Current Journalism Staff

Maybree Aardema is an eighth grader at Orion Junior High who always stays busy. She loves playing volleyball and soccer, spending time with family and friends, and listening to music. Maybree is working hard to get good grades because she wants to go to BYU and study sonography and hairdressing. She also enjoys reading and writing stories, especially during quiet moments. One of her favorite quotes is: “Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on the light.”

Ben Albritton is a 9th-grade student enrolled at Orion Jr High and a future student at St Josephs Highschool.  He is a funny, charismatic, charming, and bright kid. He is 14 years old. He loves to hang out with friends, do sports, and just explore in his free time. He has written a few stories and loves to write and tell stories. He is very expressive in his writing. His proudest accomplishments come from his basketball rings and accomplishments. When he's not hanging out with friends and playing basketball. He spends lots of time with family and loved ones.

Blair Andrew is an 8th grader at Orion Jr High. She is the second oldest in a family of six. She is a competitive level eight gymnast and strives to go even farther in the sport. Blair loves hanging out with friends, listening to and singing music, and exercising. She also loves basically anything purple. Blair hopes to continue gymnastics for years to come, with her favorite events being beam and vault

Grant Baird is a journalist who loves to tell funny stories. They have very good, fast writing experience and very interesting stories. He lives in Utah with his dogs Spark and Franky. He loves riding his 250 Honda dirt bike with his friends. He is a food enthusiast and loves camping and loves hiking. He also likes to go to car shows and drive in my car. His favorite food is hamburgers and fries. His favorite dessert is a Butterfinger shake. Also, he loves to work hard and help fix things with his dad around the house. He also likes to sleep a lot.

This is Lexie Casella, she is a 9th grader at Orion Jr. High. This is the 8th school she's been to. She has lived in various places around the world, including Nebraska (which is where she was born), Italy, Florida, Texas, and now Utah. She loves pink and bows and all things girly. She has a passion for doing nails and makeup. She is very quiet and shy when you first meet her, but once you're friends with her, she is a very fun person to be around. She's funny, kind, and cares a lot about her friends, family, and boyfriend 😘. She loves Greek Mythology and her favorite show is Percy Jackson. She also loves to sing and dance (especially to Taylor Swift 😛). She loves to write poems about the people she loves, the world around her, or her personal experiences. In fact, one of her poems was chosen as one of the librarian's favorite poems, and it was put on a slideshow for the whole school. She wants to write about things that she went through so other people can relate to them and not feel alone. 

Jaxon Chansamone is from Utah and plays soccer. Jaxon is a 9th grader and this is his first time writing for Orion. He has won many trophies and metals from playing in soccer tournaments. Over the past couple years, he has written a few essays and some stories of him own. He loves to listen to music and had  been to many concerts in his life. He also loves hanging out with his friends and looks forward to it everyday after school. When he hangs out with his friends he loves to play games and just goof around. him and his friends also like  to eat a lot, they often end up going to eat somewhere like McDonald's or somewhere like that. 

Brylynn Child is a 9th grader at Orion Jr High. She enjoys art and is especially interested in cosmetology. In her free time, she likes reading and listening to music. Brylynn has written a few essays throughout her life and doesn't consider herself a big writer, but she decided to take journalism to see if it is something she might enjoy. She loves hanging out with her friends and spending time with her family, and she enjoys learning new things and exploring her interests at school. 

Jonah Christensen is a 13-year-old male, and this is his first year in a journalism class. He plays right guard/ nose guard in football. He went to the championship last year but lost. He loves the Denver Broncos.  is in his second year at Orion and his second year inthe  Weber School District. He is looking forward to writing for Orion Times.

She likes to be with friends and family. She does cheer and soccer. She is an 8th-grade student at Orion. She liked to try new things and make new friends. She likes to play video games, such as Fortnite, as a favorite. This is her first year as a journalist. She likes to travel and go to new places. Blakely likes to eat food. She is smart and determined. She loves to talk and loves to stay busy. She likes to keep good grades and try her best.

Daxdon Curtis is a Poet and Fiction author of many stories and tales. Dadon attends Orion Jr. High and is 14 years old. His work has awards, bestseller lists, and more. He has been writing for years and has accumulated a fan group of amazing people. Daxdon has many hobbies to spend his time. Some of these hobbies are Baseball, motocross, and 1/10 scale buggy racing. He lives in Ogden, Utah, with his dearest friends and family. Daxdon loves what he has and appreciates all the people who help him to get where he is. 

