Marisa McNally
Hailing from El Toro High School in Lake Forest, Marisa McNally is about to be Web-Editor for her high school newspaper as well as a writer and assistant to the Editor-in-Chief. She will be a senior for this upcoming school year, not having just one position, but three; McNally is sure to be busy during her last year in high school. She hopes to attend USD (San Diego). While she is certain that USD is her dream school she is not sure of what she will major in. Journalism is one of the many subjects that interest her as well as Film and Biology. McNally is also involved in her community. She is a part of her church youth group where she is about to be a leader and a part of FNL (Friday Nights Live), a drug prevention program. In the future McNally wishes to open a gluten free bakery. She plans to furnish the cafe in a homey manner with lots of colors -except red. She doesn’t like the color red. Some of her favorite TV shows include American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance.
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Jessica Kwok
Jessica Kwok is a junior at Walnut High School. She is the Opinion Editor of her school paper, the Hoofprint. Jessica aims to survive her grueling schedule, which includes orchestra, publication, and challenging academics. Jessica took up the cello in sixth grade, preferring this instrument for its deep and varied range. However, Jessica also enjoys life with her friends. She values the confidence and enthusiasm she finds in her friends Sharon and Molly. She frequents the movie theater and most recently saw Captain America.
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Jessica Marin
A senior at Culver City High School and Editor-in-Chief of Web of the school’s newspaper, Jessica Marin applies her “fashion sense” to the many elements of her life. Audrey Hepburn, the beautiful black-and-white film actress, also Jessica’s idol, would lavish in the Victorian age decorated bedroom in which Jessica dwells. She would most likely accompany Jessica on the Nordstrom’s Fashion Board as well, both dressed in dangling beaded jewelry and bright floral pinks and the complimenting browns. Exercising her fashion passion in more than just one direction, Jessica flexes her creative muscles on her school’s newspaper where she has served as the Editor of the Trends section. Preferring the A&E stories more than the hard news, she sees herself working at a magazine one day or in public relations. She even has her work, an article that relishes the importance of Barbie dolls, one of which has the curious resemblance of Audrey herself, published in the LA Youth newspaper that she contributes to over summer. She hopes to pursue this journalistic future at Marist University in New York where she plans to major in communications and minor in fashion merchandising. But she does not want to keep her trendy knowledge limited to New York. Marist University offers a study abroad program that allows freshmen to study in Florence, Italy for the year. Audrey would be proud…and quite jealous. But who says Jessica has to fly away and live in the adult world so soon? She spends many hours volunteering her time at her old preschool, La Ballona Preschool. She loves “how kids don’t care what you’re wearing” (who says a fashionista has to be made up every day?) and that “they love you no matter what.”
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Jeff Mirosavich
Jeff Mirosavich is an English teacher and Journalism adviser at Palos Verdes High School. His main goal for the school newspaper, The Point, is to construct a new website and train some staff members to maintain it. In 2008, the paper’s original webmaster, Joey Cody, constructed a sleek website at pvhspoint.com. “It had the appearance of a professional site like NYTimes.com,” Mirosavich said. The following year Simon Chung became new webmaster. He maintained the high quality of the site. However, in 2010 disaster struck. The domain needed to be renewed, but Cody would not release it. “Simon tried to contact him for months and could not get a response,” added Mirosavich. Chung built a new site, pvpoint.com, from scratch. The late start on the site and the fact that Chung was struck with a serious case of senioritis contributed to a much more limited site. In the spring of 2011, after the death of Osama Bin Laden, Islamic hackers took over the server The Point used and anyone trying to see the Point site saw messages in English and Arabic proclaiming jihad against the west, along with graphic images of mutilated people. The new school year will bring yet another opportunity for the PV Point staff to “create a new site that will showcase the work of the staff for an online audience,” according to Mirosavich.
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Janetta Osborne
Janetta Osborne is a senior at LA High where a school newspaper is developing. With no name or set staff positions the newspaper is in its early stages, however she is interested in the web design aspects of the paper. Heavily involved with school activities, Osborne played volleyball, started student council, and a debate club. On top of her volunteering, she is in the top 10 percent of her class and plans to keep it that way through her senior year. She plans on studying at Stanford or UCLA to become a surgeon with a minor in business and has already attended business school to prepare herself.
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Maddy Perrault
Maddy Perrault, 16, is the Managing Editor at Redondo Union High school. The name of her school’s newspaper is High Tide; the newspaper column ” is about 60 years old,” she said. Maddy, a club soccer player for 5 years, wasn’t really familiar with computer technology. In fact, Maddy was pretty consumed with her jogging and her horror movie watch; “Oh my gosh, I love horror movies, and I loved Insidious!” Then, Maddy had an epiphany; the journalism idea came to her on a white horse with a golden scroll. No, really, her friend was Editor and Chief and he introduced her to the class.
