There have been times I have weighed against capturing a photo this year when I think of how readily legacy media can weaponize pain to drive clicks. Then, I am reminded of a quote by Gordon Parks, whose photography and perspective have served as my proverbial North Star:

“I saw that the camera could be a weapon against poverty, against racism, against all sorts of social wrongs. I knew at that point I had to have a camera.”

Here are my favorite photos I took while covering Jacksonville in 2025.

Capturing people as they are

In May, when Susie Tolbert Elementary School held its final fifth grade promotion ceremony before the school closed, administrators and educators acknowledged the poignancy of the celebration in Grand Park.

When one child did not hear their name called to receive their promotion certificate, Courtney Hicks and Samaria Morgan stepped forward.

They ensured child’s name was called again. This time the entire cafetorium applauded with one of the loudest ovations of the day.

“I don’t mind being direct when it comes to the children,” Hicks said afterward.

Later, Hicks, Morgan and I had a conversation about how positive anecdotes like that are sometimes ignored when legacy media report in Jacksonville’s predominantly Black neighborhoods, like Grand Park and Newtown and Moncrief and Sweetwater.

Grand closings in Grand Park

Today, the sign at that was once at the front of Susie Tolbert Elementary has taken down. The grass is overrun with weeds. The Duval County School Board will consider whether to demolish the school during its January meeting.

13the Street is quieter than it has been over the last six decades.

The Duval School Board also closed R.V. Daniels Elementary, my son’s school, in May. We do not drive along 13th Street or Myrtle Avenue anymore because he starts to cry at the thought of losing his school community.

The namesakes of closed schools Annie Morgan, Roosevelt Daniels and Susie Tolbert were real people who made a lasting impact on the education of young people in Jacksonville. One of the thrills of the year was listening to Daniels’ 94-year-old son, Henry, as he sat on a bench beneath a portrait of his father and discussed how his father’s guidance motivated him to become an educator.

Can’t spell D-U-V-A-L without ‘A’

Education can be the great equalizer in these U.S. In 2025, Duval Schools produced its highest graduation rate in district history and earned its first “A” grade from the Florida Department of Education.

Student achievement was exemplified by the Westside High students who earned their certified nursing assistant pins alongside their high school diplomas.

Student achievement was showcased on a Thursday night at Sandalwood High School, when students from Windy Hill Elementary and Southside Estates came together to perform The High Seas in April.

The play was about a singing contest between pirates and sailors. The sailors were marooned. The pirates came to save them. It was an apt message for two schools that consolidated into each other in August.

“Not only will we take you with us, we will sing one melodic ensemble,” the children sang.

DUUUUVAL?

Moments after The High Seas ended, the Jaguars shocked football followers by moving up in the NFL Draft to select 2024 Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter.

The 22-year-old, who clearly has a zest for life, reached more personal and professional milestones this year than many people achieve in a lifetime. He was selected second in the NFL Draft, earned his undergraduate degree in anthropology, signed a contract that will secure generational wealth, got married and welcomed his first child.

Hunter’s arrival in Jacksonville was part of a great reset for the Jaguars under new head Coah Liam Coen, who’s leading the Jaguars in their first 10-win season since 2017.

When Coen arrived in January, he was widely panned for putting the emphasis on the wrong syllable.

The first-time head coach has improved in more ways than one. The Jags (11-4) have won six of seven at EverBank Stadium this year.

Ichiban is inevitable

The Raines High Vikings won the Class 3A state championship with a perfect 14-0 record. They beat Florida’s Class 7A champions by 48 points; blistered Bishop Kenny by 46; and had just enough to top Miami Northwestern 23-22 in the state final.

This fall, Raines football delivered joy and pain in both the sunshine and the rain at the new Ribault High School in the 2025 Northwest Classic. The Vikings won 53-0 in a game that was not as close as the score indicated.

Faith in the future

Ribault has bragging rights over their neighbors in a separate area: Ribault earned an “A” grade from the Florida Department of Education. (Raines earned a “B” for the second straight year.)

Weeks before Ribault’s academic excellence was confirmed, Ribault graduate Paris Richardson won the Miss Florida pageant. She became just the second Black person in 89 years to earn the achievement, and the first from Northeast Florida in 25 years.