She is an esteemed song and novel writer. She is a 9th grader at Orion Jr. High in her first year of journalism. She's made two songs, unknown to anyone but her family and close friends, called "Beautiful Girl" and "Light". She's in the process of making a novel called "Can't They See" and loves making short horror stories. Allie enjoys anything hands-on and engaging, including but not limited to crocheting, sewing, woodworking, songwriting, cooking/baking, reading, and color guard. Her favorite classes are choir, creative writing, and foods. In the past school year, she has read more than 2,000 books already and plans to double that by the end of the school year. 

 Hadley M. Fischer is a 7th grader at Orien. She is currently working on a book called “King Dream’s.” In her spare time, she is either reading, rollerblading, singing, dancing, or thinking about whether or not she will really write her book. Some things that she likes are: Hanging out with her friends, K-pop demon hunters, chikn nuggit, (YouTube channel) rollerblading, drawing, singing, dancing, making bracelets, money, being with family, being with friends, dogs, otters, cats, ferrets, making paper crafts, and most importantly…. EATING!!! Her favorite books are Wings Of Fire: The Graphic Novels, The New Girl, Baby Sitters Club, 5 Worlds, and The Cursed Princess Club.

She is a student at Orion Jr. High. She wants to write articles for the Yale daily news when she's older. Violet has written essay stories in elementary and always won first place. Violet has a passion to write articles and stories for newspapers some day. In her free time she crochets and watches Gilmore Girls. Violet is excited to start writing for the Orion times and can't wait to see who she meets in Journalism.

He is a 7th grader, and in his first year of journalism, he goes to Orion. He likes to watch football with his family and play football. He plays running back and middle linebacker. He has been playing football for 7 years. Jordyn's favorite team is the Ravens, and his favorite player is Derrick Henry. Jordyn's favorite classes are art and Utah's history. His dreams are to go pro in sports and to make his mom proud. His dream car is a Porsche 911. His favorite thing to do is to hang out with his friends.

 Lydia Fowler is an 8th grader at Orion Jr. High. It is her second year at Orion, but her first year in journalism. Lydia loves to read. She gets that love from her mom. Her favorite genres are realistic fiction, historical fiction, and romance. She has a lot of books and is always finding space for new ones. She spends a lot of her time at her dance studio, whether it is ballet, jazz, or student teaching. She has been dancing for almost a decade now, and her love for dance keeps growing. She dances 10 hours a week, six days a week.

He is a journalist for the first time. He enjoys watching horror and action movies and reading self-help books. He is starting a growing cologne collection. In his free time, he likes hanging out with friends and playing video games. He loves playing on his friend's Minecraft server. He enjoys playing card games and board games with his family. He hopes everyone enjoys what he writes      

Paislee Hunt is a 9th grade student at Orion jr. high. She's only ever really written essay's and story's for her classes in school. Paislee is a very quiet and kept to her self kind of person when you first meet her but once you get to know her a little more and once she gets more comfortable shes very goofy, and dramatic. She enjoys reading romance novels, and fantasy books. One of her favorite things to do in her free time is draw. 

Emery Hussey is a 14-year-old girl who likes to write short stories. She has taken creative writing, which has really helped her grow in her writing skills. She was also featured in Titans Write. Her stories are usually light-hearted stories that she hopes bring people smiles. She likes to hang out with her friends and family in her free time. She has two sisters and a sheepadoodle dog named Murphy. She loves traveling, and the coolest trip she has gone on is on a cruise around Europe. She also plays the piano, guitar, and occasionally the trumpet. She has played two seasons of lacrosse. Emery Hussey is a very caring person who wants to make everyone feel like they belong. She hopes that her writing is fun for others to read and can give them a little break from this crazy world, along with teaching them something new!

Anna Jacobson may just be a girl from Utah, but there's definitely more to her than that. She loves the night and if you're walking with her at night, you'll constantly see her staring at the stars. She's into astronomy and wants to pursue a career in that. She can only name a few constellations, but knows all about stars and the planets of the solar system. Anna also enjoys creating art. She tries to get better and better at it everyday. Her favorite medium to use is watercolor paint. It makes the most beautiful pieces with the way it flows across her paper or canvas. Sure she may love those things but she'll never love something as much as her friends. Her friends are very important to her and she loves to be around them. They always make her laugh and they're all just a bunch of class clowns. Music is also very important to her. Anna loves music and if you ask her what her favorite song is, she won't have an answer. She doesn't have a favorite song because there are so many good ones. Although she loves all of these things, her favorite thing in the whole world is her cat, who's name is Loki.

