Nicholas Lee Harrington, 18, is Granite Hills High School’s valedictorian for 2005. 
     Born in San Diego, Harrington has spent his life in the Alpine area. He attended Alpine Elementary and Joan MacQueen Middle School.
     Harrington will graduate with a 4.79 grade point average. His honors courses included AP biology and calculus, and International Baccalaureate Spanish. Harrington’s favorite subjects while in school were calculus and physics because, he said, "you get an answer and that’s the answer."
     Outside of class, Harrington was active in Destination Imagination, a creative problem-solving group. He also participated in Key Club, the youth equivalent of Kiwanis.
     While Harrington says he has had many memorable teachers, among the most memorable was Curtis McKenzie, his physics teacher at Granite Hills. McKenzie is also the Destination Imagination coordinator.
     Harrington will leave in August to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass. He is unsure what he will study, but says he is leaning toward brain and cognitive sciences.
     His parents are Daniel and Gloria Harrington.

Jonathan Carmody

     Jonathan Fergus Carmody, 18, is Steele Canyon High School’s valedictorian for 2005.
     Born in La Mesa, Carmody has spent his whole life in the Alpine area. He attended Boulder Oaks Elementary and Joan MacQueen Middle School.
     Carmody will graduate with a 4.77 grade point average. His favorite subject is history, but he said his strongest is math. Says Carmody, “If there was an honors (class) offered, I took it.”
     Carmody took every honors course offered at Steele Canyon.
     Outside of class, he was active in the Academic League and was a medallist in the Academic Decathalon.
     He is also a National Merit Scholar. In sixth grade, according to his mother, Leslie Carmody, he was the youngest student to take the Golden State Exam, on which he received high honors.
     Carmody has worked for Innfinity, an Alpine-based software company, since he was 15. In his spare time, Carmody volunteers at the Alpine Community Center, helping with their computers.
     He said his  most influential teachers were Mrs. Garza, his fifth-grade teacher, and Kay Cunningham, who tutored him in extra algebra classes he took in fourth grade.
     Carmody has been accepted to Harvey Mudd College in  Claremont, Calif. He plans on studying computer science and math.
     His parents are John and Leslie Carmody.

Kourtney Reynolds

     Kourtney Reynolds, 17, is one of four Mountain Empire Senior High valedictorians for 2005.
     Reynolds was born in San Diego. She began her elementary education at Pepper Drive Elementary in El Cajon, and moved to Pine Valley Elementary in fourth grade. She attended Mountain Empire Junior High.
     She is graduating with a 4.23 GPA. For honors courses, Reynolds took AP calculus, statistics, history, English and biology. The sciences were her strongest subjects, she said, and she plans on being a doctor of medicine after college.
     Reynolds will leave in August for Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y., where, she said, she plans to study biology.
     While in school, Reynolds participated in many extracurricular activities. She has been involved with the Associated Student Body for four years, the Renaissance program, Pep Club, Key Club and the Honor Society. She has also been in 4-H since she was in third grade. In addition to academic activities, Reynolds has also been very active in sports. She has played basketball, volleyball and softball at school, and plays soccer with AYSO.
     Reynolds said her most influential teachers have been Mari Mann, the ASB coordinator, and LizAnn Parker, her math teacher.
     Her parents are Greg and Betsy Reynolds.

Soroya Rowley

     Soroya Telitha Rowley is one of four valedictorians at MEHS for 2005.
     Rowley spent a good portion of her high school career on stage. She has been active in the drama club for five years, and served as its president during her senior year. Her plays include The Wizard of Oz, Kiss me Kate and Cinderella.
     Rowley has also been in the Choir Club for four years, Key Club for two years, pep club for one year, and has served on the yearbook staff for three years. She has served as president of the Choir Club, vice president of the Key Club, and photography editor for the yearbook. She was also the ASB representative for Erebus, the student art book drafting club, for one year.
     Outside of academics, Rowley said, she played junior varsity basketball during the 2003-2004 season, varsity basketball in her senior year, and ran varsity track for two years. She has also worked at Coldstone Creamery in Alpine since 2003.
     Rowley said she will be attending the University of San Diego to major in the theater business: acting, directing, producing and costuming."
     "Then one day," Rowley said, "maybe teach the art of theater to young people."

Paula Schanes

     Paula Schanes is one of four valedictorians at MEHS for 2005.
     While in school, Schanes has been active in the Honor Society, the Renaissance club, key club, and drama. Outside of academics, Schanes also participated in cross country and track and field.
     She will attend Humboldt State University in Arcata, Calif.  She will study to become a writer, she said.








Sheldon Anderson

     Sheldon Anderson is one of four valedictorians at MEHS for 2005.
     While in school, Anderson was active in the Renaissance Club, Erebus, the Honor Society, the Associated Student Body his freshman year, and served on the yearbook staff for three years. He was the underclassmen editor in tenth grade, the co-editor his junior year, and editor his senior year.
     Outside of academics, Anderson played football all four years, three of which he played varsity. He spent half of the baseball season his senior year playing varsity.
     Anderson said he plans to attend Cuyamaca College in El Cajon, where he will work on his general education. Then he plans on transferring to UCSD to study archaeology and history. He said he may consider getting a Master’s degree after that.
     He said he would also like to attend Oxford University to earn his doctorate in archaeology, but would be satisfied with a bachelor’s degree in history and psychology.
    "Then I want to buy an island and put a castle on it," he said. "If I can’t buy an island then I want to live in a rural, natural place anywhere but the United States."