State Press podcast transcripts are produced by a third-party transcription service and may contain errors. The official record for State Press podcasts is the audio. Please listen to the audio as this transcript may only contain summary forms of the given episode.
Ava Peguese:
Welcome back to the podcast! The State Press magazine is out with the best of ASU
Connor Greenwall:
This week, we sit down with a few magazine authors.
Joahan Lopez:
Also, a sports magazine story deep dive.
Ava Peguese:
I’m Ava Peguese
Connor Greenwall:
I’m Connor Greenewall
Joahan Lopez:
I’m Joahan Lopez, and this is State Press Play.
Ava Peguese:
Hey there. The State Press magazine is out with its final issue of the year, and I could not be more excited. Our very own podcast editor, Kylie Saba, has branched out and written an insight for the magazine titled Being a bookworm. As a fan of books and worms. I had to sit down with her. Kylie, why write an article about your love for reading?
Kylie Saba:
Oh that's such a good question. I have been an avid reader since as long as I can remember, from going to the library to buying my own books to like reading books with my mom, like we always had the tradition that we would always read, like we had so many Christmas books. So like from December 1 until Christmas Day, we would be reading Christmas books, and, like, we even had the Christmas Carol in, like, cartoon form for kids. So it's always been just a big part of my life, and it I feel like it's become even more prominent as I'm getting older, because I'm reading more profound things.
Ava Peguese:
Interesting. I like that. The anecdote that you included in your story about your librarian was so cute. I feel like this supportive librarian trope is something that happens to every kid that makes them love reading. Tell me more about being a kid who was seen as a nerd or a bookworm.
Kylie Saba:
It, I'm gonna be honest, it was actually really tough, because I was kind of I was physically and mentally bullied for it. I was seen as like the weird kid, not the quiet kid, but just the weird kid. Like I had some friends, but I was the one that always raised their hand to read out loud when we were reading books in class. I was the only one that would read ahead of the books we were reading in class, like Hatchet. When we read Hatchet in class, I finished that book in one day. I loved it. I thought it was so cool, and every other kid thought that was weird, that I finished it like ahead of schedule, but like I always I still loved it because my-my family loved it. They embraced it so hard. They would always provide me with books. They would always like push me to be my greatest, nerdiest self. It everything. I was a major nerd in all kinds of fields, and they embraced it in so many ways.
Ava Peguese:
I feel like a lot of people can get their love of reading from their parents. Because, yes, like as a kid, you do have the option to pick up a book, but what your parent is teaching you generally matters. Like my dad, every weekend, we would go to the Goodwill and we would pick up a couple of books and have a great time reading, and he made it exciting, and that's what kids need. And I think that in this newer generation, it's a little easier to just, you know, it's a screen rather than let’s read a book.
Kylie Saba:
Oh I, I completely agree. And like my dad does not read, the only books my dad has ever read are Michael Crichton books. My dad loves Michael Crichton books, but if you try and get him to read anything else, he won't. My mom is a big reader, though, and she like, I like, she didn't read a lot being a stay-at-home mom with three kids, but when she would it was like, I mean, she was in a trance. She loved to read, and my whole family loved to read, but, like, my span of reading really did come from my grandma and the librarian in elementary school, my grandma Saba would take me to the library every single weekend, whether it was our, like, local library or, like, I went to a church preschool, and they had a library, and she would take me there because she worked there. And, like, I would just pick up books and read and read and read, and it was so much fun. I think technology was not a big thing for my family at all. I mean, like, I remember when my parents got their first iPhone. I remember when the first iPhone, like, they got it for each other because they didn't have one before. And so, like, I would watch TV shows, but I mean, my imagination was wild, and reading kind of helped influence that a little bit more than TV.
To hear more from Kylie, please tune in to State Press Play and read The Best of ASU Issue.
Joahan Lopez:
We are here with the great bella Keenan who wrote a great story called the rise of AU football, delving into the sun devils like a legendary 2024 season. So, Bella, how are we doing today? Thanks for joining me.
Bella Keenan:
I'm doing really well. I'm excited to be on this podcast. Oh, thank you, thank you, yeah, it's quite the honor.
Joahan Lopez:
All right, so, um, obviously I'd READ your story as a big football fan and it was quite the legendary football we had. um I started in the beginning. Why did you decide to start the game, uh you know, start the story with the Kansas, the Kansas game?
Bella Keenan:
Well, in reality, I wanted to do a good play at the end of the game where it really felt like the game was on the line and I was looking through the games throughout the season. and although I could have started with the big 12 championship game or the Texas game, I felt like this game was midseason and it was kind of one of those pinnacle moments um where ASU, they could have flipped for flop. Like they could have done well or like like they did, or they could have just uh lost, they were down, you know, with the c minus um to go against Kansas. So I think I just wanted to do that last minute, like everyone's standing, holding their breath moment, and that's the moment that captured it.
Joahan Lopez:
When you say that's like the most pivotal uh, you know, point of the season coming to that end over here, that kind of like changed like the landscape of the A football season.
Bella Keenan:
I mean, I don't know, because there are so many games that you could say. Like, I mean, even the Utah game, it's just that when it came to that moment, that moment was really important, I'd say, um, but there are definitely other games that were like really, like I talked about the BYU game, um, but if I go back to Utah, that game because they were ranked, so that was also there just wasn't like a moment at the end of the game that had that Kansas had, which was in that you saw had, which was in Kansas.
To hear more from Bella, please tune in to State Press Play and read The Best of ASU Issue.
Connor Greenwall:
I'm joined by Leah Mesquita and Audrey Eagerton from the State Press magazine to talk about their article, whom it excludes. To start off, can you guys tell me a bit about your role with the State Press magazine?
Audrey Eagerton:
Yeah, I can start. I'm a managing editor at the State Press and before that, I was a magazine reporter.
Leah Mesquita:
Same here. Other managing editor. was a magazine reporter for about two years before moving up. So yeah.
Connor Greenwall:
and can you tell me a bit about what inspired you to write this article?
Audrey Eagerton:
Yeah, I can take that. Yeah, this story has been in the works for over a year. I was going to take it on when I was a reporter last year for the best of ASU issue, and just realized that it was going to take a lot more work and a lot more reporting, and this year, it was something that I really wanted to report on and finish. And so I was like, Leah, let's take this together, because it's a lot of intense interviews, and a lot of it's very research heavy. And so we kind of worked on it together, put our heads together, conducted interviews together just to report on how the ASU charter doesn't really hold up for students at ASU with disabilities or students with disabilities that want to come to the university.
Connor Greenwall:
Can you tell me a bit about the research process that went into writing this article?
To hear more from Audrey and Leah, please tune in to State Press Play and read The Best of ASU Issue.
Ava Peguese:
And that’s all for this week’s State Press Play. I’m Ava Peguese.
Connor Greenwall:
I’m Connor Greenwalll. State Press Play is produced by our podcast desk editor, Kylie Saba.
Joahan Lopez:
And I’m Joahan Lopez. Our original music is by Ellie Willard and Jake LaRoux.
Ava Peguese:
Special thanks to our managing team, Morgan Kubasko and Matthew Marengo.
Connor Greenwall:
You can check out all these stories and more on statepress.com. See you next week
