Since ChatGPT was launched in 2022, use of the program has become increasingly prominent in the classroom environment. Although many teens have found the website to be helpful in their studies, there have been many situations where students have abused ChatGPT by cheating or plagiarizing. 

“ChatGPT has been helpful for me because it helps me study and gain more information that teachers haven’t told me,” said Audrey Taylor, a student at The Walker School in Marietta, Georgia. “It was really difficult to find practice problems, and ChatGPT was an easy way I could get practice problems, and they were accurate and helped me.”

Audrey is a perfect example of a student using ChatGPT for the right purpose. For most students, the website is a useful study tool and a helpful way to clarify topics covered in class. Specifically, Taylor had noticed a significant difference in her understanding of AP World History from the first semester of sophomore year to the second. She struggled less frequently and even noticed her grades improving over time.

While attending her current school, Audrey has overheard many situations where students have been caught using ChatGPT for the wrong purposes. “Someone got in trouble, got a zero, and had to go to the head of school and the honor council.” Taylor said. 

There are severe consequences for students who have used ChatGPT maliciously. Not only do the offenders have to attend a court-like hearing in front of the honor council, but they lose trust from their teachers, parents, and peers. The machine is a test of students’ integrity and must be used wisely.  

“My friend who goes to Northeastern University in Boston put his essay into ChatGPT to help with grammar mistakes, and whatever his English teacher used to check it said it was completely ChatGPT.” said Maeve Scruggs, an undergraduate student at Texas Christian University. “It made it look like he didn’t write it but he did write it.”

Although the technology used to find plagiarism is successful and helpful in many situations, there have been situations where students have been falsely accused of using ChatGPT to write their essays and assignments. ChatGPT makes it difficult to distinguish between harmless use and cheating. Luckily, the student was able to recover a draft and present it at his college hearing, preventing him from being punished or expelled.

“It’s up to educators to adjust to new technologies,” said Dr. Joe Dennis, Chair of the Department of Mass Communications at Piedmont University. 

Joe has adjusted many of the assignments he assigns to his students, requiring personal experiences to be included instead of simply stating history facts. By making writing assignments more personal, students are unable to use ChatGPT to copy or plagiarize because they must incorporate their own experiences and personality into their writing. 

“I think ChatGPT is scary because of how well it works,” Maeve said. “I think there definitely needs to be a limit, and I think it has progressed so much in the past year that the things it will eventually be capable of scare me.”

As ChatGPT becomes more popular, students are beginning to think for themselves less and depend on AI more. Specifically in college, Maeve has found it concerning that many of her peers will enter entire quizzes and assignments into ChatGPT and copy each answer, which prevents them from learning or utilizing their critical thinking. Similar to our dependence on cell phones, as ChatGPT becomes more prevalent and advanced, students will become increasingly reliant on the machine for their education.

“If the zombie apocalypse comes, are we going to know anything?”

Girls all across America are anxiously awaiting and preparing themselves for one of the most important weeks of their life, rush week. 

“You have to be the best version of yourself you’ve ever had to be,” said rising freshman at the University of Georgia Shaelan Purdy. 

Rush consists of an entire week full of activities. The first day is Letters Day (AKA Open House) in which the girls quickly stop by all the sorority houses and make their first impressions. The second day is Service Day, the sororities’ philanthropy is shown and individuals spend time learning about what each one represents. The third day revolves around house tours and girls get an idea of what it’s like to live in their desired sorority house. The fourth and final day is called Pref Night in which you get more of the house and are introduced to their traditions. Pref Night is the most nerve wracking day for girls because at this point they’ve passed several rounds of selections and the girls decide what house they want to end up in. 

“I ended up with two houses that I really liked and I couldn’t decide,” said rising junior at UGA Grey Cohen. “I had really big reservations about both and reasons I wanted to do both.”

SEC schools are infamously known for having a highly competitive recruitment process and girls from these schools spend months beforehand making sure that they’re ready for rush. Some ways in which girls prepare is by cleansing their social media, buying outfits and creating a rush resume. 

“I have cleaned up my social media, not that there was anything bad on there, just cleaned it up a little bit,” Purdy said. 

A major reason why girls decide to rush is the idea that they will find their “forever friends” throughout their time in the home. Girls that live in the same house refer to each other as sisters that belong to a sisterhood, and similarly boys in a frat are brothers that belong to a brotherhood. Many girls find a piece of mind knowing that their sisters will be with them throughout college and even after. 

“I think that being in a sorority means that you have a good community to rely on during college years but also beyond college,” said rising freshman at Louisiana State University Stori Beall.

