From Words to a Website: The Nouvelles Process

You must have looked at the Nouvelles website and the pages of articles my fellow club members and I have written, and thought, “Wow, how did they even pull this off?” Honestly, I sometimes find myself wondering about that, too. But half-jokes aside, we here in Nouvelles have a step-by-step procedure for writing, editing, and compiling our articles to the website it is today. 

First, we decide on article ideas that we’d like to write about. This is the most fun bit: you get to choose any topic under the sun to write about — granted that it doesn’t go against our school’s PVMO (which is less strict than you may realize). We are also open to including works from you, our readers, on our website (so if you have something to share, don’t hesitate to ask a Nouvelles member!). Some articles, especially those that will end up in JCA’s official website, are delegated to various writers and are to be completed within the month. The articles that go to Nouvelles’ personal website have a much later due date, depending on whether the Nouvelles issue of the year will be annually or semesterly.

Then, comes the writing. Sometimes, all the information to be written will come from yourself and your observations; other times, you’ll be asking for interviews from relevant students or teachers. Usually, you’re given about 2-3 weeks to write an article, and most members each complete two articles within one semester. In my experience, whether you’re given time to work on your articles during club meetings depends on the moderator, but I find the time to be sufficient regardless. Writing during sessions does, however, provide less strain on me to finish my work besides the growing homework pains.

Once you’ve finished, you tell the senior members: the Nouvelles moderator, the editor-in-chief, the associate editor, and/or the corresponding section head. When the edits and remarks have been duly placed, you review them and edit your article to fit, taking time to truly understand their comments and how you can improve your writing in the future. This exchange of edits goes on for usually two to three rounds, ir more, before your article is declared completed. Hooray!

If you’re in charge of layouting the website, however, the work doesn’t stop there. Once articles have been approved, you must place them into the website, taking care that the layout is not only aesthetic but also clear and understandable. Additionally, aesthetic and relevant photos must either be chosen from the internet and cited, or taken by the authors themselves. These must be added to the website as well. As the main layout artist this year, I can tell you that this is the easiest and least brain-wracking, but the most tedious part of the process. All I’ll say is that if the copy-paste button could be broken, mine would have fallen into sheer disrepair ages ago.

And lastly, once that ordeal’s over, the completed website gets handed over to the department head for reviewing. Usually, edits and remarks in this stage are minimal, and little needs to be changed. And if the website passes the final checking, then voilà — the Nouvelles website can be published for the whole world to see!

     Don’t let all these complicated-sounding steps daunt you — in this case, it’s almost easier done than said. Yes, creating the website can be draining at times, but the end product is more than worth the work. The combined efforts of all Nouvelles members didn’t go into watching YouTube or playing games for hours on end, but into a tangible end result that we can all be proud of. So if ever you want to be part of a project bigger than yourself, Nouvelles is the club for you. And if not, then on behalf of all Nouvelles members, we hope you appreciate our work and our writings.

If you came from the article “So, What is Nouvelles?: A Crash Course” and haven’t yet finished reading it, click here to go back.