Note From the 2024-25 Editor in Chief

This past school year, the 2024-2025 Atherton High School Journalism class underwent a huge change. Not only was the class given to a new teacher for the first time in over a decade but also made the decision to transform the very medium at the core of the class. Switching from print publications to digital media had been a long time coming, yet the change came on fast. Without the hard work and quick thinking of the entire journalism class, the Aerial News site would not have flourished the way it has. For the dedication to making the first year of the digital Aerial the best it could be, I would like to thank each and every student in the class. I would especially like to thank Sofia Rappa, who is responsible for the creation (from scratch) of the entire website and has been so reliable each day in class.

It has been surreal to think of the important role in Atherton’s history our class has played. It is no coincidence that the first year of the Aerial being online has coincided with the 100th anniversary of the Aerial Newspaper itself. Even though the format of the Aerial has so drastically changed, I believe that the spirit of the publication has remained. As written in the very first edition of the Aerial one hundred years ago, “As the aerial of a radio connects the four corners of the earth, so does the ‘Aerial’ of ‘Atherton High School’ link each girl into the endless chain of ‘Atherton’ students.” While this statement was written way back when Atherton was an all-girls school, the message is still true today. The transition from physical to digital serves as a giant step in connecting the students of Atherton, perhaps the biggest step the journalism class has ever taken. It has been an honor to be able to guide the 2024-2025 class through this transition, and I look forward to seeing how the Aerial News site will change and grow in the future.

Signing off,
Emma Yung