We reached out to students across central Maine in the class of 2025 to ask them about their lives, their time in high school and their plans for what’s next. The three students profiled here each had different interests, different challenges and arrived at graduation on very different paths.

Kaily Freeman, Maranacook Community High School

READFIELD –Kaily Freeman sat hunched over a table in the art room at Maranacook Community High School earlier this month.

Freeman, 18, quietly added the final touches to her last art project before she accepted her diploma later that evening. It was a bright yellow and orange portrait of her bird, Strudel, a budgerigar parakeet.

“The assignment was to hide other colors in the main colors,” she said. “So, far away, it’s yellow, but close up, you see purple and pinks.”

While high school was not always easy for Freeman, art class has been.  

During her junior year, she struggled with autism and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, which made focusing difficult. She found solace in art class, especially when she could use her noise-canceling headphones to block out distractions around her and focus on her art. 

“I pushed through,” she said. “I don’t know how I did it.”

Her talent became clear in middle school when Freeman read a book series and decided to illustrate the book’s characters.

From there, she tried everything from metal smithing to jewelry making to cross stitching, but she realized that illustration and painting is her passion.

Over her four years at Maranacook, she’s taken six art classes, not including music classes. She played bass guitar in jazz band, and she helped create sets for the high school drama program.

Freeman still illustrates a variety of characters, but has found a new favorite subject: birds. In one of her projects, she captured all of the birds in her backyard from cardinals to chickadees. 

“I draw a lot of birds. I love them,” she said. “They are all so different from each other and have a lot of cool, exaggerated shapes that you can play with. I don’t really like copying things straight from photos. I inject my own style into it. I don’t like drawing perfectly or realistically. I think it’s boring.” 

She plans to continue her art journey next year at the Maine College of Art & Design in Portland. 

As she moves beyond high school, she said she worries about violence toward minorities. For herself, she hopes she will find an accepting community and her people among the diversity of people in Portland.

With art, she’s concerned about the use of artificial intelligence, or AI, and how it might replace the artwork of human artists or devalue what an artist is paid. She’s also concerned about its impact on the environment, as producing AI images and text requires a lot of energy.

MECA is the only college that Freeman applied to, she said, and she plans to declare a major her sophomore year, which will most likely be in illustration.

“My goal is ‘Don’t fail my classes,'” she joked; but also: “To get better at art and to create some cool art.”

Amiel Sookma, Cony High School

AUGUSTA – After playing with toy trains and boats as a young boy, Amiel Sookma plans to upgrade his vessel after graduation. 

Sookma, 18, plans to attend Maine Maritime Academy to study maritime transport operations.

The Cony High School student said he’s always liked trains and boats, and he has been inspired in part by his father, who was in the U.S. Navy and graduated from Maine Maritime in Castine.

“He talked about it my whole life and I’ve been there several times. It’s is a beautiful place. I knew growing up I didn’t want to follow directly in his steps, and I found transportation interesting. I’ve always been interested in trains, cars and boats,” he said.

During his time at Cony High School, Sookma participated in clubs and played on several sports teams.

He played on the football team and was captain this year. He ran track in the spring and winter. He also filled his time on the quiz team and was part of Cony’s peer pal program, where he would help students who need additional help with math and reading. 

Between sports, he worked at Olive Garden in Augusta as a host. 

“I do it all in healthy moderation,” he said. “You kind of have to divide your time as much as you can. I still have a lot of free time that I like to spend with friends. I keep a list of my priorities and school is always No. 1.”

For Sookma, his path to building his school community was not the same as other students’. His father’s Navy career meant moving around multiple times early in his life. He spent most of his school life in Lewiston, but transferred to Cony during his freshman year.

“I think coming to Cony was fairly challenging, but this community is so wonderful that it was almost a breeze compared to looking at how others adapt to that sort of change,” he said. “But meeting new people and not having new friends coming in (was a big challenge).”  

With one more move ahead of him, Sookma said he’s ready for college and to be settled at school. 

Staying in Maine was one of his biggest priorities, and after visiting Maine Maritime often with his father, the choice was easy. He will play football at the college, and he hopes that through his major and job choice, he can travel across the world.

Hayleigh Campbell, Waterville Alternative High School

WATERVILLE – School wasn’t always Hayleigh Campbell’s first priority; it was her brothers and sisters.

Campbell, 18, had to make sure her seven younger siblings were fed, bathed and put on the school bus as she stepped into a family caretaker role.  

Now, gearing up to graduate from Waterville Senior High School and set to attend Kennebec Valley Community College in Fairfield, she said she never thought she would be where she is now. 

“We lived off ramen noodles for the longest time … It’s been hard. I raised them,” she said. 

Campbell is the third-oldest of 10 children in her family. She missed her freshman year of high school taking care of her family.

It was then, around three years ago when her younger brother died, that she realized her mother was abusive to her and her siblings. She told a case worker, and the siblings were placed in foster care.

Campbell went from living in the Skowhegan area to Florida, where her father lives, before coming back half-way through her sophomore year to attend Messalonskee High School. After that, she was placed with and adopted by a foster family in Waterville. 

When she enrolled in Waterville Alternative High School, it marked a turning point. There, she thrived, earning straight A’s and finally enjoying school.

To process what she experienced, she turned to painting and writing.

“I like doing art at school, and I’ve been told that I’m a good writer,” she said. “I think I just doubt myself a lot, but I do like to write about the situations that I’ve been in.”

Based on her experiences, Campbell has realized she wants to go to school to learn how to help others in situations like hers. She’d start with sibling visits, she said, to establish rights for siblings so if they are separated in foster or adoptive care they would still have the ability to see each other. She has not seen her own sisters and brothers in seven months.

“I didn’t think that I would ever be graduating,” she said. “I want to help kids who have been in similar situations to me, so I want to be a Department of Health and Human Services worker.”

At Kennebec Valley Community College, she plans to study psychology before heading to the University of Maine at Augusta for the last two years to earn a bachelor’s degree. At UMA, she plans to study mental health and human services.

“It’s a little scary,” Campbell said. “But I think I can do it. I’ve overcome a lot.”