Eliyah Jones is a writer that likes to focus on entertainment. You can see this in her previous articles from last year along with the school's podcast she helped with. She likes watching analog horror, doing arts and crafts, sewing, writing, and drawing in her free time. Other than that, she's always hanging out with her friends.

is a girl who likes music, hanging out with friends, and her cats 🫰. She hates homework and would rather be doing literally anything else. Her personality is pretty straight forward and doesn't try to be someone shes not. Writing is her way of expressing herself, her feelings, and her thoughts, because writing them is easier and less corny than saying them. She values being real and comfortable in things that she does. 

Heston is not very good at writing, but he could get better as time goes on. He likes to go on trips with his parents, and he loves to go out hunting and fishing. Those are his favorite times with his family. He has two older brothers, and one of them is moving away and won't be seeing him for a while, and the other one just got asked to homecoming. Their names are Jamison and Pierson. He goes hunting with his brothers a lot and fishing, and he thinks they are the best brothers. He has been getting bad grades for all the quarters, but he is trying to get them up and keep them.

Fallon is a 13-year-old boy who lives with a family of 6. A mom, dad, 2 sisters, and 1 brother. He is the 3rd oldest and loves Legos. He likes fun and video games and loves journalism. He loves superheroes and loves Marvel more than DC. He is naturally positive and mostly a pacifist. He has lived in Utah his entire life. He hated elementary school for reasons he would rather not share. He likes Greek myths and Harry Potter better than Star Wars. His Favorite superhero is Deadpool, and he thinks Green Lantern Sucks. 

Adisyn Lazo is a 9th grader at Orion Junior High. She enjoys art and is especially interested in versatile sketch art. In her free time, she likes to listen to music and take photos. Adisyn has written a few essays throughout her life, along with a couple of poems as well. She does not consider herself a big writer, though. She took journalism to see if it's something she might appreciate. Her friends and family are very dear to her, especially her two nephews. Adisyn also enjoys learning new things at school and picking up new hobbies. 

When she turned 6, she had a unicorn birthday party. She was so excited. And honestly, people had so much fun. She had a bounce house and everything. Her parents even got her a statue of a unicorn. She had the whole things a dress with horns, everything. Every single birthday, she had a different theme. It was so fun for her. Especially since she was very young. 

Addysen Mackenzie (Also known as Addy Mackenzie) is a student and a poet. Addy is hard-working and is a joy to be around. Addy lives with her daddy, mommy, brother, and her two dogs 50% of her time. The other 50% is spent with her mom, dad, brother, and her mom's 3 cats.

Caleb Mann is a student at Orion Jr High who has written a couple essays during his three years attending the school. He likes to spend his time with friends or at home, usually cooking or just relaxing. On weekends, he goes to work, once or twice a week, usually. He works at the Slop Shop, a family-run breakfast restaurant. He currently works as a host and a busser, but is hoping to become one of the cooks when he gets the qualifications and skills.  He likes to go to the school dances and sometimes the games, as long as he gets to spend time with his friends. One of his favorite things to do is watch football with his older brother, sometimes at home, other times at his favorite restaurant, Buffalo Wild Wings. When he is with friends, they usually walk somewhere to get food and sometimes go to a store or something along those lines. He loves horror and zombie movies, one of his favorites being Zombieland. Caleb’s favorite kind of music is rock; he likes bands such as Pierce The Veil, My Chemical Romance, and Slipknot. He loves playing video games; he plays and has played a lot of games. One of his favorites is Days Gone, a game based in a post-apocalyptic Oregon that is full of zombies. His favorite game to play with friends is probably Call of Duty, mostly playing the zombie mode. He also likes anime, watching a lot of the more popular ones and some lesser-known ones as well. So in conclusion, Caleb Mann is a guy who loves his friends, football, games, anime, and cooking.

