Molly McEwan has a dream, one she fully intends on seeing come to fruition.
She’s standing at the top of a mountain, camera in hand, to take a picture of the clouds below.
“Something you’d see in a National Geographic,” the Marmaton Valley High School senior explains. “When people see those pictures, they don’t always realize somebody had to be there to take them.”
McEwan will take her love of photography to Kansas State University in the fall, where she plans to double major in photography and business.
But for now, the 17-year-old will settle for being at the top of the proverbial academic mountain, where she will be named Marmaton Valley Class of 2012’s valedictorian during senior commencement ceremonies Saturday.
“It’s weird how time flies,” McEwan said this week. “Freshman year seemed to take forever. Sophomore year wasn’t too bad, and our junior year was even quicker. But our senior year just flew by.”
McEwan, daughter of Mike and Kathy McEwan of Moran, maintained her sterling academic credentials through a mixture of hard work, organization and more than a dash of common sense.
And she’s done so with a schedule crammed with extracurricular activities, enrolling in honors courses at Marmaton Valley and dual-credit courses at Allen Community College and holding down two part-time jobs.
Such an endeavor is something of a family tradition, she explains. McEwan’s older brother, Robert, a junior at KSU, also was an honors student at Marmaton Valley.
Mike McEwan, meanwhile, teaches social science courses at Marmaton Valley. Kathy McEwan is family and consumer sciences agent for the Southwind Extension District in Allen County, a position that also deals heavily in educating the public.
“It’s not like they pushed us and told us we had to get all A’s, but it’s not like they had nothing to do with our classroom success,” Molly said of her parents. “It was sort of implied.”
The classroom success can be attributed in part to McEwan’s ability to organize her time wisely.
“There wasn’t a lot of sacrifice,” she said. “It came fairly easily. When I had homework to do, I did it. When I had to go to work, I went.”
McEwan works two days a week at Sterling Six Cinemas, and babysits at the start and conclusion of each day for a neighboring family.
ALONG WITH her hectic schedule, McEwan has her photography.
