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Teen of the Week: Parkersburg High School senior Lauren Young eager to help children find their voice

By Douglass Huxley 5 min read

PARKERSBURG -- Incoming Parkersburg High School senior Lauren Young says she hopes to one day help children and young adults with their ability to speak and communicate.

"I would love to be a speech therapist and work with kids," Young said. "That's probably my dream, to be in either a school setting or hospital setting working with kids everyday."

Young said she always knew she wanted to do something with children. She said she thought about being a Pre-K or kindergarten teacher but then she found out about speech therapy.

"What a fun way to involve learning with kids. You're helping them learn and grow, and how they can help themselves communicate with people," Young said. "And I think communication is such a huge thing, especially for little kids, or kids of any age really. So, I felt like that would be such an awesome job to have and see how you can help shape these kids and make a difference in their lives."

Young works on her own communication skills as a member of the Speech and Debate Team at Parkersburg High and on stage as a member of Troupe 264 at the school and at the Actors Guild of Parkersburg. Young said she got interested in theatre when she was in middle school and got to watch her uncle in the Actors Guild production of "Little Shops of Horrors."

"We all went down as a family and I just instantly fell in love with it. I was like, this is so cool," Young said. "So, I got into theater and that really helped my self confidence and just feel like I knew what I was doing. I was happy with what I was doing and was around like-minded people that just instantly made me feel welcome."

Young said he first experience on stage came in the Actors Guild production of "Madagascar Jr" where she played the role of Alex the Lion. She said she was excited and nervous to take the stage for the first time but that the cast was amazing and made her feel comfortable.

"I've kind of grown up with all the people that were in that cast and carried on being friends with them throughout high school," Young said. "That was such a fun experience. To see them grow from when I started to now, just seeing what they have been doing with theater, what they're doing in high school, what they're wanting to go to college for, it's been an amazing learning experience just seeing where life has taken us the past couple of years."

Young has her own plans for college. She'd like to attend Ohio University after graduation.

She said she has friends who attend the university and knows others who plan to attend. The university has an amazing speech therapy program and that she loves the city of Athens, Young said.

"I feel like that's such an amazing environment to study in," Young said.

She said as an only child her parents didn't want her to move far away. She said it will be an adjustment for them but that they are proud of the adult she has become and are excited for the next chapter in her life.

"They're very excited, probably a little bit more excited than I am even," Young said. "They're just as excited as I am and that's been awesome, just having that support from them."

Young said her father raised her in the garden and that she loves spending time with her parents there. She said she plants flowers with her mother, helps her father with the tomato plants and that her room is full of house plants. She said this influenced her choice to start work at the Wittens Farm Market when she started looking for her first job.

"I thought, 'That would be such an amazing place to work', and I was not wrong," Young said. "Work is one of my favorite things for sure. Just going out and helping people, and working with them, and making sure that I'm delivering the best service, and just any kind of help that I can."

In her free-time, Young said she enjoys spending time with friends, swimming, kayaking and being outdoors as much as she can. She said she enjoys volunteering at The Gathering Church in Parkersburg and that she enjoys the community where she lives and the support they show for one another.

"I think our community as a whole is incredibly tight knit and comes together when people need things," Young said. "That's something that if I move away I don't know if I'll find as much in other places. That's something I've really adopted being raised here, and growing up here, that I've just continually noticed and has never really faded away."

Douglass Huxley can be reached at dhuxley@newsnandsentinel.com

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