I have been teaching for eight years. For seven of those years, I have been the advisor to the school newspaper. I will continue that journey in August when school resumes and we resurrect the paper.
With all the talk of fake news and conspiracy theory, having a school newspaper is not an easy sell. Many people either believe the students will either fail at writing, given many of their reading and writing state scores, or they will produce something which will irritate and aggravate a parent, district, teacher or someone else in the area of their lives that they are worried about.
My students, over the course of 3 schools, have written about Christmas, Easter, the cost of water in Desoto County, animal rescue, video games, school policy, being gifted, new teachers, scholarships, sports and games. There have been pages dedicated to growing succulents and cooking. Sports stories and athletes. Nothing in the general sense of students which would upset anyone, unless someone just wanted to find something to get upset about.
With the advent of online teaching, many schools have an online option for the paper. I like this, but I believe the students, most of whom have never experienced reading a printed paper, need to establish that first. Once they have that down, then begin deciding how to move it online as well.
Because the majority of my career was spent working for a printed newspaper, I have extensive experience in that area and love the challenge of finding the students' strongpoints. I had one young lady who was such a talented writer, all I had to do was express a story idea and she would run with it.
I have had others who could be shown how to design a news page and within an hour, could create a page, complete with art or photos and stories. I have some that can do it all equally well. Photographs are the only hard sell because these students are so used to having a cell phone that can take photos, they believe selfies are the way to go. This is challenging to be sure.
Writing gets better with writing. Most students today have difficulties with writing and because journalistic writing is different from creative or technical writing, it just takes time.
Marketing also can play in to this because as any teacher can tell you, fundraising is a part of most schools today. None of us ever has enough money to go around for doing the things we want to do. Most of these things are to develop our students to become the best they can be. With a printed newspaper, that becomes printing costs. These can be paid by advertising and most years, we have been able to sell enough to have our product printed. Students learn to have conversations with businesses and learn about what their activities cost.
Most of my journalism students like the autonomy which comes once the first printed copy is placed in their hands. Once they see a byline, a photo credit with their name, or one of their friends telling them they read what they wrote, they are hooked. I have seen reading and writing scores jump, student grades improve, and even their attitudes become more positive. It doesn't happen with them all. It does with quite a few.
So if anyone contacts you from your local school, asking for your support of their journalism students, please consider a small donation, even if you don't buy an ad. Let's keep these students interested in the world, their state and the school community. Oh, it will also make them more informed adults.
And if you are so taken with this idea, I do have a Donor's Choose project for our first printing job. I can always use your help if you don't hear from your local school. You can access my project here.
Thanks for reading.
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