The Future Of News Media: My Experience Attending A Journalism Workshop For High Schoolers
Story and photo by Judah Hillman
On October 18th, I attended the Maryland-D.C. Scholastic Press Association’s (MDCSPA) fall workshop for high school journalists at the University of Maryland College Park. The workshop was advertised as an opportunity to meet other local student journalists and work with experts in the field to build our journalistic skills. As I made my way across the beautiful campus towards the imposing journalism building, I was given a warm welcome to this opportunity to learn more about the world of journalism by the MDCSPA staff and the other student journalists attending the workshop.
Weeks prior to this event, I signed up for two workshops: “Ramping Up Graphics & Design,” a workshop about how to design with Canva, and “Student Leadership of Publications.” Each lasted for roughly an hour. During my first session about Canva, I hoped to gain skills on how to create attractive designs for FNN and my personal artistic pursuits. Our instructor had 20 years of experience designing high school and college yearbooks, and extensive experience using Canva. She taught workshop participants techniques to create a transparent background over an image, design scoreboard sheets, make color palettes for brands, and even how to properly use and edit templates for our desired vision. I sat inside a room on the second floor along with other high school students from all around Maryland and D.C. It was interesting to meet a group of people who were so completely different from me, but who share my passion for journalism. The skills I learned in this session applied more to yearbook scholars, whom there were a lot of in the room. Nevertheless I found much of this activity to be helpful and fun, and I learned many techniques that I can apply to our newspaper and to my own projects.
Right after the first workshop, scholars were given a small tour exclusively around the College of Journalism. The tour guide informed the group about different rooms and programs, and answered general questions about the University of Maryland. Despite previously familiarizing myself with their women’s volleyball team, I didn’t really know what other programs or events the university offered. Starting the tour on the first floor of Knight Hall, the tour guide mentioned the many windows in the building. I didn’t particularly notice the building’s architecture any more than its beauty, overlooking a lovely walkway outside. The guide explained that the many windows were intended to symbolize the ‘transparency’ of journalism, gathering the truth rather than changing stories to reflect what the public wanted to think. As a student journalist who often writes articles about government policies, this served as a reminder of the importance of remaining unbiased because of the powerful ways that the media influences public opinion. I learned that what you say can greatly impact society, so it's best to relay information with transparency. As they say, “with great power comes great responsibility.”
During the tour, the group not only enjoyed the scenery inside and out, but we also got to tour the many broadcasting rooms inside the building and learn about their purpose. UMD specializes in investigative, sports, and e-sports journalism. If you want to dive deeper into social injustices or corruption, inform the public about local football games, or even write about competitive gaming and interviews, there are many opportunities at UMD to help you along your desired path.
My second and last event of this workshop pertained to student leadership of publications. When I signed up for this workshop, I wanted to know how I could be a better leader to my peers, both in FNN and in my other projects. I sat with twelve other students in a small lecture room, and we were instructed to work together to draw a picture and sculpt an object out of play-dough to build communication and collaboration skills. The instructor used this activity to introduce us to the Hersey-Blanchard Model of leadership, which consists of four categories: ‘able and willing’, ‘unable but willing’, ‘able but unwilling’ and ‘unable and unwilling’. Essentially, I learned that as a leader, there are a lot of communication skills involved. It is important to get to know and learn to work with a variety of learning dynamics and personality types to be an effective leader. I am excited to bring my newly-honed leadership skills back to my peers in FNN to push me and others forward towards success in journalistic pursuits and beyond.
Overall this was a very productive workshop, where I learned about the UMD journalism programs, and new techniques for effective leadership and design. Each skill that I learned can be applied both in FNN and beyond. I would participate in an event like this again, and I would encourage others who are interested in journalism to get involved with the MDCSPA or attend a similar event.
Judah Hillman is a junior at Friendship Tech Prep Academy.