He graduated from Crandall High School in 2010 as salutatorian, Texas High School Journalist of the Year, an Al Neuharth Free Spirit Scholar, and a national High School Journalist of the Year runner up.

Today, his career has moved well beyond the newsroom. ArtWorks, Inc., a Dallas based organizational creativity and consulting company, currently lists Wade as its Growth Officer, where he works with business leaders on innovation and creative problem solving.

It is the latest chapter in a career that began in the halls of Crandall High School.

A Remarkable Senior Year at Crandall

Wade graduated second in Crandall’s Class of 2010 with a reported 4.6615 grade point average, placing him among the top academic performers in his class.

Journalism, however, is what set his high school career apart. Wade worked on Crandall’s newspaper and yearbook staffs before rising to editor in chief.

By graduation, he had accumulated 17 state Individual Achievement Awards during 2009 and 2010, three Dallas Morning News journalism awards, two Tops in Texas journalism awards, and four national Quill and Scroll awards.

His recognition spanned sports columns, in depth news and feature writing, and headline writing, including first place state honors for a sports column and for in depth news and feature stories. He was also part of a Crandall journalism team that won a Dallas Morning News award for a series or project.

That body of work culminated in his selection as the 2010 Texas High School Journalist of the Year, an honor that advanced him to national competition, where he ultimately finished as national runner up.

Representing Texas on the National Stage

Wade’s accomplishments earned him another major honor: selection as Texas’ Al Neuharth Free Spirit Scholar. The national program brings together promising high school journalists to learn about journalism, the First Amendment, and the role of a free press.

Beyond journalism, Wade competed in varsity tennis, earning academic all district recognition and a regional qualification. He also won a district mixed doubles championship and earned team MVP honors.

He served as executive vice president of the student council and was active in the Environmental Club and Mu Alpha Theta. His classmates voted him Most Likely to Succeed.

From Crandall to SMU and The Dallas Morning News

Wade headed to Southern Methodist University with an impressive collection of scholarship honors, including recognition as an SMU Hunt Scholar, Pre Law Scholar, Hilltop Scholar, and Cox BBA Scholar.

He joined The Daily Campus, SMU’s student newspaper, first covering arts and entertainment. He later rose to arts and entertainment editor, then managing editor, where he helped oversee a staff of roughly 30 writers and 10 editors.

In 2011, Wade publicly criticized the removal of an opinion column from a special edition of The Daily Campus, a dispute centered on university transparency and editorial independence.

By 2012, while still enrolled at SMU, Wade was working as a digital producer for The Dallas Morning News. He produced, edited, and published digital content, building a substantial body of work covering Dallas arts, entertainment, film, and lifestyle topics.

He graduated from SMU in 2014 with a degree in journalism. Even after leaving college journalism behind, Wade stayed connected to the profession, joining a group of former SMU student journalists in 2018 who publicly advocated for protecting editorial independence in student media.

Where Is Chase Wade Now?

Wade has since applied the communication, leadership, and problem solving skills he developed in journalism to the business world.

ArtWorks, Inc. currently lists him as its Growth Officer, working with organizational leaders to identify creative resources and develop solutions to business challenges. According to his ArtWorks biography, his career has taken him from a major newsroom into the startup world and across multiple industries.

There remains a connection to his Crandall days. The company notes that outside of work, Wade enjoys exploring Dallas’ culinary scene and still occasionally plays tennis, the same sport in which he excelled at Crandall High School.

Chase Wade built a different kind of Crandall success story, one measured not in championships but in journalism honors, editorial leadership, and a career that has continued to evolve.

The title his classmates gave him in 2010, Most Likely to Succeed, remains a fitting way to describe what came next.

The post Where Are They Now? Chase Wade — CHS Class of 2010 appeared first on Shop in Seagoville.

The reunion will bring former Pirate musicians together with Mile Post 595 for a night built around live music, old friends and Crandall school pride. A recent announcement from Mile Post 595 also confirmed plans to bring back the Crandall Rock Band All-Stars as the community heads into homecoming season.

Former Band Members Invited to Sit In

Organizers are calling on former CHS Rock Band members from all eras and musical backgrounds to participate.

Guitarists, bass players, drummers, keyboard players, vocalists and other former members are welcome to sit in with Mile Post 595 during the reunion. The event announcement encourages alumni to “come back, plug in, sit in and rock out.”

Mile Post 595 is a Dallas-area group that performs a mix of rock, country and blues and has regularly appeared at Rusted Rail.

A Pirate Music Tradition

The reunion provides former students an opportunity to reconnect with musicians they performed alongside while at Crandall High School and once again take part in the program that helped bring them together.

The CHS Rock Band has a history of performing publicly in the Crandall community, including appearances at local events and fundraising activities.

The theme for this year’s gathering is “Once a Pirate, Always a Pirate,” with organizers encouraging former members to spread the word and contact old bandmates who may want to participate.

How Former Members Can Participate

Former CHS Rock Band members interested in sitting in during the reunion are asked to contact Mr. Nutt through Facebook. The public reunion announcement was also shared through John Nutt and Mile Post 595’s social media accounts.

Rusted Rail is located in Crandall and features live music as part of its entertainment offerings.

The post Crandall High School Rock Band Alumni Reunion Set for Sept. 17 at Rusted Rail appeared first on Shop in Seagoville.

