She gives a runway spin as she makes her way into the classroom as her friends jokingly tease her and they all burst into giggles.
Editor Aniyah Smith sure does know how to make her personality known. Smith is a junior here at Churchland High School, and at just 17, her schedule is already pretty busy.
“I’m in yearbook, I'm an editor for journalism, and I was the manager for the JV softball team.”
Smith’s main task is editing and posting articles on the school’s news site, and it’s not easy work. “I basically get the articles, I’ll read through them, and that’s kind of when you determine whether or not it has enough information to be posted, or if it needs more information, you need to work on it more. If it has enough information I’ll go through change any grammatical errors, then I’ll find a picture or take a picture, and then post it up on our website”
You definitely have to have a knack for it, and Smith knows exactly what she’s doing.
“Some skills that are required for you to have to be an editor for journalism are really good english skills like, it sounds obvious but you really have to catch any grammatical errors, make sure the words flow together, that the article, which is kind of like a story, isn’t choppy and missing information.”
Smith’s love for journalism all began when she had Mr. Bolduc as her English teacher her freshman year. “He told us kinda how it was and I really enjoyed when we did the writing portion of the subject, I really enjoyed that and I had a lot of fun, especially with the poems and stuff so it really made me realize that writing is something that I enjoyed. I don’t know if I would continue it as a career, but as a hobby, I definitely love writing.”
Even though she has a lot going on, Smith is passionate about what she does, and why she does it.
“I feel like the most enjoyable part of yearbook and journalism is it just gives me a way to express myself. Growing up I wasn’t really like the popular person in school, I’m still not, but I feel like it gives me a way to get my opinion and my feelings out there about how I feel towards things going in the school, and outside of school.”
Photo: Destiny Loftus