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A First Response - Junior Thesis

Article by Janine Alven

Video by Lucas Miller



Every year at Minarets High School, the entire junior class completes a junior thesis project. The topics of these projects vary and are chosen by the juniors themselves. English teacher Micheal Vaughan assigns the project and keeps the juniors on track.


ASB Treasurer, junior Katelynn Mangan chose to do her junior thesis on first responders. With that, she also opted to do a project alongside her paper. For the project portion, Mangan chose to collect donations to be able to give first responders a gift basket or something similar.


Everyone has something that motivates them and Mangan shared what motivated her to do the project.


“My mom was a first responder and she’s a really big part of my life, I also have friends whose parents are also first responders and they’ve always been there to help me so I wanted to give back so that they feel important and well taken care of" said Mangan.


Mangan has also been personally affected by first responders.


“My mom was a firefighter for several years and she always made sure if she was going to a fire she always made sure that I was well taken care of, and she always made the fire department feel like my home" shared Mangan.


First responders are the people who immediately respond to any accident or emergency. While California is known for having a fire season, the local areas surrounding Minarets are frequently at risk, with fires like the Creek Fire in 2020, which canceled school at minarets for a week during distance learning. Everyone in the mountain community has encountered or heard of the acts of these first responders.


Mangan expects to start the fund-raising project soon and it will be exciting to see what she accomplishes.


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