Although anyone can rush, it’s important to note the cost. Dues differ depending on the college but according to Yahoo Finance, joining a sorority costs anywhere from $1,000 to $4,750 a semester. This is obviously a hefty amount of money to be charged per semester but dues go towards housing, events, member fees and recruitment, and returning member dues are significantly less, usually ranging from $600 to $1,000. Some people argue that joining Greek life is paying for friends and although this may seem like the case, others think of it more as an investment. 

“I don’t think rush is buying your friends, I think it’s facilitating a way to connect with people you might not have met otherwise,” Purdy said.

Another benefit that sororities have to offer are all the networking opportunities that can arise from social events and connecting with alumni. By joining a house, it automatically introduces you to a whole new world of potential jobs and internships. 

“It can get you good connections, whether that be jobs or internships in the future,” Beall said. “I’ve already had a few people reach out and be like, ‘Oh I was a Kappa Gamma, I work for interior design.’”

Additionally, each sorority has a philanthropy (charity) they support by donating money or directly volunteering. This helps girls narrow their choices because they tend to choose sororities that align with their views. The houses host several events to raise money and this is a major incentive for dues. 

“Every sorority has a different mission and you can find out which one you want to be a part of and I really like that,” Purdy said.

Something that sororities receive a lot of backlash for is their exclusivity. Over 70% of sorority members are white, which has become a major topic of conversation, yet little change has been made. There are still people of color who choose to rush, such as rising freshman at the University of Ole Miss, Fiona Bernard. As a way to ease Bernard’s nerves, she decided to reach out to other POC’s at Ole Miss and felt a lot more confident about rushing.

“I talked to other girls rushing and they had nothing but good things to say,” Bernard said.

Sorority girls also tend to stick within their crowd and don’t hang out with people outside their social group. Some girls work to break this norm by branching out and connecting with outside groups. 

“Sometimes there’s a culture of not talking to people outside of Greek life but it’s important to be very well-rounded, have friends outside of Greek life,”said Abby Van Brimmer, a rising sophomore at Georgia Tech. 

As the summer season is coming to an end and the start of school is rapidly approaching, girls throughout the country are preparing to face rush week and all it has to offer. 

“I’m excited to really experience the whole week,” said rising freshman at UGA Sidney Cohen, “because I know it’s going to be something new and something that I’ve never put myself through.”

A small crush in Joe Dennis’s freshman year of college amazingly led him to a road of great success. 

Dennis went straight into college at North Central College in Naperville, Illinois. He decided to study journalism and first established his career as a sports journalist especially for volleyball to report on his crush, Tara. Later, Dennis became a professor at Piedmont University and taught summer camps to high school students at the University of Georgia.  

When Dennis was a kid, he would sit on the couch almost every night and watch the 10:00 news with his dad. Watching and listening to the news consistently made Dennis interested in journalism.

“My dad was a good listener,” said Dennis. “taught me how to listen to people.”

Dennis was born on the South Side of Chicago and grew up with his mom, dad, and older sister. Family was extremely important to him from the start and carries these same beliefs as an adult. 

With three kids, spending quality time became more important as he got older, he decided to leave behind his journey of journalism and pursue teaching as it would give him more time with his family and kids. 

Dennis said, “I made a decision, and I chose family, and that’s fine”.  

Not only was family important to Dennis but so was religion. Dennis was raised by a very Catholic family even attending Catholic school for 12 years. Once Dennis went to college he couldn’t wait to not attend church. Dennis said it was nice to not feel the need to wake up early every Sunday morning and feel the pressure to go to church.

Dennis said, “I think personally that was an age where I know I started to question a lot of things regarding my faith, and going to a catholic church you weren’t allowed to ask questions.” 

After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Dennis and his wife decided to go church hunting in Athens, Georgia. Dennis wanted to find a church where they let everyone be who they wanted to be with no judgment. Now Dennis teaches Sunday school for high school students at the Methodist church in town.

There are various ways Dennis approaches teaching as being a religious person. Dennis doesn’t preach when talking in class but he sees everyone as a child of God. By seeing everyone as a child of God, Dennis said it makes the children seem important and valuable. 

 “Being able to let students know it’s ok to question things about religion is ok.”

Over the years of working in journalism Dennis’s views of the world drastically changed but did not affect his religion. Dennis said, “It hasn’t made me sad about the world, it has made me motivated to change the world.”

In everything Dennis does he strives to change the world little by little every day hoping to make a larger impact on the world. 

“Don’t let fear get in the way of a good opportunity,” Dennis said. 

Although Averi Caldwell already has a degree in journalism and significant experience in the field, she feels like she is making up for lost time in graduate school.

“I really like it,” Caldwell said, “Not only is it giving me a chance to get two years of my college experience back, but I have more time to gather skills I would like for the industry.”

