Mancos High School, following its commitment to project based learning and career pathways, has started its own student newspaper.
The paper, which the students dubbed The Notebook, covers school and community events while allowing students to get a taste of what newspaper writing entails.
Students write the stories and take photographs.
Suzette Brewer, a former journalist, teaches the journalism class, along with ELA at the high school.
Brewer said students wanted to try something new, and the student-run newspaper was born.
“I said, ‘We really kind of need our own thing, our own voice and I want you guys to run this thing,’” Brewer said. “This is totally student driven, and they voted on the name. They work really hard every week.”
The students learn how to write in Associated Press style from the ground up, but Brewer said they’re improving by leaps and bounds every week.
So far, The Notebook has put out about six editions.
“The first couple of weeks, we were just kind of getting our sea legs and they were wrestling with how to do this,” Brewer said. “They were learning things on the fly that you wouldn’t know from ELA.”
For example, student journalists learned how to respond to a source who wanted to review a story before it published.
“I said, “Oh no, we don’t do that, and here’s a link to The New York Times’ policy on not allowing sources to review and improve stories in advance …’ So that was his first walk through the fire,” Brewer said.
Once students started getting the hang of writing for their paper, Brewer said the classroom started turning into a little newsroom.
“Over the past couple weeks, they really have gotten competitive,” Brewer said. “It’s like a little competitive newsroom. But not in a mean way …. They are competitive with each other, but in a very nice, siloed way. People are starting to bring them stories.”
Brewer added that like a real newsroom, students must have their stories turned in by the weekly deadline.
“Deadline day is deadline day, so it is a real newsroom in that sense,” Brewer said. “We follow all the rules of regular journalism.”
There are currently six students in the journalism class: Eva Casey, Lexi Chaffin, Jessica Halladay, Dacota Johnson, Levi Priestley and Tegan Shinn.
The students are mostly freshmen and sophomores, with one senior, and they are all finding their own niche in the paper.
Brewer said one student writes student profiles each week, while another has been writing about mental health.
Despite having busy schedules, the students work to get their stories in on time.
“They do work hard every week. They will stay up at night, the night before deadline … they will finish those stories, and I am so proud of them for that,” Brewer said.
The paper can be read online at sbrewermancos.wixsite.com/the-mancos-notebook.
