She’s all about elegance and grace — she soars through the water on the school swim team, and works at a classy dress boutique — but Libby Whitham can’t wait to get up to her rubber gloves and goggles in messy crime scene evidence.

Whitham, a 17-year-old senior with charming, dirty-blonde curls, radiates cheerfulness when she talks, like an athlete who just beat Morgan. But she’s seriously passionate when she describes how she’s learning to understand DNA, fingerprints, impressions and the rest of a criminologist's toolbox.

“I think everyone should take medical forensics at the CLC,” she said. “It’s so cool how the littlest thing can be tied to a person.”

It’s not all about blood spatter and gun powder residue, though. When she’s not studying techniques that shatter alibis and turn suspects into convicted criminals, she can be found at the pool practicing her speed, especially in the individual 100-butterfly, one of the most difficult strokes to master.  Whitham, a second-year team captain, says she’s striving for a coveted podium placement at State this year. Last year, she made it to finals.

She’s taken her love of swimming into her summer job, a lifeguard at Pratt Aquatic Center in Tooele that required her to pass some rigorous swimming and strength tests in the pool — and, of course, what to in worse-case scenarios: “It’s always just good to know CPR,” Whitham said.

After high school, she hopes to attend Snow College, and then transfer to UVU for a forensics degree.

As a senior, Whitman says that if she could jump in Doc Brown’s DeLorean, she’d tell her freshman self: “Work hard now, because when you get older it will be a lot harder.”

She’s excited to be on the newspaper team this year, especially with the hope of focusing on underrated news.

“There’s so many things that go uncovered,” she said.