Kara Charette
Graduating class: 2012
Inducted into Hall of Fame: 2024
Hall of Fame Category: Athlete
Kara Charette was a four-year athlete in three sports and boasted a resume that would turn the average high school athlete green with envy. But Kara Charette was true blue through and through.
Karen Arsenault was her coach through four years of volleyball and called Kara “the strongest athlete I ever coached.” And, for good reason. Playing the middle-hitter position, Kara registered 221 kills in her freshman season to help set the stage for a brilliant career in her favorite fall sport.
That was in 2008, and over the next three seasons the quick-moving, hard-hitting standout would add her name to the school record book and earn a bundle of individual awards while lifting her teams to power status among the state’s elite high school volleyball teams.
With Kara’s all-around contributions, the Blue Devils won back-to back Division 2 South Sectional Championships in 2010 and 2011. As a senior, she was a key factor in the team’s 20-5 season record that enabled the 2011 team to become the first Fairhaven High School volleyball team to appear in a State Champion-ship game.
Her team lost to Medfield, but Charette’s all-around play in that game and throughout the season resulted in several individual honors. In addition to ranking third in blocks in all of Division 2, Kara led the division in kills and graduated as the school’s all-time leader with 1,175, according to Coach Arsenault.
Following her final season, The Standard-Times All-Star selection was named the news-paper’s Player of the Year, and later was selected to the newspaper’s All-Decade Volleyball team (2010-2019). She also earned a spot on the Boston Globe’s All- Scholastic team for the second straight year. And Kara Charette was just warming up.
As a member of the 2011-2012 girls’ basketball team the veteran center / forward was outstanding at both ends of the court - scoring, rebounding and playing stellar defense and was a key component in the team’s drive to an undefeated South Coast Conference championship and an appearance in the Division 3 State semifinal round. Kara finished her high school basketball career as the school’s all-time leading scorer (boys and girls) with 1,688 points and her 1,081 rebounds also was a school high.
In addition to winning the coveted Dave Cowens Award as the area’s best player (female division), Charette was named The Standard-Times Female Player of the Year and received the Phelps Scholar-Athlete Award from the Boston Globe. And, just like she did in volleyball, Kara earned a spot on The Standard-Times All-Decade Girls Basketball Team (2010-2019).
Charette wrapped up her high school athlete career as a member of the Blue Devils’ tennis team where she played doubles and then first singles in her senior season, and was a unanimous selection to The Standard-Times Super Team while earning a spot among the Will McDonough Athletes of the Year in The Boston Globe.
Kara earned a full basketball scholarship to Franklin Pierce University in New Hampshire where she majored in Criminal Justice. On the basketball court she was named to her conference All-Rookie team as a freshman in 2012-13 and was a Second Team and First Team All-Star in 2012-2013 and 2015-2016 respectively. She scored 1,945 points in her collegiate career, 3rd most in school history.
Kara graduated from Franklin Pierce in 2016 with a 3.6 GPA, and later enlisted in the Army and became a Special Agent for their Criminal Investigation Division. During her time in the Army, she completed her Master’s Degree in Criminal Justice: Homeland Security from Liberty University in Virginia in 2022.
Kara came off active duty for the Army in the fall of 2023, and has remained a member of the Army Reserves. She is now employed as a Special Agent with the Department of Justice in South Florida where she lives and enjoys playing beach volleyball.
Kara becomes the second member of the Charette family to enter the Fairhaven Hall of Fame. Her older sister, Kaleigh, was inducted in 2008.