In her third year as McKinley’s newspaper adviser, English teacher Cynthia Reves openly discussed her feelings and experiences with her new Pinion staff. During the interview with her students, Reves talked about how she got her position as the adviser.

“Journalism was my major in college, so I wanted it,” she said.

When asked how her passion for teaching and writing began, Reves told her students about how she was always an avid reader, and that she always wanted to be a writer. As a little girl, she used to write short stories with her friends, print them out, and gave them to her parents to read. She later graduated from Arkansas State University, and became a teacher at McKinley High School. When she eventually became the adviser for the Pinion, it was difficult in some ways. Especially meeting deadlines. However, Reves said she had two very memorable experiences.

The first one was when the paper was put out in her first year of teaching. Her staff at the time had very little knowledge about what they were doing, but they learned together.

The second experience was when they got to go to a press conference of Soul Surfer, and met Bethany Hamilton, a famous local girl who lost an arm to a shark bite.

“I’m excited,” Reves said about this year.

She hopes that her new staff members will learn more about journalism, and feel proud about what they put in the paper. Furthermore, she hopes that the students and faculty submit stories to the Pinion so that it will be a voice for all students.

An advice she gave to this year’s new staff was to “Do work you’re proud of.”

She expects this year will be different as it has been each past year.