This year’s prom court was made up of 12 juniors- Haley Banta, Lino Caputo, Lexie Conley, Christine Jie, Litsa Kapsalis, Ethan Lane, Josh Lane, Lillie Michael, Casey Murray, Lucas Redding, AJ Shaw, and Sam Starr. And, although they are all spectacular students and people and students, only two could be crowned this year’s “prom royalty.”

Casey Murray and AJ Shaw were chosen by the student body as this year’s prom royalty, and both of the boys live fascinating lives that I had the honor of talking to them about. From hiking up mountains in New Mexico to having dreams of being a broadcaster, these two boys do it all.

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Murray was born in a suburb in the booming city of New York and moved here to Lake Bluff when he was just six years old. Shaw, on the other hand, was born in Highland Park on the infamous date of September 11, 2001, and has lived in Lake Forest his entire life.

In a typical school day, Shaw said that he usually gets up and goes to school, then heads over to West Campus after school for baseball. Murray, on the other hand, starts school bright and early at 7:45 a.m. in Mr. Schuessler’s AP Biology class on a typical school day. After school, Murray said he has “sailing practice until right about sundown.”

With both of the two playing their separate sports, one might think they don’t have much time to fit in any extracurriculars in their busy day. Yet, the two prove this point very wrong. Murray alone does three extracurriculars outside of sailing for the Lake Forest Sailing Team- the Model UN leadership team, Lake Bluffs Boy Scout Troop, and of course, writing for the Forest Scout.

If you’ve ever been to a football or basketball game, you might know that Shaw is the color commentator for the varsity football and basketball teams. Next year will be his third year commentating for basketball and second year for football.

When asked about his favorite activity to do, Murray shocked me with his response. “Hiking up a mountain in New Mexico, sailing in a snowstorm, or role-playing,” Murray said.

The most important question of all that I asked the guys had to be ‘Where is your favorite place to eat around town?’ The two gave me quite differing answers.

Shaw said that his most favorite place to eat is Portillo’s.

“That place is the best,” he said. “I typically get either the Italian Beef or the cheeseburger and top that off with the cheese fries, and sometimes even a chocolate cake shake.”

Murray, on the other hand, went with The Other Door as his favorite place to eat.

But, he said that “The Market House and Sushi Kushi are the only places in Lake Forest that I visit with any regularity.”

Since summer is coming up soon, I was interested to see what the two might do during their summer breaks.

Shaw takes a break from his busy schedule and said that his summers “are usually pretty relaxing.” He doesn’t travel too much and likes to see friends and family during the break.

The Boating Center at Lake Forest Beach is where Murray spends most of his summers, and when he’s not there, he is at a week-long summer camp at Wisconsin’s Ma-Ka-Ja-Wan Scout Reservation.

Even with the utmost intelligence and a long list of extracurriculars, the two both don’t really have any ideas on where they want to attend college yet.

“I would say that I want to go to the school where I can establish my career hopeful of being a broadcaster, and where I can also be happy with myself,” Shaw said.

Murray, on the other hand, said that he just wants to be “Hopefully somewhere, doing something” in his future. He said he lives by Teddy Roosevelt’s saying to “get action.”

The two shared that they just hope to be successful and happy with their lives after high school, and with the bright personalities and lives they both possess, I can be sure that that will not be an issue.

These two were clearly two great choices to represent the junior class as prom royalty this year, and are two people that we can all look up to as having quite interesting lives and being inspiring to all.