Beloved Teacher Ms. Blok Leaving VHS to Become a NYT Game Developer

In early March, English 10, Honors English 10 and Journalism teacher Ms. Blok was having a seemingly regular afternoon, watching MasterChef and playing The New York Times puzzle games. However, that all changed when she received a phone call from Johnathan Knight, who is the chief executive of The New York Times Games. The information that she received from this call would completely change her life. 

Knight explained to Ms. Blok that executives at The New York Times had taken notice of her stellar performance in the games, specifically in Connections and Wordle, and wanted to extend her an offer to become a game developer. Ms. Blok was overjoyed to hear the news, as she was a big fan of the New York Times Games, and the position offered a $1,000,000 salary. 

In her role as a game developer, Ms. Blok would be responsible for picking the purple category of the game connections, which is widely known to be the most prestigious category. Most game developers start out by picking the yellow category, which is the easiest, so directly being given reign over the purple category meant that this was the job offer of a lifetime. However, she felt conflicted about leaving her amazing students and beloved Journalism program.  

Nevertheless, Ms. Blok knew that she needed to move on to a new era of her life, and accepted the offer to begin developing games in August of 2024. As a result, she will sadly be leaving Valencia High School. She has had an amazing 23 years at the school, touching the hearts of many students and helping them achieve great success. In New York, she is most looking forward to eating many different types of pizza and taking long walks in Central Park. We are sad to see her go, but we wish her the best in her future endeavors!