The Tower alumni in this story reached out to us over Facebook, explaining how he 'replicated The Tower' in the paper he advises for. I was immediately intrigued by this. What exactly does replicating mean? What makes Tower so great that it should be replicated? How is their paper different? These are all questions I got the answer to after interviewing him. It's an interesting angle and I'm glad I was able to write his story.
We recently put out a 12 page issue celebrating 90 years of our school and The Tower. We reached out to a ton of alum and crafted a variety of stories. The main reason for this issue was to make people aware that our budget is lowering every year. In this editorial, I was quite frank and transparent. I was worried the editorial would sound whiny, but I think I focused more on how we are handling these problems. I am especially proud of the last paragraph where I thank the community for letting us tell their stories and support our publication. I wrote the piece knowing a lot of the community would read it and am happy with its turnout.
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This is probably my favorite story I ever wrote. Last year, we did a special edition fat tab about sex. I signed up for a feature about purity rings because I was genuinely interested in the topic. The story turned out being about a particular student at my school. I'm proud how I focused on people, rather than the broad concept of it.
This column was written as a result of someone forgetting to write a column for issue. It was Monday afternoon, the day after I got back from a music festival in California. I offered my column idea, wrote the piece in 2 hours, and placed it on the page. Although I didn't have a lot of preparation, I like how I documented the trip.
I took an in-depth approach in explaining the new SAT format and the effects it will have on students. I was fortunate enough to get interviews with the founders of a couple study prep sites and blogs who were incredibly educated on the subject. These strong, credible sources made the story so informative and rich in detail.
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I go to a lot of concerts. I saw the story idea on our sign up sheet named 'someone who likes to go to concerts' and signed myself up immediately. I didn't know the exact angle I would take, but I later decided to talk about the different kinds of venues I go to and the unique qualities of each. Also, I was able to include a lot of my concert photos to compliment the story, which was awesome to see.
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I choose stories that I am passionate about or am interested in. A lot of my writings consist of some sort of concert or album review because I am a music fanatic. It has been a nice outlet to describe the music I like. In fact, I don't really write my reviews for an audience, it's more for myself. I also have written a lot of editorials, especially this year. I enjoy writing them. They are concise, factual, and convincing, which are all characteristics that I tend to convey in my writing. I believe my editorials are a good model for younger staffers who are not as experienced with writing the certain time of story. Below includes some of my favorite pieces I wrote throughout my years on The Tower.
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*click on photos to magnify them
My staff has a lot of issues with our administration attempting to restrict the power of the press. A few days before this was written, our administrators sat us down for a meeting and critiqued our story topics, our diction, and how we 'target the administration'. It was upsetting to hear the authority in our school talk so aggressively to students. We wrote this editorial to express the legacy of our newspaper and also touch on our first amendment rights. It was a long, quote heavy editorial, but it successfully proclaims our pride.
My staff has a lot of issues with our administration attempting to restrict the power of the press. A few days before this was written, our administrators sat us down for a meeting and critiqued our story topics, our diction, and how we 'target the administration'. It was upsetting to hear the authority in our school talk so aggressively to students. We wrote this editorial to express the legacy of our newspaper and also touch on our first amendment rights. It was a long, quote heavy editorial, but it successfully proclaims our pride.
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