Personal Narrative

In this day and age, journalism matters. As a high school journalist, this fact has become more and more evident to me. Journalism is how we communicate news to the masses, and inform the general public about things going on around them that they may not have been aware of. My role as a student journalist has allowed me to be a communicator to my peers at school, as I am able to help my classmates tell their stories.

Going into this unusual school year, I was selected as a coeditor-in-chief of my school newspaper. In a normal year, I would have been trained by my predecessors and had gone to an in-person workshop over the summer, yet due to COVID this did not happen. Along with this challenge, our staff greatly decreased in numbers, as we lost 12 seniors to graduation and a few other staffers due to schedule conflicts, bringing us from 27 staffers to 13. Our numbers were even more reduced, as our staff was divided into three sections for the first quarter of the school year due to the hybrid schedule: A group, B group, and the online group.

To conquer these new challenges, we made many adjustments to our normal procedures. For the first time in my school newspaper's 100+ year history, we opted to not publish a print edition for the time being, and instead decided to publish an eMagazine. We have since published 4 eMagazines this year, and we were met with rave reviews from the community. To efficiently publish, I have personally converted many things that happen in person to online (story ideas to google forms, etc.) and have been met with success. Despite the staff's small numbers, we are closer than ever this year.

Outside of being a communicator to my school, journalism has helped me gain many personal skills. Journalism has made me a confident social butterfly, as I have greatly improved my people skills through interviewing various members of my community. It has also increased my social network, as I have forged good relationships with adults and my peers that I otherwise would not have through student journalism. Journalism has also increased my writing skills, as well as my efficiency on the computer with design. My position as an editor-in-chief has taught me how to effectively lead a diverse group of people.

Get in touch at emhelm1703@gmail.com or helmuthemi@students.cps.k12.in.us