issues.”

The policy states memorials on school district property must be “proposed, reviewed and adopted cognizant of concepts of equality, proper concern for all students and community members, appropriateness of memorials, and best usage of available property.”