While most high school students indulge in a sport, hobby, or passion, Elowyn Wells (12) is doing it all. Wells, an impressive tennis player, baker, gardener, musical assistant stage manager, and the editor-in-chief of the newspaper, has a full schedule. 

“I don’t want to be a one-trick pony,” Wells said. 

In terms of her journalistic passion, Wells was introduced to her love for writing at a young age by attending poetry readings with her mom every Saturday. 

“Hearing the stories, thoughts, and beliefs of the poets gave me the ability to write for myself,” Wells said. 

She then took her developing passion to a creative writing class in middle school, giving her an outlet to write more often. 

“Having a class that embodied the work ethic for creative writing really helped me prioritize it in my life,” Wells said. 

In the seventh grade, she was published in The Sunset Times in regards to a survey that she filled out for her creative writing class. She notes this as one of her proudest accomplishments early on in her writing career.

“Our teacher had us fill out a survey about our school and the staff writer selected my questionnaire,” Wells said. 

Moving into high school, she resumed her love for writing in her Sophomore year when she took Introduction to Journalism and Photojournalism; inspiring her to write for the school newspaper the following year. 

“I decided on writing for the newspaper because I really enjoyed the piece that I wrote for Intro to Journalism, so taking that love, ambition and passion from Intro to Journalism to the newspaper immediately made me stand out to my advisors,” Wells said. 

She quickly found herself moving up the newspaper ladder, going from web editor, to co-editor, to editor-in-chief all within the course of a year. 

“I kept up that hard work throughout the first semester and was asked to be co-editor and to train to be the editor-in-chief for the next year,” Wells said. 

Looking into the future for Wells, she is considering attending college at Truman State or The University of Missouri – Columbia. Wells is not opposed to going out of state and is also considering schools on both the east and west coasts.. She doesn’t want to nail down her future career to one particular thing, though she definitely wants to pursue journalism in her occupation. Wells mainly wants to enjoy her job: doing a little bit of everything. 

“I plan to implement journalism and media in my life when I go to college, wherever that may take me,” Wells said.