Web + Social Media
A seamlessly designed website serves as the beating heart of a school newspaper, connecting students, staff, and the wider community in ways that were once unimaginable.
Looking Into Critiques from Last Year
Importance of Strong Web
Last year, the most abundant comment amongst our critiques from Quill and Scroll was the lack of cohesiveness and organization across our website. Our reviewer specifically stated, “I still applaud a well-organized website and one reason is that organizational excellence really helps the staff keep their own repor4ng organized and accessible.” Since receiving these comments, we have made several changed to the website, regarding the categorization of stories, and I specifically, have put more emphasis on understanding the inner-workings of the website to best publish content.
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Importance of High Quality Photos
Getting Attention in Today's Media Landscape
If I have realized anything through years of being active on Instagram and other social medias, it is that it is extremely hard to actually grab a viewer’s attention. We absorb so much content and media everyday at record-breaking metrics in human history. So, it requires truly grabbing posts to do this. The best way to draw someone in is an extraordinary photo. One with emotion and character. One that makes people sit and marvel for even a millisecond. I am constantly working on bettering my photography skills, in order to bring that attention-grabbing feature to my stories that we post throughout social media.
Importance of High Quality Infographics
Attention Grabbers
The second way to best target audiences on social media is high quality, informative infographics. As a staff this year, we have appointed two people officially to graphics and are as a whole undergoing a graphics focus, as we navigate how to best reach audiences on different platforms. In a comment story I wrote last year, I partnered with our staff's graphic creator Connie Erdozain to draw people to the story ("Class ranking outdated, should not determine academic achievement").
Social Media Portfolio
Instagram Account
Social media is currently managed by other members of our staff and its maintenance does not fall under my roles. Despite this, I understand its value and work to assist with social media content in ways that I can.
We currently have a lively Instagram, X, and Facebook account that maintains at least weekly posts. We take photos from the stories and activate readership by posting them with the first few paragraphs of a story.
Room for Improvement
Variety of Posts
I believe there is some room for improvement on our social media channels that I will work to implement next year when I might assume a more senior position on the staff. Firstly, social media platforms are constantly changing landscapes and I believe that we need to work to adjust to the popularized methods of communication on each given platform. For example, we are yet to utilize the Reels feature on Instagram even though it has been around for over a year, and I want to work to increase this usage and variety overall. This is important if we truly want to connect with audiences, especially younger high school age margins.
Looking Forward
Use of Next Door and LinkedIn
Additionally, I feel we have room to improve in regard to our social media portfolio. In Atlanta, NextDoor is a main hub of information and community activity and we have been extremely slow on the uptake of this device. If we can get on the networks of the surrounding neighborhoods, we can harness direct access to a platform that people check daily for local updates already. Additionally, we need to react to the Twitter shifts and develop a Threads and Tribal account to accommodate the censoring differences on the different platforms.