Unique Creekside staff ready to tackle this year’s book
Written by Evan Blackwell, CJE
All-inclusive coverage, where every student in a school is mentioned in the yearbook, is a common goal for yearbook staffs. But imagine a school of more than 1,200 students where nearly half the student body works for the yearbook staff.
That’s the reality for Creekside Middle School in Carmel, Indiana, and Scott Chelli, yearbook adviser.
“We have a unique setup that poses some real challenges and keeps us on our toes,” said Chelli.
District policy for Creekside calls for Chelli’s yearbook and journalism classes to be open to as many kids as possible every school year. The staff doesn’t change over every year. It changes up every quarter.
In Chelli’s first year as Creekside’s adviser with the 2016 yearbook, he estimated there were close to 500 students that contributed to the book.
“I don’t just have one set of 30 kids creating our book, I literally have hundreds,” said Chelli. “It will be the same this year, as well.”
When Chelli began teaching yearbook last year, he said he was also given the charge from his principal to integrate more technology into the class, and modernize the photos and layouts.
Chelli said Creekside’s 2016 yearbook made great strides in all those areas, from the quality of the photos, to the theme, the colors and the text. In the spread example that can be seen above, the dominant image was taken using an iPhone.
“At least 90% of the photos were taken this way,” said Chelli. “It was a big change from prior years.”
Work has now begun on Creekside’s 2017 yearbook, and once again, there should be plenty of help on hand for this large, creative staff.
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