As a graduate student of the University of Georgia, Caldwell is pursuing a master’s degree in the field of communications, and this opportunity has remained extremely important to her. One of the reasons she values this experience is because during her own undergraduate  experience, she was forced to go online for two years due to the widespread COVID pandemic Her master’s program is helping make up for  the lost time.

“There’s a whole other group of people that you’re able to communicate with, which is extremely helpful in an industry that requires communication,” she said.

Impressively, Caldwell knows both English and Spanish, which is helpful in the world of journalism. However, Caldwell’s achievements extend far beyond the world of language. Going from a small-town to a large institution, she learned to adapt to her new environment.

“I love it, while I love the people that I met growing up, I definitely enjoy a faster paced life,” she said.

By attending the University of Georgia, Caldwell spent time at a University that was more than double the size of her hometown, placing her in a much bigger environment than what she was used to. Despite this, Caldwell was able to excel contributing to various school publications  like The Red and Black, as well as Columns, the school’s online paper for faculty and staff. In addition, she made contributions to other publications, like The Atlanta Journal Constitution and InfUSion, showcasing her adversity in situations that might petrify some.

Caldwell thinks journalism is an important part of society, which is one reason why she feels she is making a positive impact. “It’s good for a country to have informed citizens, and that includes being informed of what kind of media they’re consuming.”

Some people know what they want to do from the time they’re young. For Joe Dennis, it was a different story.

“I don’t want to write,” he said during his teen years, “That’s boring.”

That was Dennis’ response when asked to write for volleyball at his freshman orientation. His whole life had been defined by his many hobbies and different interests, and journalism never even came of interest to him until he realized he could cover his crush, Tara Fenske. He is from Naperville, Chicago and a proud sports fan as well as many other things to this day. Dennis’ many hobbies, interests, and skills are what shape him to this day.

Dennis grew up on the South Side of Chicago, originally wanting to be a baseball player. Even though he wasn’t good enough to get too far with it, his love of baseball never left him. He is still a passionate but disappointed White Sox fan to this day. He also supports the Chicago Bulls and Bears, but they haven’t had much success recently either. 

If Dennis is in the vicinity, chances are a fedora isn’t far behind. 

In 2012 while at the Peabody awards, Dennis ran into a street vendor selling fedoras that was looking to sell. When he was told he would look good in a fedora, a new door was opened for him. From that moment on, Dennis’ fedoras have become a part of his identity.

“I’m Filipino, Bruno Mars is Filipino, and he rocks the fedora, so maybe I can do it,” he said. “Now it’s kind of like part of my image.”

While growing up, the radio was always on for Joe.

“I loved listening to the radio every night, doing my homework in my bedroom,” Dennis said. “So I became a professional disc jockey, and emulated that energy that [radio hosts] had to their shows.”

He even chose North Central College with the goal of going somewhere with a good radio program. With that skill, Dennis finds himself the public address announcer for the Georgia hockey team. This has always been a passion of Dennis’ and something that helped him get to where he is today.

From Dennis’ obsession with Kesha, to the AP stylebook, there are so many things that make him unique. All of these have helped him get to where he is today in journalism. 

“Every experience you have on this earth informs,” he said. “Makes you a better journalist.”

Hello! My name is Ashley and I am 14 years old ,I am a rising freshman and will be attending Arabia Mountain High School in the fall. I do not have any journalism background but I love to write about things that I am most passionate about that could be ranging from talking about my favorite artist which is Frank Ocean at the moment to talking about social issues in the media today. I believe that the different perspectives that people have are so interesting and honestly so refreshing and sometimes very much needed

Growing up I’ve always liked giving my perspective on topic as well as hearing others. I believe that it’s a mixture of both, you are able to hear the opinions of people and are able to do research about it and come up with your own opinion. It’s so much easier to write on a topic that you are passionate about because there is some motivation behind it, rather than writing on a topic that you are not because you are less likely to care as much.

Overall, because of my love to give my opinion and love to write I am interested in journalism and would love to know more about it.

Hi! My name is Emory Miller, I am 15 years old, and I am a rising sophomore at The Burlington School. I live in Burlington, North Carolina with my mom, dad, and younger sister named Addie who is twelve years old. I love to travel, spend time with family and friends, play soccer, and love going to the beach and lake with friends.

I started to attend The Burlington School in 6th grade and have been involved in various academics, athletics, and arts which have shaped who I am today. Specifically in athletics I participated in middle school cross country, basketball, and soccer even receiving the honor to play high school soccer in 8th grade and even becoming varsity captain for our schools woman’s soccer team as a freshman.

