Reflections showcases a year of high-quality work by OWL’s 8th graders, the Class of 2027. In English class, students retold existing stories from new points of view, wrote memoirs, explored poetry, and constructed arguments. They also read Angie Thomas’s The Hate U Give and joined book clubs with justice as a central theme.

The magazine’s Water, Me poems came out of a collaboration across three classes. In science, students studied water as a source of life through the eyes of multiple cultures, beginning with the Ojibwe picture book We Are Water Protectors and hearing from guest author Abdullahi Janna about water from a Somali perspective. In social studies, they studied global water shortages. In English, they wrote shape poems about why water matters.

The magazine opens with a section on the 2023 Senate Expedition, with students’ research and their reflections on presenting to lawmakers at the Capitol. It also includes memoirs, alternate narratives, and a comic by Markus. Claire, Connie, Anya, and Aria made up the publication team, and Aria created the cover art.

Read the full magazine below. You can also read the 2022 8th Grade Magazine, the 2024 Justice Magazine, and the 2026 Justice Magazine.