Tonganoxie High School seniors serving as Mirror interns
The Mirror has two Tonganoxie High School students serving as interns this school year.
Emma DeMaranville and Ben Lanza, both seniors at THS, are serving as interns for the spring semester.
The seniors are assisting editor Shawn F. Linenberger with various stories, briefs and other duties. They also will be writing blogs that will appear in the coming weeks at tonganoxiemirror.com.
Emma DeMaranville
DeMaranville is heavily involved in Family, Career and Community Leaders of America. The THS senior also is or has been involved in Girl Scouts, Future Business Leaders of America, THS Chieftain Stars dance team, Student Council, soccer, Students Against Destructive Decisions, Foreign Language Club, forensics, debate and girls letter club.
She also was named THS homecoming queen in the fall and is a current class member in the Southern Leavenworth County Leadership Development Class.
DeMaranville was named a Leavenworth-Jefferson Electric Cooperative youth trip winner. As part of her trip this past summer, she toured the Kansas State Capitol in Topeka and the Wolf Creek Power Plant in Burlington before heading to Washington, D.C., where she met with several elected officials and toured the Capitol and other landmarks there. She joined more than 1,500 youth from other electric cooperatives nationwide to learn more about the U.S. government and how it functions.
Earlier this month, she visited New Orleans to attend a youth leadership council in conjunction with the LJEC trip.
In the fall, DeMaranville plans to attend Kansas State University and major in political/legal communications.
“I wanted to do the internship because it was not only a great opportunity to be involved in the community, but also to help me prepare for what I would like to do with my future,” DeMaranville said about The Mirror internship.
Ben Lanza
Lanza is a senior in his final semester at Tonganoxie High School.
A basketball manager for the Tonganoxie High boys basketball team, Lanza also is on the THS golf team.
Originally from Mamaroneck, N.Y., Lanza moved to Tonganoxie the start of his freshman year.
He’s a diehard fan of the New York Giants in football, the Knicks in basketball and Yankees in baseball, but has grown to love the hometown Royals and Chiefs. He also likes to watch Kansas sports teams, specifically Kansas University and Kansas State University basketball.
Lanza is leaning toward K-State as his college of choice and dietetics as his planned major. He hopes to eventually become a nutritionalist.
In his free time, Lanza likes to work out in the weight room and play pickup basketball. His favorite television shows are anything that appears on ESPN or Comedy Central.
That appreciation for ESPN helped him gravitate toward his current internship.
“What made me want to serve as an intern at The Mirror is the chance to showcase my knowledge of sports through writing, which, I believe, is one of my talents.”