At the end of each school year, many students expect to receive a yearbook, but very few know the time and energy that goes into creating it. From taking pictures to creating page templates to asking interview questions, the yearbook staff gives their all to create a yearbook so that students can reminisce on their high school experience in the future. This collection of pictures and memories is assembled over the entirety of the school year by a group of students who are involved in the yearbook club as well as the advisor, Morgan Schwarz.
The first step in the creation of the yearbook is deciding on a theme that is both eye-catching and displays the school year accurately. The theme decides the organization, coloration, and artistic details of every page in the yearbook. Then layouts and templates are created, including which activities and events go on which pages, the structure of the pages, and photo arrangement. Next, photos are taken at sporting events, school pep fests, band and choir concerts, activity meetings, and more. Those photos are then placed on their rightful page and adjusted to best capture the subject portrayed in the image. Lastly, once final touches have been made, the final draft is sent to Josten’s to be printed, the yearbooks are then shipped to the school, and distributed to the students by the yearbook staff.
This year, the yearbook staff is composed of about 12 middle and high school students. They meet on Wednesdays at 7:30 a.m. as well as on early release days during the first period. This is because, as stated by the advisor, Morgan Schwarz, “In many schools, yearbook is offered as a class. Since we don’t have that class, we need to make the yearbook as a co-curricular or club in order to have a yearbook.” So time must be spent outside of school hours creating the yearbook, and students involved in this club do not receive a class credit for it, unlike other schools.
Staff members are assigned pages they are responsible for completing throughout the school year. On these pages, they are asked to adjust picture and text boxes, take and insert pictures, interview students involved in their assigned activity, and overall, design a visually pleasing page that includes as much of the student body as possible. However not every staff member has the same responsibilities, the photographers are solely accountable for taking pictures, and the editors take on leadership roles.
Pictures are essential to the creation of the yearbook, and without photographers, many of those photos would not exist. According to a staff member, Arica Pagel, her responsibilities as a photographer are, “To try and take as many pictures of events, people, [and] things as I can.” Rather than being assigned a specific page, photographers take pictures of every activity. However, many times, photographers will also have pages of their own, along with providing pictures for the other staff members’ pages.
Similarly to photographers, editors carry out many of the same tasks as a regular staff member, as well as some additional responsibilities. They are the people the staff turns to when they have questions and they often conduct meetings. Editor Chloe Sjoquist, describes her editor-specific abilities as, “I can give my input on different designs of the yearbook like colors and fonts. I also help to edit the staff’s pages.” Editors also work closely with the advisor to direct the yearbook staff and ensure pages are completed to their full potential.
As depicted by yearbook advisor, Morgan Schwarz, her job is to, “Put together a wonderful crew to produce an amazing yearbook. Once the yearbook staff creates their pages, the editors and I go over the pages to make sure they are able to be published. I then submit [it] to Jostens. I also work closely with our Jostens representative, Jeff, to ensure that we have everything we need to be successful.” On top of that, she also assigns pages to the staff and leads meetings, whether over Google Meets or in person.
Though creating the yearbook is time-consuming and requires a whole staff effort, it is all worth it. Especially at the end of the school year when students receive a book full of their high school memories. Progress has been steady on this year’s yearbook, and the autumn portion has recently been completed. In the future, the staff would like to see a greater number of students go out for yearbook and they hope to continue to produce a yearbook that students enjoy.
