HAYDEN MARTZ

Growing up, academics has always played an important role in Hayden Martz’s family and learning was a top priority in the household.

From weekend math and science lessons with his father to English and grammar with his mother, Martz — who is graduating from Redmond High School (RHS) at 5 p.m. Friday at Key Arena in Seattle — describes his education as a combination of public schooling and homeschooling.

With all of this extra schooling at home, Martz soon came to realize that while he enjoyed all subjects, he particularly became interested in math and science. In addition, he said he and his family recognized science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) as “something (they) always saw as important.”

In addition to his parents’ support, Martz said he is grateful to all the teachers he has had since his early days at Louisa May Alcott Elementary School in unincorporated King County near Redmond.

“I was lucky to have a lot of great teachers,” he said.

This all has led to Martz’s career goal of being an inventor — something he has wanted since he was a young boy.

“I still want to be an inventor,” he said.

Martz said he enjoys creating new things that could be “beneficial and cool” and has always been curious about how and why things work the way they do — his parents have always encouraged him to ask questions. He added that when he was in elementary school, one of his uncles gave him a notebook so he could record all the different ideas he had. Those ideas included impractical and implausible things such as hover cars and rocket bikes to the more feasible things such as augmented glasses (one real-life example is Google Glass).

While academics are important, Martz said spending time outdoors is also a big part of his life, He said he enjoys skiing, playing soccer (he was on a Crossfire team for many years) and mountain biking. Martz has also been playing the violin since he was 5 years old and plans to continue playing.

“I really like playing the violin,” he said, explaining that it is a way he can express himself.

Next year, Martz will be attending the University of Alabama, where he will be part of the school’s four-year computer-based honors program, which accepts only 40 students per year. He plans to study computer science and electrical engineering, which he said will help him with learning about both computer hardware and software — important for every budding inventor.

“I’m really looking forward to next year,” Martz said.

And as eager he is to get to college, the 18-year-old will miss many things once he moves. He said the main thing he’ll miss is his family and the friends he has made over the years as well as his teachers.

Martz said he is also very grateful to all of those who have support him during his school years — both his family and his teachers.

“(Thank you) for putting up with me for so long,” he said with a laugh.

RAINE PENICH

Ever since she was a little girl, Raine Penich has loved animals.

Growing up, she never hesitated to bring home any stray dogs she found. She said there is an innocence about animals and seeing them separated from their families, essentially the only life they have ever known, can be heartbreaking.

Penich — who has three dogs and four cats and occasionally fosters an animal — said she shares a bond with animals, though she cannot pinpoint its origins.

“I don’t know when it happened, actually,” she said.

Regardless of where her love of animals came from, Penich, who also graduates from RHS Friday evening, already knows what she will be doing with it. In the fall, she will be attending Washington State University (WSU) with plans to study either animal sciences or pre-veterinary medicine.

“I’m really excited,” she said.

Penich, who is the first person in her family to go to university, is already getting to learn some veterinary skills as she currently works at Animal Healing Center in Redmond. She said there, everyone helps each other out and as a receptionist, she gets to help as a vet’s assistant and is learning basic tasks such as drawing blood — all before going to college.

“It’s really, really cool,” Penich said.

In addition, she has been a volunteer at Motley Zoo Animal Rescue in Redmond for about a year and a half to two years. Penich also works at Emerald City Smoothie — mostly at the store located inside Gold’s Gym in Redmond, though she can occasionally be seen at the location on Redmond Way.

With so much of her schedule filled with work and volunteering, Penich has not had the time to participate in any extra-curricular activities at RHS. She said she has hopes to change this when she gets to WSU, saying her goal is to join at least one club at school.

Before she and her mother settled in Redmond when she was in fourth grade, Penich said they moved around a lot. She was born in Tacoma, but they also spent time living on Orcas Island, in Pennsylvania, Texas, Oregon and Chicago. When they returned to Washington, Penich said they first lived in Tacoma before coming to Redmond.

She said the two communities are very different socio-economically and it took her a long time to adjust and realize she deserved to be in Redmond and at RHS, just like anyone else.

“My mom had to remind me of that a lot,” she admitted.

Penich describes her high school experience as a place where she overcame a bad case of anxiety and “learned how to be a person” and interact with others.

Now with her high school career complete, Penich said she will miss some of her teachers who helped her along the way and were “real” with their students. She will also miss her mother — her “mama bear” — as well as her pets.