Dead teenager Sal Singh was charged with the murder of his girlfriend, Andie Bell, five years ago – but not everyone in the town is convinced he did it, especially 16-year-old Pippa Fitz-Amobi.  

Pippa decides for her high school senior capstone project that she wants to look into the disappearance of Andie Bell, who is said to have last been seen by her little sister Becca on April 18th, 2014. As a childhood acquaintance, Pippa had always respected and liked Sal since he stood up to her bullies for her when they were younger. Sal’s younger brother Ravi disapproves of Pippa wanting to relook into the investigation, as it ended with Sal being found dead in the woods from an apparent suicide. After finding Sal’s phone and discovering messages asking for an alibi from Sal to his friends, Ravi decides to help Pippa with the new investigation. As she dives deeper into the investigation with the help of Ravi, Pippa starts to discover hidden dark secrets about each party involved. For instance, Andie was seeing an older man, the reason why Sal’s friends wouldn’t offer an alibi for him, the last text to Andie from Sal that leaves the final moments of their relationship in question, and Sal’s “confession” to Andie’s murder that was shown to be sent after he died to his father. It leaves the reader thinking, “what else hasn’t been uncovered?” 

As the story continues and more secrets come to light, Pippa discovers she’s in danger. Her enemies lurking through the shadows and those involved in the disappearance remaining silent, it’s up to Pippa to get to the bottom of Andie’s disappearance and Sal’s death while also watching her own back. Everyone is a suspect, and both blood and water are very thick.  

As the esports community keeps growing in the state of Texas, it seemed like the perfect time to check in with a young man who was passionate about changing the status of esports at his soon-to-be alma mater. He put in the time to speak with someone on a city official level, gathered more recruits, and lost sleep to pitch why the e-sports lab is important to the campus. Now, we have to ask, did any of it successfully convince the school to look into it? 

Since the beginning of October, George Sawyer has been on the path to bringing more recognition to his e-sports team at Texas A&M University-Texarkana. Unfortunately, since we last spoke, George has been a bit busy working than spending time with the team as he hates to admit. “I’ve been spending more time working, I still hangout with the team, but not as much,” said Sawyer. Having an esports lab for the university is something George wanted to discuss back in October, but he never secured the meeting, and he felt that the meeting wouldn’t have changed anything anyway. “I didn’t get the meeting, but even if I had the school wasn’t gonna care enough to give us the lab, so I’m not too beat up about it,” he said. 

The school announced that they received a grant to build the new engineering building, and when asked, George stated that he was happy for the school and “hopefully in seven years when they are done building it, then there is an esports lab incorporated.” As he gears up to graduate in the next semester, Sawyer has been recruiting freshmen and training underclassmen for his position on the team. 

The esports team has been competing in tournaments for the last couple of months and didn’t do too good the first time around, but “only lost to nationally ranked teams,” he said. Next week, the team is gonna be collaborating with SVA for an on-campus tournament. “If you’re interested in video games, winning, making new friends, or just like watching people play then ask about our e-sports team.” 

There was some controversy surrounding the Texas A&M University-Texarkana campus because of racial tension among its students. After claims of discrimination by peers, the campus community needed a reminder that everyone should be treated equally. In an email sent on September 21st, Dr. Cutrer informed the entire campus of the incidents that involved racial slurs among students. Students of the university start to hear about the use of derogatory terms by their peers, which pushes them to want to implement changes and introduce some new ways of dealing with this incident, as well as how to handle it in the future.  

Upon talking with a few students about the controversial speech taking place on campus, it is apparent that a few of them could never imagine that this might be a problem here.“It’s truly odd to see that happening here on campus given how diverse it is. There are different cultures represented in every aspect of campus life, which makes that news all the more concerning.” said senior George Sawyer. As a result of interviewing other students about the email, it appeared that most didn’t check their student emails, so they didn’t have any idea what the controversy was about. 

Many of the students had no opinion about the racially charged issue. One anonymous student admitted to saying “racist slurs with their friends as a joke.” Some students skimmed over the email and felt it did nothing to rectify the situation. There were those in the know about racial issues before President Cutrer’s email expressed concern that the “culture of the campus might be compromised.” The student organizations were asked to investigate the controversy with Dr. Cutrer as they are in a position to help produce change. 

After speaking with Thomas Tye, known around campus as “Tommy”, it seems that he believes that the only way this issue is gonna be fixed is if people look more closely inward than outward. “Personally, no level of institutional level change will deeply affect this scenario. I think the change needs to come from a personal level,” said Tye. In the aftermath of his interactions with students affected by the racial controversy, Tommy felt overwhelmed with anger and sadness. “It’s sad to know that many of my friends, who are people of color, are affected by this to the point of considering leaving school,” Tommy said. 

One of the students affected by this incident, who requested anonymity, admitted that the slurs were unprovoked. “I was walking to the dorms, and it was a group of students leaving the Patterson Student Center that randomly decided to call me the “N” as they went by,” the student said. It was her complaint to Student Life that jump-started the investigation and pretty soon other students started to come forward about the racial abuse they’ve experienced on campus too. 

