Local teenager wins gig with Christian magazine

The Boardman teenager is writing columns for Brio magazine and its Web site.
By LINDA M. LINONIS
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
BOARDMAN -- Rachel Wightman wrote, filmed and interviewed her way to being named the 2006 Brio Girl.
Among the rewards for the Boardman teen-ager is being featured on the January covers of Brio and Focus on the Family magazines.
Last April, Rachel entered the 2006 Brio Girl search, the 12th annual project of the Christian magazine sponsored by Focus on the Family. A psychologist, Dr. James C. Dobson, founded Focus on the Family, a nonprofit Christian organization that operates a variety of ministries and produced his internationally syndicated radio broadcasts.
Monthly columns
Her faith, ideals and writing skills will be tested as she pens a column every other month for Brio magazine, with subscribers numbering 225,000 worldwide, and a column for the Brio Internet site in the opposite months. Her first column will be published in the magazine in February. An article she wrote is posted on the Brio Web site, www.briomag.com; click on the "real life" tab. She wrote about the importance of each person in God's eyes.
"They are supposed to be devotional ... inspirational," Rachel said, and noted she has freedom to select her own topics.
The 17-year-old also will be fielding questions from her peers via e-mail to the Brio site. "It's kind of scary. I've lived a kind of sheltered life. I want to know how to relate ... there is so much stuff out there," she said. "I'll turn to prayer ... it's what I have known."
Rachel said her life "revolves around faith. It's what I grew up in. I think people respect me for it. I don't feel like I've been criticized about it. People have their own faiths and should live by it. Show by example, that's my philosophy."
She said she would draw on that Christian background to meet the challenges of being the Brio Girl.
Other responsibilities
When she's not fulfilling her assignments, there are other pluses to being the 2006 Brio Girl. She and her mother, grandmother and aunt will be taking a cruise Feb. 17-20 to the Bahamas, and she's scheduled for a mission trip July 3-16 to Peru. She's also received jewelry and clothing. Recently, she spent a weekend in Chicago with Barlow Girl, a Christian rock group. That outing will be featured in a story and photos in the May edition of Brio.
The Boardman High School junior, a newspaper carrier for The Vindicator for two years, serves as secretary of student council, plays the flute in band and orchestra and is a member of the school's Spanish club and the Council for Exceptional Children, which helps special needs students. At New Life Assembly in Poland, she is a youth leader, volunteers in the church nursery and coaches sixth-graders in Bible quiz competition.
The search
Promotional material on the Brio Girl event notes that the search, which is for girls in ninth through 11th grades at the time of entry, is to "recognize someone who represents what Brio stands for -- she's devoted to Christ, fun-loving and energetic, committed to family and school and involved in her church and community."
Notified by mail around Memorial Day, Rachel learned she had made the cut to the top 20 on the merit of two essays she had written. One topic concerned how God had worked in her life; the other was a topic she felt was pertinent to teen-age girls. Rachel said she "wrote about enjoying a season of singleness and not worrying about dating." Writing is one of her favorite activities and she keeps various journals including ones for prayer and travel. "You could say I have a prayer journal to God," she said.
After another round of evaluation, Rachel found herself in the top eight and received another assignment -- write 13 essays and produce a 12-minute video focusing on herself, church and school activities, and family. Brio Beauty Editor Andrea Stephens interviewed Rachel by phone and talked to her references.
Then among the four finalists from 1,000 Brio applicants, Rachel was told in August that she had been selected as the 2006 Brio Girl. She and the other finalists, Joy Gaultney of Thame, Oxfordshire, U.K.; Susana Gutierrez Moreno of Guadalajara, Jaslisco, Mexico; and Steffany Thames of Garland, Texas, visited the Focus on the Family Center in Colorado Springs, Co., in September.
While there, Rachel was photographed and interviewed. The photos and stories are in Brio and Focus on the Family magazines this month.
Second try
This result is far different from Rachel's first try in the search in 2005; she didn't make the first cut.
"We encouraged her to try again," said her mother, Kathy Wightman, of the effort she and her husband, Randall, shared.
"She has always been a good writer," her mother said. "We told her to write her heart out. She always has spoken in her mind," she said.
Wightman said she and her husband wanted their only child to have a "Christian foundation." So they enrolled her at Willow Creek Learning Center, where she attended first through fifth grades; then Rachel went on to Boardman schools.
"It was important to us for her to have Christian values and be raised in the church," Wightman said.
"We're a church-going family, and it was important to start from Day One with her," Kathy Wightman said. For about 12 years, the family has attended New Life Assembly. The Rev. Jim Barton, youth pastor of the Pentecostal congregation, was one of Rachel's references.