When people work together as a team, it shows in the finished product. Without a yearbook “team,” it would be impossible to produce a book. However, it is up to you how tight your team is. The tighter the team, the better the book. Below are some suggestions for bringing your staff together, and creating a family atmosphere inside (and outside) the yearbook room.
tips
The staff could not contain their excitement. They showed me their cover design and said it would look “really cool” in neon orange with a bright green alligator holding our school mascot protruding from the wide open jaws. Such is the life of a South Florida yearbook adviser. When I awoke from this nightmare, I thought again about who actually controls the book. While some advisers control every step of the process, from cover to endsheets and everything in between, others hold to the philosophy that this is a student production and decisions should be made by the editor and editorial staff members.
Tasks that will make deadlines easier on you and your adviser.
Basketball tends to be a difficult sport to shoot because it is played in a gymnasium. Most high school gymnasiums are not well lit, thus it is very difficult to get a shutter speed high enough to capture the action unless you use a very high ISO film (3200).
“When a tool is used efficiently, you conserve time and energy. When meetings are run efficiently, you conserve all the resources available to management: time, energy, money, facilities, materials and human effort.”
Shooting soccer is, in many ways, similar to shooting football. A large field makes it frustrating at times but there are also lots of possibilities since lighting is seldom a problem and much of the action tends to take place in four areas. Lighting is not a problem because most games are held during daylight hours. Even slow lenses can be used with great results. The four areas tend to be behind the goal, directly off to the side of the goal, in the corner of the field and on the sidelines shooting towards the large center area.
Organizing for the yearbook deadline can sometimes be an overwhelming task, but taking the following tips under advice may make your task much easier to handle.
They say that good work is its own reward, and when a yearbook staff begins pulling the first yearbooks from the box, you know this is true. However, by the time they begin unpacking books, they have been waiting for their reward for nearly a year. Because yearbook is such a long-term project, a series of small rewards along the way can keep a staff on track and motivated.
Before you begin to write, read over your interview notes and gather related terms and important information. Listing and clustering start the juices flowing; they put you in the writing mode.
The best approach to managing your time is the approach that works best for you. There are many general suggestions that can be made to guide you in the right direction, but you may have to adapt these “formulas” to fit your specific life-style. Remember to keep your life under control!