In academics I have participated in AYLA (Alamance Youth Leadership Association) in 7th and 8th grade even being elected as president in 8th grade. I have run for freshman and sophomore class president and won the running both times. While being 9th grade class president I raised over $600 and even ran a school wide community day which was a big success. I have also applied and been accepted into AP capstone program hoping to help expand my writing and research skills for the future.

In arts I have been apart of chorus since the 6th grade even taking part of winter coral reviews with broadway stars such as Aaron Lazar, Jordan Donica, and Brian Stokes Mitchell. I have even received the opportunity to sing in Vienna over Thanksgiving break.

But over the years my main interest has been in sports. I love playing soccer and watching American football. Since I was little I have always known that I wanted to do something in sports but about 3 years ago I started to gain interest in sports media and journalism. At the beginning of 7th grade I decided I wanted to do sports statistics for the NFL. I always found the statistics side of sports interesting even asking my club soccer coach for my game statistics after games.

A year later after Christmas break in 8th grade I was watching the AFC championship game and noticed a woman named Erin Andrews interviewing my favorite players after the game. By watching Erin Andrews interview the athletes I started to gain interest in sports media broadcasting ultimately changing my main goal to become a sports broadcaster specifically a sideline reporter for the NFL. I think sideline reporting is not only interesting but you get to understand the athletes feelings and how they handle certain things which is another aspect I think is not appreciated enough.

Right now I am still finding new things that interest me and maybe my goals in life will change but for now enjoying spending time at the beach and lake with family and friends.

Hi! My name is Avery Staus. I am 16 years old, and I have lived in Roswell, Georgia my entire life. I have attended The Walker School in Marietta since seventh grade, and although it is small, I have built strong friendships and became involved in areas I never thought I would be interested in. For example, I used to believe that I wanted to attend medical school and become a doctor. However, after taking classes outside of my comfort zone, I realized that my dream is to utilize my creativity in my future career and major in marketing, advertising or journalism in college. I have always despised my science and math classes in school even though I tried extremely hard to enjoy them. English and history have always been my favorite subjects and I am determined to continue my studies in these areas.

When I am not studying hard or finishing homework assignments, you will find me dancing, reading, shopping, watching a new show or hanging out with my friends. I have been a competitive dancer since I was 3 years old, and I have loved every second of it. I currently dance at Rhythm Dance Center where I have found my second family and home. I take classes in all different genres of dance such as jazz, ballet, tap, hip hop, contemporary, ballroom, musical theatre and many more. Not only will I spend hours at the dance studio, but I will spend hours reading books. The genres I prefer to read are romance, mystery and historical fiction. A few of my favorite books are “To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before,” “The Summer I Turned Pretty” and “The Hunger Games.” Another one of my pastimes is watching TV shows and movies, and a few of my favorites include “Gossip Girl,” “Vampire Diaries,” “Gilmore Girls” and “Anyone but You.”

Although I have many hobbies, there is nothing I enjoy more than spending time with my family and friends. My mom, Melanie, and my dad, Justin, are my best friends and we love to watch movies, try new foods and travel the world together. My older brother, Tanner, just finished his freshman year at the Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology in Indiana. I hold my two best friends, Audrey and Masoom very close to my heart and we enjoy shopping trips, going to get acai bowls, going out to dinners and traveling together. Our favorite places we have traveled are New York City, New Haven and Florida!

Hopefully you have learned more about me after reading this biography!

Hello, my name is Jadyn Barrow. I’m 16 years old, and I will be a junior at Druid Hills High School. I have lived in Atlanta for five years. However, I was born in Chicago, and raised in Miami. I absolutely love visiting places like the ocean and lake because I enjoy getting outside and exploring nature. Some of my hobbies include, reading, writing, swimming, spending time with friends and family, shopping and more. However, my favorite hobby is writing. I have always had a passion for it. Whether it was writing essays or making up my own stories, writing was always something important to me.

In the beginning of my freshmen year, I decided to join the Saga Yearbook Staff, where I could be a part of creating the school yearbook. Joining the yearbook staff sparked interest because I was able to use writing and photography skills. During school and even outside, I would spend time interviewing students and staff, taking photos, editing my work and designing spreads. It was a lot of hard work, but in the end, it was completely worth it. Going into my sophomore year, I was honored to have the position as editor-in-chief of the Saga Yearbook for Druid Hills, and I was so thrilled. I had a major leadership role and it was under my responsibility that the yearbook was made well and consisted of all events. I enjoyed covering all the stories that my school and community had to offer since it brought out my inner journalist. Overall, the main goal I had as a journalist was that every story got heard, no matter the topic.

In the end, the most valuable thing I gained from joining my school’s yearbook staff was that I wanted to be a journalist in the future and I wanted to base my career around that. I plan on majoring in journalism in college and then continue on with being a journalist.