It was then that the Student Government Association had no choice, but to convene a meeting to discuss the fallout the university could suffer from. “We had to get a handle on this extremely fast. These sorts of incidents can ruin the state of this university, and students wouldn’t feel protected. We are all a family and it has to remain that way,” said senior and member of the SGA Brooklyn Bailey. In the following weeks of the controversy, the SGA and Student Life have tried to come up with events to show the level of diversity that exists here on campus. According to Bailey, “I have a great feeling that this is gonna help all students feel united. Which is what we need after events like this. We have to stand undivided to tackle this.” 

Growing up with her mother and a non-existent father figure in her life, Ayla Baldwin made the big move to Texarkana with her husband seven years ago and has since welcomed two beautiful sons. Ayla Baldwin’s story is sure to entail the major changes that have shaped her into who she is today and what she hopes for in the future. She details the dynamics within her family back in her hometown as well as her own personal and professional life.

Having grown up in San Antonio, TX by her mother and stepfather, Ayla Baldwin always wanted to do something with her life. Although she was unsure of what it was, she knew she wanted her mother’s work ethic. Ayla’s mother was a radiation therapist, and her stepfather was an engineer.  “My mom influenced me by showing how important it is to work for what you have,” said Baldwin. She never considered her stepfather as a “father figure” in her life because “he never acted like a father,” as Baldwin stated. It’s not an uncommon phenomenon for women to grow up in a household with both parents, but feel as if they were raised by just one. Eventually, Ayla set out to do better for herself. That plan was set in motion when she met a great guy named John during her senior year of college and they made the decision to move to Texarkana to start their lives together. 

She attended school at the Texas A&M University-Commerce campus and graduated with a Bachelor’s Degree in Agriculture and Business. Ayla had a passion to work with animals, “I wanted to go to vet school, but at the time I didn’t think it would be a good fit,” she said. Her passion for animals can be seen throughout her office, which is adorned with pictures of cows and chickens. When asked why cows and chickens were her favorite animals, she replied, “I don’t know, I woke up one morning and realized that I loved to be around cows and chickens all day.” She has no plans at the moment to go back and give vet school a chance, but never say never. 

Baldwin is employed by Texas A&M University-Texarkana as a benefits coordinator. “I deal with faculty, and staff advising them about what benefits we provide,” she said. Since August 2014, Ayla has worked as a benefits coordinator for TAMUT after moving to Texarkana with her soon-to-be husband, John, a state trooper and father of their two boys Joel and Robert. “John and I had third-pick when it came to him graduating from The Academy, and he chose Texarkana to be his work-station,” said Mrs. Baldwin.  Having settled down and married in 2014, the couple had two sons, Joel born in 2016, and Robert born in 2017. 

Not a lot of people think ahead to what they want their next five years to look like, and Miss Baldwin is one of those. When questioned about what she wants her future to look like in five years, she said “I’m hoping that I’ve been promoted. I love my job, but it gets lonely. I’m hoping I’m a better mom to my sons, and an even better wife. All in all, I’m just hoping for more happiness.” 

Houston, Texas – home to over 6.9 million people, the largest city in Texas, and the debut place of a new way of gaming.  Esports is a new genre of gaming that allows sports teams to get together and have tournaments. This new gaming platform would spike interest in a young man’s heart to bring esports to a metropolitan area 290 miles north of Houston in Texarkana. 

Long before esports, the world welcomed a young man named George Sawyer into the world born and raised in Houston, Texas. Now residing in Texarkana, Sawyer is attending Texas A&M University-Texarkana on a full academic scholarship and is in his senior year. He holds a position in most organizations here on campus and plans to use what he learns to help push his career forward. “I’m hoping to go into broadcasting sports, but the overall goal is to commentate for professional esports games,” said George. He didn’t have an interest in actual sports, but it grew over time. “ I didn’t like sports, until I started playing football in middle school and then my interest peaked,” and his love for actual sports pushed his interest into computer gaming.   

He has a passionate interest in making the esports team represent Texas A&M University-Texarkana in a positive and exciting way. “I would like to see the university give more recognition to esports because most colleges refuse to offer it,” says Sawyer. As of right now, the university doesn’t know that the esports team is nationally ranked. 

The school funded a dance team for $50,000 and denied the esports team half of that investment to build a gaming lab for upcoming gamers. “The fourth floor seems to care more about what looks good than what people care about,” said one student. With that money, the team could have built a better gaming lab, which would have provided more opportunities for players to learn and give everyone their own space to develop. As quoted by another source, “the school gives our Student Life Center thousands of dollars each year to show off “The Best Week Ever”, but every year the number of students participating decreases.”

George said, “I spoke with a representative to assist me with organizing a town hall meeting to gain recognition for the e-sports team’s accomplishments”. It’s not usual to see a twenty-two-year-old man spend the majority of his time protesting for change at his soon-to-be alma mater. “I just want them to recognize us [esports players] as students too. We don’t dance or participate in harmful acts. We just play video games and stay out of trouble.” By playing video games, you can learn valuable skills such as exceptional hand-eye coordination, being aware of your surroundings, and how to work as a group. 

So why would a school deny students access to those types of survival skills? Hopefully, the community will be given more insight into these issues when Mr. Sawyer holds the informative town hall meeting at the end of the month. “I’m hoping the meeting will take place at the end of September, but the beginning of October at the latest. I want to force the fourth floor [the administrative offices of President Cutrer] to finally acknowledge us as a positive and growing organization.”