Maddy’s staff consist of approximately 50 people split into two different classes. The biggest challenge to overcome, says Maddy “is to keep up the quality of the paper.” If she makes it through her senior year, Maddy plans on studying at McGill University, however she does not plan on pursuing journalism.
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Lauren Lee
Lauren Lee, a junior at Woodbridge High School, is an upcoming news editor for the Golden Arrow.
Lee enjoys spending time with friends, writing about the days in her life, and looks forward to a fruitful, but challenging, school year. She feels her optimistic attitude has helped her through tough classes, and, last year, her being diagnosed with juvenile arthritis.
“When something difficult comes up, there’s always a bright side to it,” Lee said.
Though her condition restricts her from playing impact sports, sprinting, and carrying heavy objects, she knows that she is fortunate to lead an otherwise active lifestyle.
Besides her involvement in the newspaper, she is active in Model United Nations, and will take on a challenging course load — atop all of this, her bright, infectious smile attests to her positive attitude.
She relies on the encouragement of friends, self-motivation, and even a teddy bear and journal to maintain balance in her life.
“I’ve got this little teddy bear… ‘Brownie.’ He’s got lots of fur and is short with fat limbs. I’ll hug him. He’s very special to me,” Lee said.
She finds comfort in keeping a daily journal, and has kept the routine since fourth grade.
“I’m proud of being able to write. I enjoy being able to express my thoughts in my journal — it’s like a catharsis — a letting go of anger. I usually write what was difficult about my day, and I look through my previous entries and just laugh. I’ve written volumes and volumes.”
Her journal-writing is the inspiration behind “Lauren’s Daily Blog,” and she is excited to continue contributing to the Newspapers2 workshop this week.
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Will Jones – Web Editor
Will Jones is currently a student at La Costa Canyon High School. He is starting his senior year this coming Fall semester and will be working on the online team for the MavLife News, the newspaper at La Costa High School. Will is going to be the online editor this year for the MavLife News.
As any computer enthusiast, Will is interested in web design and in 3D modeling. In his academical interests, Will is mostly is interested in math and is going to be taking two AP math courses this coming school year.
Will is currently taking the Newspaper2 summer program, thanks to the invitation his teacher gave him, to better his skills in web design.
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Alexis Maldonado
Alexis Maldonado is a student at Banning High School. In school he mainly enjoys history and English, though his favorite class is journalism. After his sophomore year, Alexis traded in his track shoes for a pen and pad (his schedule didn’t allow for both), and joined his school’s journalism class. He worked hard in the online team, a group otherwise known to play computer games throughout the class period. Soon he will be entering his second year of journalism, where he will further his work on the online edition of his school’s newspaper.
Outside of school, Alexis enjoys listening to music. He has a greatly varied taste, but his favorites are rock and hardcore, such as Attack Attack!
In the future, Alexis hopes to go to a university such as Loyola Marymount University or Chico State University and find a job as either a journalism or criminal investigator.
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Alvin
Alvin attends Walnut High School, and is currently an online editor. He likes swimming and his goals are to go to a cool college after high school and maybe make the swim team. As a part of BREA, he swims year-round, attending Mustang Varsity during the spring. Aside from swimming, he also plays a bit of tennis, a dash of golf, and a sprinkle of soccer. He likes ice cream. He also spends time programming during the summer. As a freelance web designer, his aims are to go into back-end development soon. In his free-time, he doodles, plays minecraft, and fools around. ICE CREAM. 
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Angel Balladares
Angel attends Orange High School as a Publications staffer going into his senior year. However, as an avid football player, he also aims to continue his football career going into USC, his dream college. Football is his greatest passion. As a matter of fact, football is one of his two primary sports, with the other being soccer. He plays varsity, right-line defense for the majority of the time, and more or less, relishes working out with his teammates. In his spare time, he hangs out with his buddies, and in general, he greatly values family time.
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Brianna Egan
by Lauren Lee
Brianna Egan, 16, is not your typical senior.
At Redondo Union High School, she is the Web Editor of her school newspaper, High Tide.
Egan is also involved in a variety of extracurricular activities such as choir, Science Olympiad (President), Fellowship of Christian Athletes (President), and Varsity Tennis. She has been playing the piano for nine years and recently started self-learning how to play the ukulele since February.
When asked how she stays on top of all her activities, Egan points to her love of organizing, though she confesses difficulty in time management.
Currently, Egan is considering focusing on science and Spanish in college to possibly become a medical doctor.
When she says she wants the superpower to be able to “freeze time,” we know that she’s on the path to a successful future.