 Paige Martin is an 8th grader at Orion Jr. High. It is her first year in journalism; however, she does have some experience with writing and is discovering her love for it! Paige enjoys playing sports. Starting her 7th-grade year, she found her love for volleyball. She loves to improve! She is a straight-A student. Throughout her junior high years, she has gotten the highest honors and holds herself to a high standard. However, that doesn’t stop her from having fun with her family and friends. She has three brothers and one sister, whom she loves very much. She has the best of friends, and they have lots of fun together.

Jade Mckinney is in ninth grade, and it is her first year in the journalism class. Through this class, she hopes to learn new skills that will help her become a better writer. In her free time, she enjoys reading. Her favorite genres are psychological thrillers and contemporary fiction books, such as The Way I Used To Be. 

is an 8th grader at Orion. He is a new journalist this year at Orion. He hasn’t written any books. He usually spends his time drawing, listening to music, or talking to his friends. He likes to mess around with his friends. Niko Tiznado has given him 7 dares this year. He likes to draw horror and humanoids. He usually doesn’t talk unless someone talks to him first.

 is a 9th grader at Orion jr high. He enjoys his weekends, buying new clothes, and McDonald's $5 meal deals. It's his 3rd year at Orion Jr high, and he is apart of the 9th grade journalism class and its his first year taking this class. His favorite time of year is summer or spring because of the weather. His favorite video games are 2k26, Fortnite, and Roblox. He was born in 2010 and his favorite clothing brand is true religion, and his favorite shoe brand is Air Jordan.

is in 9th grade, and this is her last year at Orion Jr High. Her favorite books to read are murder mysteries. When she was younger, she used to write songs and short stories in notebooks. Along with that, she also danced. She has done almost every type of dance, but her favorite is hip hop. As of right now, she is in hip hop, and about 2 years ago, she really got into cheer. She also did gymnastics with her sister for a couple of years while she was dancing. 

Parker Rigley has been a student at Orion Jr high for three years he is an aspiring musician and know how to play multiple instruments such as the saxophone, guitar and some piano. he also plays multiple sports such as Track Baseball and soccer on occasion. He's also currently working on learning a song on guitar called pump it. it is most definitely the hardest song he's learned on guitar. He is also working on improving himself by working out and mostly chilling with his friends who are actually amazing and help him through these rough times just by being there and laughing with each other. In summary he is aspiring to be a musician and is trying his best in doing that and is trying his best in keeping to his workout routine to make him feel better about himself.

Gaby loves to listen to music, be outside, and be with friends. She was born in California but moved to Utah when she was in the second grade. She loves to laugh and be happy and expressive with everyone. She has made so many friends and continues to make more.

Arfah Sajad is an 8th grader at OJH. This is her second year at Orion, but her first year as a journalist. She has watched over 100 movies and keeps watching more. She hopes to get better at her writing skills. She has written multiple poems and a couple of short stories. She doesn't like anything strawberry-flavored and loves mango. She eats a lot of vegetables and green food. Her goal this year is to have all A´s in her classes and be kind to everyone.

Ryleigh is a student at Orion Junior High School. She is very involved with her community and has lots of leadership roles. She is president of Orion's Latino's in action, and Stage Manager of the school play Oklahoma! She may seem timid at first but once you get to know her she's loud and outgoing. Ryleigh loves frozen yogurt and often walks over after school. She gets the same thing everytime, strawberry, pineapple and sherbet with boba on top and one chocolate brownie piece. Ryleigh also plays one sport, which is volleyball. Seems very generic but she's put all her effort into this sport, and she wouldn't have it any other way. She's on a new elite volleyball team which she loves! Ryleigh is outgoing and loves her friends a lot. She likes to get to know new people that have the same interests as her.

Bostyn Smith is a 9th grader at Orion Jr High, and she is a part of the journalism class where she writes about many different topics. She loves to write new stories and share them with others. She has written many essays, several stories, and poems. She has a lot of writing experience because of her English and creative writing, so she is very educated in writing and enjoys it a lot. 

is a student at Orion Junior High whose only passion for writing comes when she's lying in bed, seconds away from falling asleep. If she can get the idea down into her notes app, chances are she'll forget about it the next day and never come back until she reads it 2 years later and deletes it out of pure confusion of why she would ever write about that in the first place. Lucy wouldn't consider herself a writer, but her friends and family enjoy reading her little stories and poems, which is good enough. When she's not jotting nonsense into her notes app, Lucy loves nerding out over her favorite medias. If you're acquainted with her, you probably know more about what's going on with Conan Gray than her own life. She's quiet most of the time, but with people she enjoys spending time with it's hard to get Lucy to stop rambling. She's at her happiest when she's with her mom, and has an incredibly long list of hobbies and interests.