Richardson finished second runner-up at the Miss America pageant. Richardson says her debut children’s book, The Not-So-Perfect Garden Project, was inspired by the daughters of her cheerleading coach at Ribault.

In May, when a young girl at a reading event reminded Richardson of the inspirations behind her book, she could not resist the girl’s request for a photo together.

Another young person who might change the world is Tyson Jones. He won this year’s VyStar Tomorrow’s Leaders Elementary School Essay contest, writing that the Rev, Martin Luther King’s message “is urging us to have a strong and unshakeable faith in the future.”

Tyson’s essay also noted that King was an advocate for environmental justice and economic justice. Tyson’s smile lit up the Prime Osborn Convention Center.

The U.S. observed the Martin Luther King holiday this January on the same day President Donald Trump was inaugurated for a second term.

‘With liberty and justice for all’

Trump’s return to the White House led a group of Jaxsons to form the Jacksonville Immigrant Rights Alliance.

As local eyes watched federal immigration policy, the Jacksonville City Council entered bitter battles about whether local tax dollars should support undocumented immigrants. Immigrant allies held rallies in front of government buildings before votes on proposals by Council member Rory Diamond.

In June, 11 out of the 19 members of the City Council passed an ordinance that required Mayor Donna Deegan’s office to show that city grant funding was not used to support undocumented immigrants as well as prove state and federal dollars received by the city were not used for diversity, equity and inclusion programs. 

Deegan vetoed the bill, and council failed to override her veto. Diamond later brought back the undocumented-spending provision as a budget amendment, causing a 14-hour budget standoff that ended with the amendment’s withdrawal.

People over political parties

When Deegan revived the River City Readers program this year, she credited former mayor John Peyton for creating a literacy initiative during his tenure.

In May, Peyton and former Sheriff Nat Glover shared the stage during the OneJax Humanitarian Awards. The friendship the two formed after Peyton’s mayoral victory in 2003 is the personification of respecting differences in opinion and perspective.

Glover was Duval County’s first Black Sheriff. It’s current Sheriff, T.K. Waters, has faced scrutiny for how the Jacksonville Sheriffs Office conducts itself during public interactions.

In February, officers arrested Will McNeil Jr.  following an encounter that began when McNeil was observed not wearing a seatbelt.

The police report says officers provided several warnings that they would break the window and remove McNeil from the vehicle before officers “broke the driver’s window and opened the driver’s door.” The report did not mention that an officer punched McNeil in the face. That punch, captured on McNeil’s dashboard camera, led civil rights organizations and journalists to question Waters.

Alton Solomon, McNeil’s father, said he was also roughed up by JSO when he was McNeil’s age.

“To see that…It’s a hurting feeling,” Solomon said in a July press conference.

‘Ring with the harmonies…‘

For many, this has been a weary year filled with silent tears. Nevertheless, there have been songs of hope that were born of the faith the dark past taught them.

In February, more than 100 children sang Jacksonville’s most famous anthem in the 125th anniversary of “Lift Every Voice and Sing.” Their performance was organized by Sharon Coon, a Jacksonville native who has saved libraries, stirred souls and strengthened community for decades.

In January, Mrs. Coon and I sat down at James Weldon Johnson Park and had a conversation. She spoke. I had enough sense to listen to her wisdom, and not speak.

Jacksonville has scores of women, including young women, who do the work in plain sight. Their efforts are not always recognized. That is why I bring my camera.

Some are teachers, like Alanna Conyers, a third-grade reading teacher at Long Branch Elementary who was named the school’s Teacher of the Year this fall. The Eastside school witnessed reading proficiency gains and leapt from a “D” in 2024 to a “B” grade in 2025. Still, it is under-enrolled and slated to close and consolidate with R.L Brown.

They are students like Taylor Brown, a junior at Ed White High School, who is president of the Beta Club and a reading tutor. She has a 3.9 GPA and plans to become a child psychologist.

They are clinicians like Dr. Farha Deceus. She graduated from the Mayo Clinic Alix School of Medicine in Jacksonville in May and earned an internal medicine residency at Mayo’s campus in Scottsdale, Arizona. Deceus says she wanted to become a nephrologist in order to improve lives.

They are trailblazers like the young women who suit up for Sporting Jax. The Gainbridge Super League club is the first fully professional women’s team sport to kick off in Jacksonville. The starting XI includes a teenage sensation, a native Floridian and a 24-year-old captain.