For Stephanie Wooten, there was no rebuilding year, no near-miss and no waiting until she was an upperclassman to reach the top.

The Crandall High School Class of 2004 graduate won the UIL Class 3A girls singles state championship in 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2004, completing one of the most remarkable championship runs in Crandall High School athletic history.

Then she took her game to the Big Ten.

And when her playing career ended, Wooten stayed in tennis, building a coaching résumé that has taken her from junior-college national championship competition to NCAA Division I programs across the country.

Today, the former Crandall Lady Pirate is back in Texas as the head tennis coach at Weatherford College.

Four Years, Four State Championships

Winning one UIL state championship can define a high school athletic career.

Wooten won four.

UIL historical records list the Crandall standout as the Class 3A girls singles state champion in each season from 2001 through 2004.

Her dominance extended beyond the state tournament. Purdue University records credit Wooten as a four-time district champion and four-time regional champion during her Crandall career.

Stephen F. Austin later described her high school record in even more striking terms: Wooten never lost a match during her Crandall career.

She was also named the Dallas Morning News High School Player of the Year in 2002 and 2004 and reached No. 34 in the national 16-and-under rankings.

By the time she graduated, there was little left for Wooten to accomplish in Texas high school tennis.

Championship Tennis Ran in the Family

Stephanie was not the first Wooten to put Crandall on top of the UIL tennis standings.

Her older sister, Kristen Wooten, captured the Class 3A girls singles state championship for Crandall in 1999.

Two years later, Stephanie began her own four-year championship run.

That gave the Wooten family five Class 3A girls singles state championships within a six-year period and created one of the more unusual family accomplishments in Crandall athletics.

From Crandall to the Big Ten

Wooten continued her career at Purdue University, competing against Division I players in the Big Ten Conference.

The transition did not stop her from becoming an important part of the Boilermakers program.

During the 2008-09 season, Wooten finished 20-13 in singles and 21-11 in doubles. She and Michelle Sammons won 19 doubles matches together that season, tying for sixth on Purdue’s single-season list for victories by a doubles team at the time.

Wooten completed her Purdue career with 65 doubles victories, then eighth-most in program history.

Her accomplishments went beyond wins and losses. She earned Purdue team MVP honors during her college career and served as a team captain, establishing the leadership credentials that would eventually carry her into coaching.

She graduated from Purdue in 2009 with a degree in organizational leadership and supervision.

The Move From Player to Coach

Wooten did not stay away from competitive tennis for long.

Her collegiate coaching career began at Lee College in Baytown, where she served as interim head women’s tennis coach during the 2010-11 season.

It was an impressive beginning.

Lee finished as the national runner-up at the NJCAA tournament, while Wooten coached seven All-Americans and players who captured national championships in singles and doubles.

From there, Wooten moved into Division I tennis.

She joined the staff at Stephen F. Austin and helped the Ladyjacks win the program’s first Southland Conference championship and advance to the NCAA Tournament.

In July 2012, SFA promoted the former Crandall standout to head coach.

Building Winning Programs

Wooten’s coaching résumé continued to grow after SFA.

She spent the 2013-14 season as an assistant coach at the University of Houston, helping the Cougars climb to No. 21 nationally and earn an at-large berth in the NCAA Tournament.

Her next head-coaching opportunity came at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.

During the 2015-16 season, Wooten guided UTRGV to the Western Athletic Conference Tournament championship — the first WAC championship in any sport for the university — and a place in the NCAA Tournament.

Three of her players earned all-conference honors, and another was named WAC Freshman of the Year.

Wooten later spent two seasons as head coach at the University of New Mexico. Three Lobos earned All-Mountain West honors during her tenure, while her 2017 recruiting class was ranked among the nation’s top mid-major classes.

She returned to Texas in 2019 and worked at Brookhaven Country Club before Butler University hired her to lead its women’s tennis program in 2023.

The Bulldogs went 12-11 during the 2024 spring season.

Wooten resigned after that season to pursue an opportunity closer to her family — a decision that eventually brought the Crandall graduate back to the Texas college tennis scene.

A New Chapter at Weatherford College

Weatherford College named Wooten its head tennis coach in June 2024, putting her in charge of the Coyotes’ men’s and women’s programs.

The move brought Wooten back to the junior-college level where her coaching career had begun, but now with more than a decade of Division I coaching experience behind her.

The Coyotes have remained nationally competitive under her direction.

Weatherford’s women’s team finished ninth at the 2026 NJCAA Division I National Tournament, while the men’s program placed sixth nationally.

For someone whose playing career began with championships in a small Texas high school program, Wooten has spent much of the past two decades competing and coaching on progressively larger stages.

A Place Among Crandall’s Best

Comparing athletes from different sports and eras will always be subjective.

Wooten’s case requires very little imagination, however.

Four consecutive state singles championships represent sustained individual dominance over an entire high school career. She followed that run by becoming a Division I athlete, team leader and successful college coach.

There are football players with bigger crowds, basketball players with more points and runners with faster times.

But championship banners do not depend on the size of the audience.

When the conversation turns to the greatest athletes ever to wear Crandall colors, Stephanie Wooten belongs in it.

The post CHS Alumni Flashback: Stephanie Wooten appeared first on Shop in Seagoville.