Today he’s a high school junior, but when school ends in two weeks Alfonso Flores heads for his senior year at Palmetto Senior High.
This year, Flores was sports editor of the yearbook. Because of his position on the yearbook staff, he went to New York for the Columbia Scholastic Press Association Conference. There, the 2013 Palmetto yearbook won a Silver Crown.
“From a thousand books, only 100 books are selected for a gold or silver crown,” Flores says.
“I think we have another shot at getting another crown (for this year’s book).”
He says he had a great time in New York.
“When I went to the conference, I really enjoyed sports broadcasting,” he says. “I went to one of the classes and it was sports broadcasting and I fell love with it. You have to be in love with sports. Ever since I was little, it was my favorite. I love watching them. I keep up with statistics.”
Next school year, Flores is giving up covering sports to be copy editor. While he loves it, yearbook takes a lot of his time.
“We’ll eat our lunch in class. Every Tuesday and Thursday we put in a good three hours after school,” he says. “On Thursday, typically a deadline is assigned on Friday. Sometimes we’ll have to stay until 7:30 or 8 p.m. to meet those deadlines.”
Because it’s connected to journalism for both yearbook and the newspaper, Flores is working on bringing back the journalism honor society as a club at Palmetto. He has spoken to the activities director about Quill and Scroll and hopes to receive approval over the summer to bring the club back into action.
“Through the club I hope to encourage journalism and get students to join either yearbook or the newspaper,” he says.
This summer, while he waits to get back to work on the yearbook, he will attend the Student Journalism Program (SJI) at the University of Florida for six days.
Participating in that program will help him achieve his goal of getting a degree in journalism and business so he can eventually go into law. He plans on going to college in Florida – possibly the University of Florida or Florida State – and then going to law school out of state. The top of his graduate school short list is the University of Norte Dame. Law is something that is a family interest.
“My sister is in law school at De Paul University,” he says.“My oldest brother graduated from law school at Norte Dame.”
Another brother is at UF. He says his siblings have deeply impacted him and influenced where he wants to attend college.
Flores is a member of the English Honor Society. He has been on the Student Council cabinet as historian. He hopes to remain on Student Council in a senate position next year.
This year, Flores took three Advanced Placement classes — English, U.S. History and Psychology. He says he loves AP English.
“With AP English, there is no wrong answer,” he says. “You make it how you want it to be.
There is no right or wrong answer. It’s how you formulate it. And how it’s developed.”
Flores also enjoys writing non-fiction.
— By Linda Rodriguez Bernfeld
