Ainsley Jay, News Editor
Ainsley Jay, class of 2027, is a third year reporter and co-news-editor for WSPN. Prior to being a co-news-editor, she was staff reporter for two years. She is a captain of the cross country team and a member of the nordic skiing team at WHS. Outside of school, she enjoys watching TV and spending time with family and friends.
![This year, the Wayland team is made out of a JV team and a varsity team. There is a wide range of grades from eighth grade to twelfth grade that make up the teams. " [What] I will miss most [about the seniors] is their willingness to be involved," sophomore Mackenzie Grogan said. "Whether it was with school drama or referee frustration, they were really good at listening and giving good advice."](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/10/8F0FD331-F005-4C3F-9F77-402D1C1953D6_1_201_a-1200x800.jpg)
![Last Wednesday, the Wayland School Committee gathered to discuss a number of topics regarding the health curriculum and Innovation Career Pathway course. Another large topic of conversation was the ways to potentially mitigate distracting cell phone usage. "These [phones] are going to distract your learning and social relationships," Superintendent David Fleishman said. "That's concrete right there."](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/06/Screenshot-2025-06-04-at-9.49.31 PM-1200x886.png)
![After Massachusetts voted to remove the MCAS graduation requirement, policy makers are reshaping graduation standards. "The top-line understanding is that we’ve moved away from a system that we’ve known for about 24 years, which is one where every school district in Massachusetts had wide latitude to decide what their graduation requirements were in terms of coursework or other experiences, but every single student, in order to earn a diploma, needed to pass the MCAS in one English, one math and one science assessment," Massachusetts Secretary of Education Patrick Tutwiler said. "We’ve moved away from that now, by virtue of the outcome of [the MCAS] ballot question in November, to a place where communities can still decide what their graduation requirements are, but there’s no requirement for students to pass the MCAS.”](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/img_3067_720.png)
![On Wednesday, March 19, teachers from all Wayland Public schools gathered to demonstrate against the recent actions of the Trump administration, which is seeking to shut down the Department of Education.
"I want [students] to know that we're gonna fight for them and for their resources," English teacher Kelsey Pitcairn said. "This is not just about our job as educators. It's about our mission and values as educators."](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/1AB794D9-AC45-4B52-8D19-4FFFB3AF440C_1_105_c.jpeg)
![Join WSPN’s Marissa Mendoza, Edge Wheeler, Ainsley Jay, Bowen Morrison and Sofia Ciciarelli as they cover seniors’ involvement in the election and the viewpoint from a WHS educator. “[The election is] a really toxic environment,” WHS history teacher Katherine Bassen said. “It would be disingenuous for me to say, ‘oh, everything's going great.’ Obviously it's not, right?”](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/IMG_0282-1-1200x800.jpg)
![Currently only 17 states in the U.S. have a New Voices Law enacted.
“[Standing up to censorship] requires some bravery,” Jonathan Falk, a staff attorney at the Student Press Law Center said. “You're basically a student telling an adult to their face ‘thanks but no, thanks. I want to appeal this further.’ And so that's one way of [combating censorship]."](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/image-1.png)
![In the college admissions process, students have to ask teachers to write college recommendation letters. “[The teacher recommendation] is intended to fill in those gaps between what the grades and the scores look like, and show what the person looks like in the classroom," English teacher Kelsey Pitcairn said.](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Add-a-heading.png)
![On Saturday, March 2, the Wayland Dads organization hosted one of their seasonal Saturday Morning Dad & Kid Drop-Ins in Loker Elementary School’s gymnasium. "[Wayland drop-ins are] mostly for the kids and gives them an opportunity to get out of the house into a new area," Wayland dad and volunteer Judd Bornheimer said](https://waylandstudentpress.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/wspn-1-1200x900.png)