I designed this spread around the central images of Edina’s recently honored music teachers, hoping to emulate the look of a Marvel poster to reflect their lasting impact. While the article’s length limited my ability to include more alternate story forms, I prioritized one key infographic to contextualize the band and orchestra programs for readers. I removed the backgrounds and layered rows of student photos on each side — ranging from 9th grade orchestra to concert band members — to visually emphasize the scale of Edina’s band and orchestra departments. I also scattered music notes and added bars behind the title to give the page more character while reinforcing the theme.

For my first-ever spread, I focused on creating alternate story forms to highlight the different aspects of caffeine consumption relevant to the article. I researched ways in which the caffeine affects bodily function and looked into the amount of caffeine in the most popular beverages offered at our school. I also created a cohesive color palette evoking feelings of calm and sleep to connect the spread even more with the content.

With this being my first spread since receiving feedback at the NSPA convention, I aimed to balance the visual appeals with clarity by focusing on the news aspects of the story. I thought the story demanded that the design provide resources for readers to refer to and to understand the scope of the opioid crisis so I researched hotlines, tools, and steps to respond to opioid-related emergencies and integrated them into the design. The most challenging parts of this design were creating the “Prevention, pursue, protect” lines, which I wanted to look like caution tape to bring attention to the gravity of the topic, and segmenting the article with different fonts, article widths, and colors to guide readers through each part of the story.

For this spread, I worked closely with artists from the start of the design process and sketched layout ideas together so their pieces could be more intentionally integrated into the design. I created a series of infographics to help readers visualize the makeup of government staff and understand how state and local budgets impact students’ lives. To reinforce the article’s focus on civic engagement while grounding readers in a familiar context, I incorporated visual cues of election season such as ballots, yard signs, an “I Voted” sticker, and red, white, and blue colors. 

For this spread, I mimicked a desk workspace scattered with items representing the main back-to-school changes in the four areas of parking and security, bathroom passes, phone use restrictions, and attendance policies, each accompanied by embedded ASFs to inform and guide readers. I leaned heavily into illustrative design, drawing elements like the wood texture, paper people chain, pencil, toy car, and bathroom pass to create a cohesive and symbolic spread. This design is a remnant of my newsmagazine attempts from the beginning of the year and it printed poorly on our paper but I’m still proud of how the layout reflects unity and transparency, especially through intentional details such as the rainbow color scheme, thematic article placement, and the contextual infographics woven into the overall design.

To underscore Zephyrus’s neutrality on this special-edition cover, I layered photos of the two mayoral candidates (on cropped backgrounds to emphasize them) diagonal to each other and arranged their names opposite to mirror how movie posters bill names and photos of actors to ensure balance without suggesting bias. I also adjusted the column width of the mayoral election article and emphasized the word “Mayoral” to make the story distinct from the other cover stories about city council and commissioner elections. To reinforce the election theme, I incorporated an electoral college forecast bar below the masthead that I updated regularly in hopes that the data would be accurate on distribution day and I added a simple “Election Edition” label with a red, white, and blue gradient in the masthead to not draw away from the publication’s identity while still highlighting the issue’s focus.