When advisers pull their school’s older yearbooks off the dusty shelves, they are likely to find spreads of photos, many with no cutlines. Few of the pages will even provide a block of copy detailing a school event. Very few of the yearbooks produced 20 or 30 years ago included stories on substance abuse, teen pregnancy or homosexuality. These topics were generally taboo for discussion, let alone potential issues for yearbook coverage. It is not that sensitive issues did not exist, they were just not the subject of routine yearbook coverage.
New yearbook advisers routinely face obstacles, but when the little pink phone message sheet appeared in my mail tray in mid-November, it aroused no suspicion. The message seemed harmless: “Call the yearbook plant.” Yet, the news I learned when I made that call was straight out of the yearbook X-files.
As yearbook adviser, you are the captain of a ship setting out for a one-year voyage with an inexperienced crew. If you have been on this trip before, you know about the rough waters ahead. It is likely you have already begun to prepare. However, if this is your maiden voyage, you probably are not sure what to expect.
Putting together a yearbook is no easy task, especially in high school. Staffers have to plan the entire book, coming up with a theme and making overall coverage decisions. Then there are the school events – lots of them – each requiring coverage by a writer and photographer. Once the events are covered, the editing-rewriting-editing process begins. Cutlines, headlines, tool lines follow, along with the spread design. All of this, in addition to homework, sports and everything else high school brings.
What do you mean Bubba won’t be in the football team picture?” screamed the angry father. “He was the team. Without him there would have been no postseason play. No championship. No Coach of the Year. No, no…”
During my first few years as yearbook adviser, I wanted to have control over everything. I did not want the students to have too much responsibility for fear of mistakes and errors in the yearbook. As a result, the yearbook process became cumbersome and overwhelming. It took up a large part of each school day and, frankly, the better part of my life.
Sami A. Slaquer
8:30 a.m., somewhere on the West Coast – Sami is assigned the hottest story of the year – an investigative piece on the new speed bumps that are causing damage to cars in the school’s parking lot.
Anne Whitt, adviser of student publications at Dr. Phillips High School, Orlando, Fla., was recently selected as a 1997 Special Recognition Adviser by the Dow Jones Newspaper Fund (DJNF) in its annual National High School Journalism Teacher of the Year award program.
For Susan Caperna, yearbook adviser at Ridgeville Christian High School, Springboro, Ohio, having 23 students sign up to be on staff was unprecedented.
My mind was firmly entrenched in the third paragraph when my name was called. “Not now,” I whined as I scurried to finish an article in People magazine before having my teeth checked. Of all the days for my dentist to be on schedule! I had just found the ultimate story – an intriguing topic covered from an unusual angle and including a smattering of opinion, as well as multiple methods of reporting the facts.