Daxton Stagge is a journalist for the first time in his life. He has been writing and helping direct some comic books with his friends and himself. He likes watching and reading horror genre novels and movies about true events. He has multiple collections of Lego and cologne. Lego is entertaining for him, and he loves building them. He also likes hanging out with friends and playing video games with his friends. His favorite types of games are strategy and fighting games. He likes making comic books about fiction and sci-fi horror. He makes these books for his friends and family and hopes to be a book publisher or a newspaper comic artist.

Olive Taukiuvea is a 9th grade student at Orion Jr high that loves to write, draw, stay in bed all day, listen to music, and make animations in their head because they are too lazy to pick up a pencil to do so. Olive likes to go by Oliver and is still figuring out their identity after years of thinking. Oliver has created a bunch of stories in his Google Docs and personal notebooks, and mostly writes about horror and sometimes romance if they feel like it. Oliver also started the “X cult” back in 7th grade, which gained over 50 members before dying out slowly. Oliver is currently working on a survival game with their friends (Which they are in the concept stage). Oliver has an obsession with horror, random, and survival games (Such as Five Nights at Freddy's, Poppy Playtime, Forsaken (On roblox), Just Shapes and Beats, Goat Simulator, Mario 64, and Stray), but Oliver has the attention span of a goldfish, so they don't play the games for long. Oliver likes to make things for his friends whenever they get bored. Oliver also likes old technology, like old consoles and VHS. In his free time, Oliver likes to talk to their friends, take long naps, and constantly annoy their friends and family with random Forsaken nonsense all day long.

Jason Tippets is the second youngest in a family of 7. He is a journalist for the first time, and he is an 8th grader at Orion Jr High. He hopes to be good at it and to improve in any way he can. Jason has tried a lot of different literature and is currently writing his first novel. He loves books and his favorite genre is fantasy. He loves playing board games with his family and hanging out with friends. 

Delilah Torres is an avid Pinterest scroller, organizing little silly posts into a web that symbolizes her life. When she's not consuming content from her favorite interests, she's playing her trumpet, soccer, or brainstorming ideas for her next craft. She received honorable mentions in Titans Write for her poem and story, in the same competition, she won 3rd place for her BFG-inspired necklace, and 1st place, along with Kenidee Bill and Maddie Davis, for their Outsiders book trailer. 

Maddie Tropp is a very energetic 8th grader at Orion. This is her first year as a journalist, and she is very excited!! She is not shy at all and loves to make new friends! She loves hanging out with all her friends and eating food like a biggie. Her favorite food is sushi and steak, and her least favorite food is Chinese food.

Katherine Weston is a student at Orion Junior High. She enjoys reading, cooking, and gardening. She’s written many unpublished essays. She currently lives in Pleasantview, Utah. However, she’s lived in Pocatello, Idaho, Arizona, and all over Utah as well. When she’s not reading at home, she’s reading at school. Or making some random combination of ingredients that works somehow. Katherine loves to discover new recipes all the time. She clears her mind by loving her dog. 

Thomas Willoughby is a writer of song lyrics, poems, and even short stories. He loves listening to music while writing. Especially rap and hip hop. He says, "Music gives me ideas and lets my imagination run wild." He is also a fan of the Series of Unfortunate Events books and show by Lemony Snicket. Thomas's writing is a lot like Lemony's writing because he is an inspiration for his writing. His favorite color is purple, which serves no purpose for his books, but just something you ought to know.  If he is not with his friends or family, he is down in his room, writing music or being an author while listening to his top 10 favorite songs on repeat.  One of Thomas's hobbies is cooking. In fact, he wants to be a cook or an author when he grows up. Maybe even both.

Korver is a very handsome and athletic 8th grader. His grades have been good for every quarter. He likes to play soccer, and he loves Red Dead Redemption 2, and he loves playing fortnite various other video games. He loves gym class because he likes most sports.  His favorite food is steak. Korver loves food, and he can eat a lot. His favorite dessert is Ice cream with brownies. His favorite place to eat is Spaghetti Factory, and he orders spaghetti, and he really loves the bread and salad there, too. This is Korver Wilson's first time trying to do journalism, and he is in the 8th grade.