The last four years here at Elder High School could not have been better. I have made friends, gained great relationships, found passions, went to a lot of football and basketball games, and did what I could in the classroom to excel myself to the next level of education in college.

I will be spending the next four years in Morgantown, West Virginia at West Virginia University, double majoring in Sports and Adventure Media and Photojournalism with a minor in either Spanish, Italian, or Portuguese. (too many cool languages I can’t decide)

Looking back at the last four years at Elder, I noticed how much I have grown as a person. I came here knowing absolutely nobody except for my dad, Mr. Louis, Mr. Alig and Mr. Tierney. Yes, that is slightly embarrassing but I came from and Oak Hills grade school and almost everyone I am friends with now went to a Catholic grade school in the area.

What is funny about this is that one of my soon to be best friends had a similar path here. His father was an Alumni who was not from the area. Adam Duwel.

An origin story of how I met my closest friends and how I chose my Majors

I met Adam freshman year in a class called Dramatic Techniques with this goofball teacher by the name of Mr. Gary Rogers. I did not want to take an art class because I was not confident in my ability and I didn’t like it anyways so I figured this would be fun to take as a freshman to meet some people and boy did I meet some characters.

Mr. Rogers taught the class in one of the greatest ways possible, games that can be used as ice breakers. We played charades, and a bunch of acting games since it was a drama class and we got to learn some life lessons and tools as well like public speaking and how to be loud and proud in the middle of a room where you know nobody. Charades led us to interact with the whole class and it is still one of the coolest classes I have ever taken and it was a close class in general. One of the greatest moments from our various games of charades is, well, I can’t say but just go ask Matthew Walter about his Monica Lewinsky and Bill Clinton impressions.

Literally nothing happened sophomore year. I don’t really remember any of it. (except for failing Chemistry by .2 points)

But the most memorable years to date were my final two, junior and senior year. Senior year isn’t over yet and we haven’t even gotten to the fun stuff and what we have been working towards this whole time like graduation, class events, baccalaureate mass and Elderfest.

Junior year was memorable because of the pandemic. It is going to be the 9/11 moments that our parents had where they can remember where they were when it took place. For me, I was on Kairos. I was sitting at my group table before we were heading to small group when we saw that the NBA, MLS, MLB, and NHL were all begin suspended indefinitely. It was one of the craziest times of my life as I was already behind in school because of the retreat and now we weren’t going back for the rest of the year.

During the quarantine, I picked up a few new hobbies and a few old ones too. I started collecting baseball cards again and found out that Adobe photoshop existed, but the biggest hobby turned into my passion and future job was photography and digital media.

Film photography can be called “an old person’s hobby or art” but it was something fun to experiment with when there was nothing to do. I found my grandma and moms old film cameras in my basement in a few boxes and the Easter bunny brought me my first few rolls of film that sparked something in me that has led me to decide WVU for my higher education and to study digital media.

This past school year and my senior year, I have gotten the opportunity to be the social media manager for the basketball program. I got to coordinate a media day, and post hype graphics and all starting lineups and game updates not only for my school but for some of my closest friends, JT, Scotty, and David.

It is something I will never forget just like anything else I have experienced here at Elder and I will never be able to thank Coach Espy and Coach Bengel enough for the opportunity to do that and be on the sidelines taking pictures every single game to boost my portfolio. Elder is not just a school for athletes and athletics as it may seem like that for most. Elder has helped me come to a realization that I can do anything I want to do and that they will help find opportunities to follow your dreams while you are still in school.

That being said, this isn’t my ‘Farewell to the Quill” article but more of a recap and what is in store for me in the next chapter in my life post Elder.

Altiora! and Let’s Go Mountaineers!