English Department Chair Caroline Wagner and creative writing teacher April Berry presented Hillyer with her award on Friday, May 8. Hillyer won this award for many reasons including, being a strong leader, a positive role model, and someone with unmatched passion.

Journalism teacher Jessica Norris shared her reasoning for nominating Hillyer for the award.

”I nominated Siann for the department award because she is very involved in our English department. She is an editor in Journalism, involved in creative writing, and was in our spring musical! She is a dedicated and hardworking student who deserves this special honor. 

Hillyer has excelled academically even taking on a new role this year with the Dragon’s Journal. 

“Siann has done a wonderful job leading the journalism and creative writing collaboration. She created a creative writing page on our Dragon’s Journal school paper, and now we involve the creative writing club with our school paper,” Norris Explained.

Berry also nominated Hillyer for the 2026 English Department Award. Her work in Berry’s class and her independent project combining creative writing and journalism inspired Berry to nominate her. 

Berry stated, ”Siann has inspired me to work on getting more and more student voices out into the world. She filled that void by publishing creative writing pieces in the Dragon’s Journal, and I want to continue with that process, along with other avenues for publication.“

Hillyer said that she felt honored to receive the award. 

“I was super excited to win the award for English! I love English so much and I’m glad that I get to show that to people, especially with the award!”

Congratulations to Hillyer and all of the other 2026 department award winners.