Sunday, August 24, 2008

Journalism Students ONLY

Hi Guys!

Sorry I couldn't be at school today, but that doesn't mean that we won't be working. We put our first paper to bed on Friday, and I am very proud of the job that you guys did. Hopefully, even though I am extraordinarily pleased with how the first issue went, it will only get better from here. 

We had a few technical hitches with the website - they were attacked with an SQL virus on Friday, so all of our stories went into cyberspace and died. Fortunately, I came in on Sunday and fixed the problem, even though there are a few things left to fix (sorry Adria and Melissa).

I would like you to create a login for blogger.com and respond to the following post:

What did you think about getting our first newspaper out? What did you contribute? What could be improved? Do you have any additional story ideas you are interested in?

Respond to the post with a response of no less than 150 words.

**Please note: When creating your blogger account, it doesn't matter what you name your blog website (although keep it clean). Also, your username should be first/last name (i.e. BlakeRoberts).

14 comments:

Blake_Roberts23 said...

I feel that our teacher/sponsor is an absolute, utterly, smiteworthy (because I am the all-mighty smiter), egotistic, loving, caring, and generous person. Yes, I just went there. I am happy with the product of our first two weeks in class. Everyone worked hard to meet their deadline and meet the criteria. We came up with plenty of useful material, photos, and great overall work ethic. I feel that everything that should have been covered in the first two weeks of school was covered. Editing went smooth. Had the virus problem, but hey, pressure makes diamonds. We are doing a great job advertising the paper and getting our name out there. I would like to start getting into the media section of journalism though. It's something that is most definitely interesting to me. I know a lot about it and media production is what I will be majoring in college. I really do miss the layout part of actually producing a printed product. I think the the newsletter is still a good idea. We should still have the program to do so. If not, Dearing will know where it is. All together, compared to previous years, this year will be a great year for journalism. Trust me, I would know. I've been in this class for three years ha.

Lyndsay =] said...

I think the process of putting together the newspaper was a lot of fun. Considering that we are a journalism class, it seems a bit obvious that we need a newspaper! It's nice to see that the class is on track this year, opposed to the past few years. It was great to read everyone's pieces.
I contributed an editorial on AP classes to the newspaper. I also edited a few articles. While editing the papers, I found that the class needs some help on punctuation and grammar (myself included). Other than that, I don't see anything major that needs to be improved.
I really enjoyed writing the editorial, but I'm really looking forward to reviewing a few upcoming albums. Along with the album reviews, I'd like to write an article on students and the upcoming election.

Anonymous said...

I think that our first issue was very successful. Last week was a very productive week for our journalism class. I'm glad that we're starting the year off on the right track. The whole process was interesting and a great experience.
For this edition, I wrote an editorial discussing the current condition of the stage area. I also edited a few articles and took a couple photographs for this issue.
Although our first edition was remarkable, there are several improvements we could make. We need to work on our writing and editing skills. We also need to improve our organizational skills. I also think that producing a print version of our newspaper occassionally, during improtant events, would be a niffty idea.
As far as additional story ideas go, I don't have anything particular in mind at the moment. I'm not sure that there is anything going on at school or around school during this time. I plan to cover the Out of the Darkness community walk, which takes place on October 4.

MelissaJackson said...

I think that our first newspaper went well. Everyone got his or her stories in on time and the site looks amazing. Even with the virus preventing us from getting it all up Friday we still we're able to get it up before the week started. Which is a good thing. I contributed the weather and other extras.
I think our paper would have been better if the virus didn't occur, but it still looks good. So far I don't really know what additional story ideas I would be interested in. considering we don't really know what events are going on around the school.
I think that our paper will get better as we go on in the year and it will defiantly get better if we don't run into anymore virus problems. The site would be better if there were advertisements along with more photos. But overall the paper turned out good for our first paper. The first couple of weeks were covered in the paper.

LenaDawn said...

I was really happy with the results of our first issue of en garde. Every bit of news was covered, and the stories were clear and informative. Everyone acted professional with their job and didnt fool around we got the job done. I contributed to some of the photos on the page. I do love the online paper but i have heard complaints about not having a print out and i myself would like a printout, Some people like to keep articles for themselves. For future stories i cant wait until spirit week, the battle of the classes and battle of the bands, writing about all the activities that will be going on will be really fun and interesting for everyone. All of the senior activities will be really interesting to write or read about such as senior brunch, skip day, Senior Prom, Graduation and Graduation Practice. I am looking forward to contributing and finalizing next weeks issue.

DesiraeNicole said...

I think getting our first newspaper out was a success. Everyone worked very hard and met their deadlines. Everyone was also very proud of their own work as well as the others. Our paper turned out to be very well written and put together.
I contributed the pictures to the stories.
I don't think anything needs improved as of now. There may be things in the future that we could adjust but as of now I dont think there is anything we need to change.
I think we should add the viewers art to the paper such as; pictures of projects,poems, stories or others students have or are creating. We could also add their descriptions of their art.119
I think this will also help our reviews better because the readers will feel like there a part of the paper.
I will be looking forward to the many upcoming issues of "En Garde" and the stories that everyone will be publishing in the future.

