Prior to his freshman year at Sedona Red Rock High School, Dylan Beattie was not an active skateboarder. A lot has changed over the last four years.

During his freshman year, Beattie got into skateboarding with some friends. Since then, many of those friends have moved away from skateboarding. But as a senior, Beattie remains active in the sport.

In the fall, Beattie will attend the University of Utah, where he’ll study architecture. One of the reasons that becoming a Ute was so appealing to Beattie was the state’s reputation as a good place for both snowboarding and skateboarding. His love of skateboarding is so strong that after college, Beattie has ideas on designing skateboard havens like Sedona’s Jack Malmgren Memorial Skate Park, where he continues to spend much of his free time.

“Ever since I was young I’ve been into building model rockets, frames of houses and stuff like that — I thought that was a good major to sort of round things out,” Beattie said. “I want to help build people’s houses and buildings for the community. I’ve also thought about building skate parks, too.”

In addition to skateboarding, Beattie has also participated in school sports. Beattie was part of the Scorpions’ track and field team as a freshman, sophomore and junior. There, his love of getting airborne also worked to his advantage.

Beattie participated in the 110 and 300 meter hurdles, as well as the triple jump and high jump. His best time in the 110 hurdles was 19.09, which he did as a freshman, while his top time of 48.03 in the 300 was accomplished as a sophomore. His best distances in the triple jump [35 feet, 8.5 inches] and high jump [5 feet, 10 inches] were both done as a junior.

Another hobby that Beattie has taken up in his time at SRRHS is photography, an interest fostered greatly by teacher Mal Cooper. When Beattie is out hiking with his dog, he frequently takes pictures of the red rocks and other parts of Sedona’s landscape.

While he hasn’t been interested in photography for long, Beattie is an award winning photographer. He won the 2019 Arizona School Boards Association photography contest with a landscape photo of a cave in Sedona, winning money for his school’s arts program in the process.

Due to the COVID-19 crisis, Beattie is finishing up his time at SRRHS at home, doing online classes. While he acknowledged that it poses some challenges, Beattie is also keeping himself busy.

“A lot of the students have no motivation to continue school work — it’s all online,” he said. “I find it hard to focus at home, compared to school, with that environment. But I’m keeping myself busy with hiking and skateboarding and I have a rail and ramps at home.”