Ella Bilu
Ella Bilu, of Westridge School in Pasadena, California, can trace her love of journalism to childhood, where she was always asking questions to satisfy her curiosity.
Bilu joined the journalism program in seventh grade, and has contributed to many areas of the newspaper since.
“I’ve always been quite ambitious, and I just tried to publish as many articles as I could,” Bilu said. “I love sharing my own opinion, so I wrote plenty of opinion pieces. I’m a big sports girl, so I’ve covered a lot of athletics. I have my own column about women in sports. And then, of course, I do that basic news, and I’ll do features too.”
Her favorite pieces to write are opinion articles because it is “cool to be able to share your voice and then hear feedback about it and potentially make real changes,” she said.
One example of Bilu’s journalism making a change for her community came after the Los Angeles fires in January, Bilu said.
“We were dissatisfied with how our administration responded to kind of a once in a lifetime event for our community. We thought they could have stepped up more,” Bilu said.
She was involved in the writing of an editorial on the topic as a call to their school’s leadership. Bilu said she was able to sit with school administrators and have a productive conversation about what steps to take moving forward.
“Being able to write these stories and set off to answer questions that I’ve always had, that I know other members of my community have, is kind of why I keep doing it,” Bilu said. “I don’t like not being in the know. I want everyone else around me to be educated too.”
Bilu will be attending Duke University to study journalism, media studies and public policy.
Emilie Driscoll
When Emilie Driscoll, of Lakeridge High School in Lake Oswego, Oregon, was a freshman, her school paper had just six students on it. Now, The Lakeridge Newspacer has grown to 20 students.
“The fact that it gets to continue on with a whole slew of editors after I leave is something I’m really, really proud of,” Driscoll said.
During her junior and senior years, Driscoll served as the content editor-in-chief of the paper. In addition to focusing on content production, Driscoll said she made a point to mentor new students and help build the paper, especially in light of budget cuts that shuttered the intro to journalism class.
“Growing a program and being able to see it really come to life just made me so proud,” Driscoll said. “Being able to put out a product that the students around us really enjoyed that was something that was one of my main goals, to have more student engagement with our paper and really become more visible. And I think we did that really successfully.”
Outside of The Lakeridge Newspacer, Driscoll also writes for the Oregonian’s Youth Voices program. She has published a variety of articles in the Oregonian, but the article she is most proud of covered student counselor shortages and the mental health crisis.
“It was just such a unique experience, especially because I got to talk to so many counselors from a really personal point of view,” Driscoll said. “I think it was also the story that really pushed me the most, because getting students who you don’t know to open up to is really, really difficult.”
Driscoll is headed to Boston University next fall to study journalism and advertising and said she is excited to take advantage of the wide array of opportunities the school has to offer. Driscoll was also a member of the Quill & Scroll Student Advisory Board.
Lillian Gray
Lillian Gray, of McCallum High School in Austin, Texas, was drawn to journalism because she knows “what it feels like to be the person who gets covered and who gets their story told.”
“The niche that drew me to join journalism is just wanting to make other people feel that way,” Gray said. “I wanted to make other people feel like they’re seen and like their stories are being told.”
This year Gray was a staff reporter for The Shield where she has covered a wide variety of topics including holiday celebrations, political speeches and city events.
“I just wanted to keep pushing myself, but at the same time, really push myself to tell more stories,” Gray said. “I really like covering the impact of political decisions, what politicians say, or things like that.”
Gray’s passion for storytelling translated into a series of stories about immigration, focused on students who have moved from other countries. She reported seven stories as a part of this project.
“My favorite thing is just to cover stories that aren’t usually told and to shine light on people who might be falsely shown in the media or in the political atmosphere,” Gray said.
In leaving behind high school journalism, Gray says she will miss reporting in such a small community where she has a handle on all the events and happenings.
“It was really fun to just get to know so much of the school,” Gray said.
Gray is off to University of Maryland-College Park where she will study journalism. She is looking forward to meeting new professors and getting involved in student media.
About the Scholarship
National winners in Quill and Scroll contests – such as the Yearbook Excellence Contest or the International Writing, Photography and Multimedia Contest and the Eye on Ivy Editorial Writing Contest – are eligible as seniors to apply for Quill and Scroll scholarships: the Edward J. Nell Memorial, or the George and Ophelia Gallup awards. The Richard P. Johns award is available to all Quill and Scroll seniors, including those who did not enter contests. The scholarships are awarded for the freshman year only and can be paid in two installments.
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