Big Walnut’s Lyle wants something different

Story and photo by

LIZ ROBERTSON

Big Wal­nut High School’s Jor­dan Lyle

“Nor­mal is bor­ing,” said Jor­dan Lyle. “I always wanted some­thing a lit­tle different.”

The Big Wal­nut senior does not want a desk job as she seeks out a career path in crim­i­nal jus­tice. Jor­dan said she would like to become a fed­eral agent and is con­sid­er­ing the FBI or CIA. She also plans to minor in French or psy­chol­ogy — “I’d like to apply psy­chol­ogy in the field” — where she said she would pre­fer hands-on work.

“I’m keep­ing my options open,” she said.

Already accepted to Tif­fin Uni­ver­sity, she will also apply to Cap­i­tal Uni­ver­sity along with other schools that would waive the admis­sion fee.

“Capital’s close,” she said, not­ing that Tif­fin is a bit far­ther away which would allow her to spread her wings, so to speak. Both schools offer the course­work she needs for her career choice.

“My goal in life is to be that pow­er­ful woman fig­ure,” she said. “I think my two moms have inspired me.”

Both par­ents are fire­fight­ers, a career that Jor­dan con­sid­ered but then deter­mined she wanted some­thing with even more challenges.

“I just always liked things a lit­tle dif­fer­ent, a lit­tle more inter­est­ing,” she said. Jor­dan admits though to still being “girlie” sometimes.

Her strength comes out on the soc­cer field where she plays goalie. Play­ing the sport for 13 years, she was told she was too aggres­sive, so she became a goalie, a posi­tion that allows her to “do what­ever you need to do to get the ball.”

Jor­dan, a scholar ath­lete, also pole vaults and holds the school record at 10 feet. Improv­ing about a foot a year for the four years she has com­peted, her goal this year is 11 feet 6 inches.

“I told myself when I was lit­tle that I would never pole vault, but I fell in love with it,” she said. “It’s a dif­fer­ent sport than most, more com­pan­ion­able then competitive.

Know­ing oth­ers in the sport at other schools, she said every­one cheers each other on.

“I think because it’s such an impos­si­ble thing to do,” she said.

Jor­dan is now being coached by the uncle and grand­fa­ther of a boy who holds the pole vault­ing state record of 17 feet 4 inches. She said she would love to one day com­pete in the Olympics.

“My mom helps train me as well,” she said, adding that her mother is also ath­letic in soft­ball and has even attempted pole vault­ing, clear­ing 6 feet.

Jor­dan will “def­i­nitely” pole vault in col­lege; she is hop­ing to play soc­cer as well, she said.

Eng­lish teacher Angie Stooks­bury said, “Jor­dan is one of those young ladies who has a great sense of who she is and what she stands for. She is quick to step up and get involved and lend a help­ing hand. I am so proud of her accomplishments.”

While sports takes up much of her time, Jor­dan also finds time for other activ­i­ties. She vol­un­teered for three years as a zoo aide, is cur­rently in the Big Brother Big Sis­ter pro­gram and did some tutor­ing in French with ele­men­tary students.

“It was a fun expe­ri­ence,” she said of the tutor­ing, not­ing that it did help her weed out teach­ing as a career option.

This year she is also doing Eagle First Flight, a pro­gram that helps fresh­men accli­mate to high school.

Christina McDo­nough is a social stud­ies teacher at the high school and advi­sor for First Flight.

“Jor­dan is a great stu­dent that I have had in both global stud­ies her fresh­man year and in AP Psy­chol­ogy her junior year. When I think of Jor­dan, I think of some­one who is very pas­sion­ate about what she does. Jor­dan was a very inquis­i­tive stu­dent. It was clear she wanted to learn as much as pos­si­ble in psy­chol­ogy. She was always very engaged and involved in the class. She was also really good at mak­ing con­nec­tions between our con­tent in the class­room and the world out­side the class­room. Jor­dan is also some­one I would con­sider to be a leader. She has a dynamic per­son­al­ity and as I said before she is very pas­sion­ate about the things she gets involved with. She is enthu­si­as­tic and ener­getic and a pos­i­tive upbeat per­son,” she said.

It was dur­ing her sopho­more year that Jor­dan helped lead Peace Week, where top­ics such as bul­ly­ing were addressed. Speeches were pre­sented with Jor­dan and oth­ers behind a cur­tain so no one knew who was speak­ing. The assump­tion was the pre­sen­ters were from other schools. Then at the end, the audi­ence dis­cov­ered that it was their class­mates speaking.

Jordan’s speech was on hav­ing gay parents.

“It made me grow as a per­son,” she said. “It allowed me to see adver­sity in a dif­fer­ent light, grow and be a strong woman.”

Jor­dan finds that, in her school, cliques are dis­si­pat­ing and the classes are com­ing together to do things as a united group.

“You are see­ing the lines dis­solve,” she said, adding that both the school and com­mu­nity are evolv­ing and maturing.

She said the teach­ers chal­lenge the stu­dents as well as being there for them to talk to.

“It makes school more than just school.”

Before senior year, Jor­dan thought how much she would miss her friends once she grad­u­ated and left, but now that senior year is here, “I’m not think­ing about it so much. I’m just enjoy­ing it so far.”

She has admit­ted that senior year has “hit me a lit­tle bit” and said she has an early case of mild senioritis.

While she is look­ing for­ward to going to France this sum­mer with her French class, for now she is busy with sports and her course­work in physics, advanced place­ment Eng­lish, French, food, draw­ing, gov­ern­ment and economics.

Jor­dan offers the fol­low­ing advice to underclassmen.

“Just relax. You have four years of high school. And there is life after high school, so there is no need to get caught up in the small things. Even­tu­ally you will be going on to big­ger and bet­ter things.”

Jor­dan is the daugh­ter of Teresa Lyle of and Tracy Smith of Sunbury.

Posted by Liz Robertson on Oct 5 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.