Alyssa Anglin never took her eyes off the prize ever since freshman seminar class four years ago. Anglin has achieved her goal and earned the highest title of Valedictorian. Throughout her four years at Bishop Noll Institute she has taken the hardest classes she could, while also participating in after school activities. Alyssa is the third in line of Anglins to be Valedictorians from Bishop Noll, following her mother and her brother Nick Anglin. This aspect helped push her to her goal as her family constantly supported her.
“I honestly didn’t really expect to be Valedictorian; while I have worked hard throughout high school, I didn’t know who else was up for it, and I didn’t know what their GPAs were, so I wasn’t sure where I was in the order. I haven’t seen my rank in the class since my sophomore year, the year before they decided to stop showing it on your transcript. I knew I was up high in the rankings then, so I took the hardest classes I could and worked to get good grades in everything, but I still didn’t know if it was enough,” said Anglin.
Anglin participated in many after school activities, which made it very difficult to maintain her goal such as, golf, band, theatre, and campus ministry. She took many ACP, AP, DC and honor classes, which made it very difficult to maintain the high grades to earn the Valedictorian title and was even part of the Journoll staff in her high school career. Though many of the classes were challenging for her, she always excelled in English, History, and Theology classes because she enjoyed them so much. Anglin said that English was easy for her and fun at the same time because she is such an avid reader and has been since she was younger.
“When you have drama until 5:30 every day for several months, or pep band every Friday for boy’s basketball games, or a newspaper article to write in the next two days, or class you miss for altar serving at a school mass, or whole days of class you miss for golf sectionals, it really cuts down on your homework time and sometimes makes it difficult to catch up. However, because I really enjoy all the activities I’m involved in, and I also believe that grades are paramount (of course) I worked (and work) hard to balanced both,” said Anglin.
As college is the next step, Anglin plans to take her education to the next level as well at IU Bloomington. She said, “Many of my scholarships depend on my achieving a 3.0 GPA or higher in college, so yes, making the Dean’s List would be idea. Also, rumor has it that to get into medical school, it’s a good idea to have a 3.7 GPA or higher.” She plans to study Biology and go into medicine after her undergraduate degree. Anglin has said that she has had many experiences in her life that having the skills and knowledge to practice medicine is a very important thing. She loves how interesting the human body is and believes this will make her a great doctor.
Alyssa credits all her achievement to God, since she would not have the gifts I have if it were not for Him. “But in addition I think my parents helped me significantly. They, as well as the rest of my family, encouraged me to take the most difficult classes available, and to excel in them,” said Anglin.