![Broadcast, yearbook and newspaper combined for 66 Interscholastic League Press Conference awards this year. Yearbook won 43, newspaper won 14 and broadcast took home nine. “I think [the ILPC awards] are a great way to give the kids some acknowledgement for all of their hard work,” newspaper and yearbook adviser Paige Hert said. “They typically spend the year covering everyone else’s big moments, so it’s really cool for them to be celebrated so many times and in so many different ways.”](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/05/edited-ILPC.jpg)
![Looking down at his racket, junior Hasun Nguyen hits the green tennis ball. Hasun has played tennis since he was 9 years old, and he is on the varsity team. "I feel like it’s not really appreciated in America as much, but [tennis] is a really competitive and mentally challenging sport,” Nguyen said. “I’m really level-headed and can keep my cool during a match, and that helps me play a bit better under pressure.” Photo by Kyra Cox](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/hasun.jpg)
![Bringing her arm over her head and taking a quick breath, junior Lauren Lucas swims the final laps of the 500 freestyle at the regionals swimming competition on date. Lucas broke the school’s 18-year-old record for the 500 freestyle at regionals and again at state with a time of 4:58.63. “I’d had my eye on that 500 record since my freshman year, so I was really excited to see if I could get it at regionals or districts,” Lucas said. “ State is always a really fun experience and medaling for the first time was really great. It was a very very tight race, [so] I was a bit surprised [that I medaled]. [There were] a lot of fast girls at the meet in general, [and] it was like a dogfight back and forth, back and forth.” Photo by Kaydence Wilkinson](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/Kaydence-2.7-23-edit-2.jpg)
![As her hair blows in the wind, senior Brianna Grandow runs the varsity girls 5K at the cross country district meet last Thursday. Grandow finished fourth in the event and led the varsity girls to regionals with a third place placement as a team. “I’m very excited [to go to regionals],” Grandow said. “I’m excited to race in Corpus Christi, and we get to go to the beach, so that’s really awesome.” Photo by Addison Bruce](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/brianna.jpg)
Senior Spotlight: Kendall Smith
Kendall Smith has Big Goals Set for the Future
May 3, 2018
With a passion for kickboxing, writing and serving others, senior Kendall Smith has her eyes on a few prizes.
Smith is in three AP classes, NHS, NEHS, Rho Kappa, Mu Alpha Theta, Environmental Club, Key Club, Poetry club and has a part time job at Panera. On top of this, she finds 30 minutes six days a week for kickboxing.
Her kickboxing hobby started a few months ago after she quit track and was looking for a new way to stay active.
“I really enjoy it,” Smith said. “It’s nice because I wanted to get back into the routine of working out and having an incentive [to do so].”
Smith said that trying something new was her biggest obstacle.
“When I started out, I was really nervous because I get a lot of anxiety over trying new things by myself,” Smith said. “I was trying to get some of my friends to come with me, but then they had stuff to do, so I just went by myself. It was really awkward, but the trainer is really cool and it kicks my butt everyday.”
Next year, Smith plans to attend Texas State, which does not offer kickboxing.
“I’m just going to have to figure out how to make myself do that everyday,” Smith said. “Texas State has a pretty cool workout facility and they have a boxing area with bags and stuff so I might do [kickboxing] there.”
At Texas State, Smith plans to double major in Wildlife Biology and Journalism with a minor in German. Over the summer, she wants to get an internship at one of the Texas State parks, or something related to environmental sciences, in order to get field work.
“I want to do environmental journalism, if that’s a thing,” Smith said. “Ultimately, I want to be a journalist for National Geographic, which is super in the future and it’s really competitive, but I want to try that.”
Smith is also involved in her church community at Hill Country Bible Church. She participates in Great Adventure, which is a mix of mission trips, Boot Camp and Backyard Bible Club. This is all to help prepare people to spread the gospel in a simple and understandable way. She said that she hopes to continue doing it in the future.
“After my first year in college I’m going to try to intern with the whole Great Adventure deal,” Smith said. “I think it’s pretty cool and I feel like I can do it all right.”
After college, Smith said that she plans to take a few years off.
In this time, she said that she wishes to join the Peace Corps and do a nine month mission trip called The World Race, which would bring her to 11 different countries.
“I feel like the World Race and Peace Corps will help me build my resume and gain experience to appeal to potential employers,” Smith said. “More importantly [it will] better the lives of people in impoverished countries and empower them with my knowledge so they can continue to help others. Also, I feel like the journalism aspect would help me go tell the stories of the people I meet through these experiences, which will hopefully motivate other people to go and better the world in their own way.”
![The fire department came to the school after students were evacuated when smoke started coming from the ceiling of a classroom. All students and staff are safe. “All of my friends left their stuff too, so we couldn’t contact our parents, and it was stressful,” senior Brynn Fowler said. “It was scary because I didn’t know [what was going on], and I couldn’t find anyone because it was a big crowd.” Photo by Anthony Garcia](https://cphswolfpack.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/09/firetruck-300x200.jpg)
