October 12, 2024

Many great people have walked in and out of the doors of Hills West and succeeded at the next level in their fields. With Tobias Harris being the most well-known due to his basketball talents, many other successful people have left as Hills West graduates. Hills West Media has seen two of their most recent and successful graduates continue their work at the next level.

Douglas Lattuca was one of those alumni that saw immediate success. Lattuca graduated in the Class of 2019 and attended Syracuse’s Newhouse School of Communication. Going back to his high school roots, Lattuca reminisced on the great times he had with his fellow journalists through the Colts Corner Podcast by saying nothing was better than “winning an award from the LI Press Association, doing live podcasts before school, interviewing athletes, coaches, and teachers and doing it with some of my best friends.”

After graduating from Syracuse, Lattuca got a full-time job as the voice of the Danbury Hat Tricks of the FPHL this past July. With the end goal of being the voice of the New York Rangers, Lattuca is just getting started regarding his professional career. 

Along with Lattuca, his fellow graduate from the 2019 class at Hills West, Ben Dickson, has seen immediate success following graduation at Hills West and the University of Maryland. Dickson joined Lattuca every Thursday for the regularly scheduled Colts Corner Podcast. “Nothing topped recording the podcast every Thursday after school with the boys,” said Dickson. Ben’s learnings in the journalism field here at Hills West were endless. Dickson said, “Between writing, podcasting, broadcasting, and more, so many opportunities existed as a student journalist in high school.”

After attending the University of Maryland, Ben secured a job at Newsday covering high school sports, even Hills West’s games. Despite having a dream job as a national college basketball reporter, Ben acknowledged the importance of having “confidence in yourself and your skill while showing the willingness to stay at it and appreciate every relationship along the way.” 

Hills West Media would like to congratulate these two journalists on their success outside of high school and thank them for creating a legacy that is hard to top.