It was 8 p.m. Friday night.
The weather was unusually warm for the second week in February, and all other teachers and students scurried away from the building as soon as the 2:40 p.m. bell rang.
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From the category archives:
Staff Management
There is something about working together toward one common goal that creates a special bond.
For spring delivery books, that time is here – distribution time. The Idea File has numerous articles full of tips on making your Distribution Day a smooth success. Here is one of our fun classics full of sound advice for handing out your yearbook.
The job seemed overwhelming. The class was once a dumping ground. Lying on the floors, escaping for lunch midway through class and only having to take a few pictures each semester was the norm. The class was yearbook and the operation was titanic.
New yearbook advisers routinely face obstacles, but when the little pink phone message sheet appeared in my mail tray in mid-November, it aroused no suspicion. The message seemed harmless: “Call the yearbook plant.” Yet, the news I learned when I made that call was straight out of the yearbook X-files.
As yearbook adviser, you are the captain of a ship setting out for a one-year voyage with an inexperienced crew. If you have been on this trip before, you know about the rough waters ahead. It is likely you have already begun to prepare. However, if this is your maiden voyage, you probably are not sure what to expect.
After a rough year in yearbook, with a staff that wanted to make their own rules; that wanted to break long-standing traditions; that did not want to take responsibility for their own actions; that did not have a lot of confidence; with parents that did not understand that yearbook is not like a “real” class, that it is more like a “real” business; and so on and so forth. Well, let us just say, after all that I knew I needed help in revamping and reorganizing my yearbook journalism class. So, what did I do? As crazy as it may sound, I went to the school’s dance teacher for help.
Putting together a yearbook is no easy task, especially in high school. Staffers have to plan the entire book, coming up with a theme and making overall coverage decisions. Then there are the school events – lots of them – each requiring coverage by a writer and photographer. Once the events are covered, the editing-rewriting-editing process begins. Cutlines, headlines, tool lines follow, along with the spread design. All of this, in addition to homework, sports and everything else high school brings.
During my first few years as yearbook adviser, I wanted to have control over everything. I did not want the students to have too much responsibility for fear of mistakes and errors in the yearbook. As a result, the yearbook process became cumbersome and overwhelming. It took up a large part of each school day and, frankly, the better part of my life.
Choosing a yearbook staff can be the most important decision an adviser makes all year. Many yearbook advisers have faced the hazards of announcing over the public address system that anyone who wants to join the yearbook should meet after school. This approach often meets with various unwelcome responses, and perhaps no response at all. Often the result of such a tactic is the appearance of a clique, which has arrived to “do” the yearbook. It is at this point that the adviser is at the mercy of the students.
