From June 28 to July students flooded the American University campus for the second session of the Journalism, Film, and Media Arts session of the NSLC program. Here are some of their stories:
“My dream is to become a best-selling novelist and write a book that has an impact on everyone who reads it.” Abby Hadfield, 16
Coming from rural Pennsylvania, this rising high school junior has awaited the opportunity to attend the Journalism, Film, and Media Arts leadership conference since the arrival of an email in December 2014.
Abby Hadfield is attending the program as a student in the Professional Newswriting class.
While her attendance may show her experience is with news writing; however, her true dream is to “make it” as a novelist or a creative writer.
“Journalism is just a more practical form of writing,” Hadfield said.
“It’s really hard to make it as a novelist,” Hadfield said later in a brief interview just after the start of her first workshop session.
Beyond the classroom, she is involved with the school newspaper, the school literary Magazine, Girl Up, Girls Room and Interact Club.
Hadfield’s passions truly translate into her dreams for the future.
“My dream is to become a best-selling novelist and write a book that has an impact on everyone who reads it” Hadfield said.
“I would like to live in Mexico and help my country move forward as a leader.”
~Marina de la Sierra- 16
This student is one of many international students at the leadership conference and has traveled from Mexico to be a part of the leadership conference taking place from June 28 to July 8.
Marina de la Sierra found the program through her American school that encourages the students to look for opportunities to study in the United States.
“I got interested in it because I like writing a lot and I saw there was a journalism program,” de la Sierra said.
Journalism was not a career she had considered before the camp and she wanted to gain some experience.
Her openness to this opportunity has been allowing her to gain whatever might benefit her in the future.
De la Sierra is looking into working for the UN and help those who are impoverished and uneducated in the future.
She views human trafficking as a major world issue and is looking to alleviate it in the future.
“I would like to live in Mexico and help my country move forward as a leader,” she said.
“Knowing that everyone has a different mind for a different reason.”
Breezy Culberson, 21 (Not Pictured)
This 21-year-old office staff person of a leadership camp at American University has truly made the most of her opportunities and is continuing her education to attain her own dream.
Breezy Culberson works at the NSLC office and is responsible for some of the coordination and teamwork it takes to pull together such a big opportunity for hundreds of high school students.
Culberson chose to attend the Journalism and Mass Media conference in Berkley when invited, became a Psychology major in college and is inspired by the work she has a degree to do.
When asked how the conference benefited her, she said, “It looked good on my resume.”
The leadership experience was definitely of value to her as a student.
The discovery of her personality tendency, a koala, gave her a better direction as to her college choice and future career.
In the next six months, Culberson will be going back to school to continue her education and earn a master’s in psychology.
Her main reason for her fascination with psychology, “knowing that everyone has a different mind for a different reason.”
“You know if I could just play that, I would be really satisfied.”
Michael Silverglade, 17 (Not Pictured)
His experience with the leadership conference began with his sister’s involvement four years ago and now he is gaining experience in the field he enjoys, music.
Michael Silverglade’s letter came to invite him to the camp in December 2014, but his interest in playing musical instruments certainly came before that.
“In elementary school, I played trumpet… it was legit but it wasn’t very good,” he said.
He started playing trumpet in his middle school band and only expanded his involvement as he moved forward in school, adding euphonium and bass by his high school years.
He started self-teaching bass in his freshman year after he saw one of the seniors playing and started listened to more music.
He thought, “You know if I could just play that, I would be really satisfied.”
Now, Silverglade is in his school’s symphonic band, the school jazz band and a rock band made up of a drummer singer and himself on bass.
In the future, he hopes to be able to work on the business end of music by producing it and to continue playing bass.
“It’s just something I really enjoy,” Silverglade said.