🗞️Staff Stories🗞️

Mrs. April Meyer is the Navigator’s amazing teacher advisor. For most years of the Navigator’s existence, she has been guiding staff after staff towards being the best student newspaper possible. This trend continued this year as she provided amazing feedback on articles, led our semi-weekly calls, helped each staff member in a unique way, and taught the NAVI280 Live course.

Dear high school, I've put off writing this letter until the last possible moment (it’s due in an hour) because it means saying goodbye to you. 

Dear readers. When I was twelve years old, I wanted to be a Catholic nun–not because I was Catholic (I wasn’t), or because I had any idea what life in the convent required (I didn’t). Actually, my new career aspirations stemmed from watching The Sound of Music and reading about Christian saints.

Life is filled with unknowns from the day we are born until the day we die.  It is a simple truth of life.  However, you can have one of two perspectives on these unknowns, and the perspective you choose makes a huge difference in your life.  The question every person must answer is, do you run into the unknown or stay back and wait for it to come to you?

It’s time to move on, and it is hard for me to believe. The past four to five years have been a whirlwind with many highs but also many lows. Time works strangely: a moment can feel like an eternity, but a lifetime in the blink of an eye. It doesn’t make sense to me, and maybe it shouldn’t. I think if anything, it is simply a good reminder to make the most of the seasons that God has placed us in.

As the clock ticks closer and closer to graduation, a mix of emotions swirls through my head. I’m excited for the new adventures to come in college, but I’m also nervous to leave because NSA has been the most supportive community I know.

I never knew I would join NorthStar Academy, and in fact, I never knew online school was an option. I never knew that this event in life would lead me to one of the sweetest communities I have ever seen. In the grand year of 2020, when the whole earth shut down, I was presented with the opportunity of learning in this new format. Six years later, and I have had one of the roughest senior years I’ve ever heard of. 

I’m often asked the question, “Where are you from?” Well, the short answer is this: I was born in Texas. My mom is from Tennessee and my dad is from Mississippi. Not so crazy, right? Plot twist. My citizenship is American, although I would not say I am fully from there.

One thing about me is that I have always loved writing. From a young age, I have loved telling stories through writing. It has always been my favorite school activity! Needless to say, this class caught my eye during freshman year, and I took the course for the first time in tenth grade. I instantly fell in love with all aspects of the NAV.

As this school year draws to a close for the Navigator, the completion feels different, very, very different. Out of my ten staff members, eight of them are graduating seniors: Zoe, Brooklyn, Keziah, Jared, Alex, Avery, Jonah, and Onyi. Truthfully, I don’t know how to say goodbye to this many seniors.

Alex M. is a senior here at NSA, who resides near Atlanta, Georgia with his family. His whole family is from the American South, and he loves a good homemade mac and cheese! Some of his hobbies include making songs with Suno AI, playing video games, and just chatting with friends. A fun fact about Alex is that he is very tall in real life but hates heights.

Students shooting each other dirty looks, parents talking to the hotel to mess with another contestant’s alarms, and interviews where interviewers kick out students one by one, until only one remains standing – this is what you may expect when I say “Scholarship Hunger Games,” but as you will soon find out, that is not always the case. 

NSA is home to many amazing seniors. These students have put in a tremendous amount of effort and are preparing to enter a new phase of their lives. As they reflect over the past years, the things they have accomplished, the lessons they have learned, and the people they have met, they can take all of these things and look forward to turning over a new page in life. Onyi U. is a prime example of one of these seniors. 

Summer can be a fun time of relaxing, traveling, and meeting with friends and family. How did the Navigator staff enjoy the season?

Hello My Name’s Onyi. No. No. No. Scratch that out and start again. Separate Hello and My with a period, put Name in lowercase, and avoid contractions in formal writing. Hello. My name is Onyi. That looks better.

Standing aboard the Navigator, I see land off in the distance. I sailed with the Navigator for the past three years, and it has been a voyage full of ups and downs. Beside me stands our captain. He also has sailed with the Nav for the past three years. Looking through my binoculars, I can see the new recruits standing at the port. Seeing them standing there nervous and shuffling their feet reminds me of the first time I met the crew aboard the Navigator.

If you had told me 6 years ago I would be doing online school, I probably would have looked at you and laughed. The idea was so surreal in my head that I would have recommended you go to some sort of psychiatrist. Yet here I am, in my third year here at NSA, planning on graduating next year!

I never knew I was going to join NorthStar Academy, and in fact, I never knew online school was an option. I never knew that this event in life would lead me to one of the sweetest communities I have ever seen. In the grand year of 2020, when all earth shut down, I was presented with the opportunity of learning in this new format.

Africa is a vast, diverse continent where some of the most fascinating countries, regions, individuals, and creatures live. Among the latter am I, who has lived in East Africa for most of his life, primarily in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Mrs. April Meyer is the Navigator’s amazing teacher advisor. For most years of the Navigator’s existence, she has been guiding staff after staff towards being the best student newspaper possible.

When COVID-19 struck, questions about the security of my dad’s job arose as his company began letting employees go.  When he was offered a job in Mississippi near our family, we decided it would be best to move.  In the thick of the pandemic, we left our Florida home to join them.  At the time, I was homeschooled.  I never dreamed that I would discover NorthStar in the years after the move.

Going through life requires a lot of tools for you to be successful.  You need to have perseverance when times get tough and patience when life slows down.  I believe that NorthStar Academy and more specifically the NorthStar Navigator has helped me build up this “Life Toolbox” by helping me acquire or sharpen four major tools: teamwork, patience, perseverance, and time management.

On August 29, 2022, I started my first classes at NorthStar. Since then, I have learned more than I could have ever imagined.

My first year at the Navigator was the 2023-2024 school year. While I have come to really enjoy being here on staff, I was, at first, very hesitant to join.

NorthStar Academy’s student council elections are now open, and the time to vote is just around the corner. Who will be the next student council president? vice president? Well, only time will tell, but for now let's introduce some of the students that are running, and what position they are running for.

When I started at NSA, the last thing I expected was for it to give me the opportunity to pursue professional ballet. Originally, I started attending NorthStar because my family did not like our public schools. We chose NorthStar because of its flexibility, Christian worldview, and academic rigor.

I’m sure we can all agree that life after COVID-19 is drastically different from life before it. For me, one of the main things that changed was my school. I attended a private English-speaking school in India until the end of eighth grade, but the school had trouble functioning when it went online. My family began travelling more, and I was about to start high school. It seemed like time for a change. By that point it was an easy choice for me and my siblings: we needed to switch schools.

Just like a captain steers and guides their ship, so also does the editor-in-chief lead the Navigator. Since 2019, the Navigator has had four different editors-in-chief. Whether they served for one or three years,  each has left their mark in distinct ways and brought change to the Nav for the better.

The Navigator staff brings you memes about life at NSA and here at the Navigator. (Mrs. Meyer has not created a meme as she does not really understand them, even though people try to explain them to her, but that doesn’t help.) We thought it would be fun to do something new and have memes in this publication. Enjoy!