Leadership & Team Building

Being the editor-in-chief of The Charger is more than scheduling deadlines and editing articles. I also have to manage a 25-30 person staff, ensuring that everyone's voice is heard, each member is doing their job, that I am building strong relationships within my staff, and more. But above all, I want to ensure that I am fostering an environment that can help others find their passion for journalism much like I did. Throughout my time as a section editor and the editor-in-chief, I have developed and grown leadership skills such as adaptability, innovation, conflict management, decision making, and critical thinking. As a leader within and outside of the classroom, I have learned the importance of accountability and leading by example as classmates are looking to me for direction and instruction as well as guidance in order to complete daily tasks.

Leadership & Team Building

At The Charger, our staff has a work hard, play hard mentality. We celebrate birthdays and holidays often in the newsroom and celebrate the distribution day of our print edition each month by getting lunch together. As editor-in-chief, I foster a positive environment in which my staff can enjoy all the amazing parts of journalism and will never be scared to ask a question or speak up.

For our newspaper, we spend the first day of every month coming up with ideas for each section of the newspaper and write them on the whiteboard, a day we call "maestro". Some of these stories will go to our print edition, others to our online, and some to our broadcast. I lead our maestro in a way that encourages others to share ideas and opinions regarding story selection to ensure that everyone has a say in what we cover that month.

Our newspaper class hosts lots of fun parties within newspaper, usually for birthdays or holidays. Our biggest event is our Secret Santa party. Each year we draw names, buy each other "gag gifts", and meet at a staff members house to eat dinner and exchange gifts. Personally, this is one of my favorite events because it brings The Charger staff closer.

After we receive our print edition each month, our staff is allowed to leave OHS campus during our newspaper period. Generally, we split into five or six different cars, distribute to our various locations, and then eat lunch together at a local restaurant. Distribution days are a nice reward for the newspaper staff after a month of hard work, and help bring us closer.

In order to commincate with my staff outside of school hours, all of our members are a part of our Band groupchat. This allows me to send my staff messages to remind them of deadlines, let them know what we will be doing in class tomorrow, and send messages of encouragement. As editor-in-chief, I take it as my responsibility to motivate my staff through kindness, as well as ensuring that they are aware of any upcoming deadlines or important newspaper-related events.

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