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Every student at Heritage has his or her own past. But for some of us, our past is what makes us who we are today, and no one knows better than Tyler Kelley, whose senior project is focused around attitude. For Tyler, attitude is what affects life the most, and to reverse the effects of his negative life experiences, he strives to maintain a positive attitude. “I could have been one of those kids that was always in depression and said ‘woe is me’ all the time. But I know that I wouldn’t have all the friends that I do now.”

            The first twelve years of Tyler’s life were filled with negative experiences; “But it prepared me for life… If someone went through an abusive or neglectful situation, they would have a better perspective on how things are.” His attitude during those times was what kept him grounded in his own despair, until “I realized positive was the better way to go.” Currently, he is famous for performing comical and random accomplishments, from playing guitar with strangers in a coffee shop to singing Irish songs in A Capella. “I try to have a positive, happy attitude. Things could be worse and I should be happy with what I have.”

            Because of his understanding of how attitude affected his own life, Tyler has committed his senior project to the effects of attitude on people. He visits classrooms as a guest speaker to present the psychological impacts of adapting positive and negative attitudes, including examples from his life story along with pre-recorded student and teacher interviews. Not only are his presentations informative, they give the audience a better understanding of just how powerful emotions can be. Some audiences have even felt faint during his description of the abuse he went through.

            Tyler says that the best kind of attitude that a person should have is “A moderately positive one, where they can understand that bad could happen, but it’s not what they should focus on.” If people can realize how important attitude is, it can change their lives for the better.  Changing his attitude from negative to positive made Tyler Kelley the person who he is today, and his triumph is in defying the odds by overcoming his past.

“…All the times people told me I couldn’t do something… I just had to say ‘You’re Wrong’.”

-Tyler Kelley (senior)

Juniors and seniors were led out to the track for a mystery assembly on Wednesday, October 5. It turned out to be a presentation called “Stopping Kids Intoxicated Driving” (SKID) Seniors Michael Youngs, Hannah Terry, and Fletcher Stenlund orchestrated the event for their senior project.
The program is a live action role play on what can potentially happen when teenagers are in a car accident due to drunk driving. The stage was set with two vehicles covered with tarps and over the speakers sounds of students talking about their future and then switching to a party where students were drinking alcohol and decided to leave in a car. Drunk driver played by Michael Youngs stated “I drive better drunk anyways,” so he chose to drive. Senior Zach Hall only drank soda at the party so he was making the right choice and ended up as the front seat passenger. Hall forgot to put his seatbelt on, over the speaker came the sounds of a head on collision with another car full of Heritage High school Students. When the tarps were unveiled three kids in the car who had been coming home from the party suffered minor injuries but Hall in the passenger seat of the other car was thrown through the windshield and died instantly.

The reason for the SKID program is for students to witness what can happen when you ride in a car when someone gets behind the wheel after drinking alcohol. Teens may think that drinking at the time of the incident is fun but there can be deadly outcomes. Then you will wish you never drank, or even got in the driver seat of the car when before you know it you’re no longer breathing. Then the paramedics come to your home and aware your parents of what happened to you. The SKID program is a great deal for high school students so they won’t be like Zach Hall who was killed by a drunk driver. Hannah Terry says; “If we saved one persons life we were successful. We felt that if we impacted one person then it was worth it hopefully more were impacted by the presentation we felt good about education the students and making a difference,” said Terry.

People thought that the paramedics pushed Sarah Johanson out the other side of the helicopter and she just got out of the other side, but that wouldn’t even be possible because she was strapped to a stretcher. Yes she was actually taken away in the helicopter. They took her to Southwest Hospital so Johanson can get the full experience of what happens. Sarah says; “I didn’t get to see out the window because I was strapped down the whole time, but it was exciting. I don’t know how to describe it besides that.”
Now the students of Heritage will think twice about getting into the car while drinking and driving, after witnessing the horrifying consequences from the SKID presentation.

-Written by Amanda Holloway