Editor's note: Spreeha Debchaudhury will be a senior at La Jolla High School this year. She was selected by the Junior Statesman Foundation to attend the Democratic Convention and will be posting reports from Denver on our Web site at www.lajollalight.com.
By Spreeha Dechaudhury
There comes a point in your life when you notice that your family discusses politics on an average weekend when most other families in your neighborhood are chatting about the latest pop sensations or sports stars. And at that point, one might wonder why she is discussing alternative energy solutions with her parents instead of such "normal" things as her friends might discuss with their parents at the dinner table.
But then there comes another point when you realize that talking politics has become normal for you, and other topics are what are unusual. As a 16-year-old soon-to-be high school senior, both of those points have come and gone for me. My name is Spreeha Debchaudhury, and I attend La Jolla High School. One more year until graduation!
Before I get into the high-stress of college applications, visits, and the inevitable headache of decisions, I've decided to make use of my fascination with politics by attending a crucial element of our electoral system: the Democratic National Convention in Denver. I wanted to attend the Republican one in St. Paul too, but sadly, it takes place during my first week of school, and I'm already in hot water because I'll miss school registration when I go to the convention.
I came to know of the Junior Statesmen Foundation's (part of the Junior State of America program) symposium on the convention last year when I got a letter from the organization inviting me to participate. I came to know more of the details about the U.S. electoral system and how it has evolved from the dawn of our nation in Advanced Placement United States History and leaped at the opportunity to be part of history in the making. I applied to the program, citing my long-held fascination with politics, strong academic record, and leadership roles taken in my personal essay, and was accepted.
Jeff Dunn, director of the symposium, invited us to take the opportunity to contact our local news media to be student correspondents and report on events in Denver. This was almost the perfect opportunity for me! I love writing. I've written several short stories in the past, as well as a multitude of poems, and one of my favorite things to do in my spare time is role play on the Internet.
Roleplaying involves creating your own character (or characters) and essentially writing a story with someone else by interacting with the characters they have created. Thoughts, feelings, and actions are all described in this interaction, and it really is a great writing exercise. So, you can imagine my excitement when I e-mailed the editors of the La Jolla Light asking to be a student correspondent for the newspaper, and was responded to enthusiastically.
So here I am, student correspondent for the La Jolla Light. That's all for now. I'll be back - next time at the convention floor.
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