AndyMckenzie!!! said...

I think that getting our first issue out is a big accomplishment especially for this early in the school year. I think that having the first issue online helps for us to save trees and keep the environment nice and safe. I contributed to the "Renovation and Innovation" story, I got all the quotes and took notes about the new and old school.
umm the only thing i saw that could have been improved is the fact that it said by by in front of everyones names. I think a good addition would be a area where you can look through an art gallery of students art work in the school. Like just a bunch of pictures of different pieces of art work ya know.
I think that the future issues of "en garde" are going to be really fun to be involved in. I only need six more words!

Unknown said...

At first, i was a little nervous about putting our first addition to bed because we were running really close to deadline. But overall I think that the first addition of the newspaper went over very well and the process of it was alot of fun! Of all of the stories i've read, i thought they were very catchy and interesting. Also the pictures and other graphics look very professional and nice. I think the online instead of print addition is a great idea and saves a lot of trees! All of the stories were great in my opinion because they concerned about every student at GCHS. But while of course my favorite was the fashion column i contributed. I feel good about my first addition to the paper. But i also know that my writing can only get better from now on. In the next few additions i would like to do my column on guys fashion at our school, special semi-formal attire for homecoming, and upcoming winter fashions. I'm excited for the upcoming additions and GOOD JOB to all the journalism class!!

Potter said...

Hello Parsons.. After reading Blakes comment, I have come to the conclusion that he really wants to get in your pants.... Anyway.. Back to the question. I was really excited we got out our first newspaper on friday! I have never done anything like this before, so it was an awesome new experience. I, along with Andy went to interview Baker, Ferrer and many teachers for information. That went really well; We got alot of info. Then came the writing part. That didn't exactly work out for us. Thank God you stayed after school with us and did most of it for us. I think we should do a story on the special needs technology. It would make a very good story in my opinion; plus Ferrer requested it. Well I'm late for class now, so I got to go. Later Parsons.

Josh Howerton "Chuck Schwab" said...

I thought that getting our first newspaper out was good and that it is a good thing that we already have got our first paper out after only two weeks of school. I contributed to the online paper three articles that can be found on the website. Two of my articles can be found under sports and they are a 2008 Greenup County Football preview and a Greenup County Football prediction article. My third article can be found under news and is a interview that I did with Greenup County's Head Football Coach, Mike Sammons. I also had written a fourth article that was not published on the web site that was a game summary of the Green and Gold Game that was played on August 21st, in which the Gold team, in white jersey's, won the game. I think it can be improved by getting rid of the little mistakes that were in the first issue, the main one being that I saw was the word "By" was in front of the writers name twice, saying "By By _____________". Other stories that I probably will be working on is a couple more interviews with football players and some more game summarys.

NathanHernandez said...

I think our first newspaper went pretty well. My Spanish teacher took us to the website and we (me, Shelby, and Allison) showed everybody what we had written. I like the name of the paper. It’s French. French rocks. I think our website could be improved by making it look more like an actual newspaper instead of an online newspaper. I know that’s practically impossible. I think the layout of it right now is passable but one you can actually hold would be cooler. I’m in drama so I would like to write about anything that goes on in there like, the first performance of “Bang, Bang You’re Dead” in Greenup County High School history. Our instructor said she’s tried to do this for the past six years but this might actually be the group to do it.

Shelby said...

I really enjoyed writing, and the outcome, of our first edition of the paper. This class is a lot of fun and definitely different from any of my other classes and I really enjoy it. Overall, I think that everyone worked really hard to get things done and it shows. It appears that the paper will only continue to get better and better with each edition. I agree with a couple of people that we should provide a print copy during big events. Otherwise, I like the online idea. It fits our budget, hah.

I contributed the feature article on the new Media Center for the paper. It wasn't a bad topic to write about .. I'm not too picky about what my subject is though. I'm pretty sure I would rather do something besides sports .. news, features, reviews, editorials, whatever is fine with me. Ummm, I have a few more words left to go sooo .. Great job journalism class, and I hope it only gets better from here.

allison<3bryan said...

I was super excited about getting our first issue out! I thought we all did a great job and that our topics really covered what Greenup County High School students need to know. I contributed to the paper a review of our upcoming cross-country year. It looks like it will be a good one, by the way. Very few things can be improved that I saw. The reviewing/editing was perfect and the stories interesting. The only thing i can think of is maybe giving more details. For the next issue I would like to do an article on any of the following: Farmer Day, The Back Yard Brawl otherwise known as the Greenup vs. Russell game, any new movies such as the new Harry Potter, and political information about Obama and Mccain. Oh and I love the newsletter idea about replacing Uncle Sam with Mr. Baker's face and saying "I want you to read the Greenup County High School newspaper."

Mr. Parsons said...

Great posts, guys!

I am glad to see that everyone is so positive about the newspaper - we got some great articles out there, and it will just keep getting better as we get more experience under our belts.

There is a lot of exciting stuff on the horizon - the webcasts will be huge, and the literary magazine will be totally awesome. If we keep working this hard, the school will notice our efforts.

Once again, congrats to you guys - you are the ones that put the paper together.

Parsons