MADELYN AUGUSTINE
When I first joined the Advanced Journalism class and Catalyst newspaper staff, I was exceptionally hesitant to do anything other than write and take photos because those were the only two things that I had experience in. About two weeks in, I decided to push myself out of my comfort zone and give broadcasting a try. Producing broadcasts has now become one of my favorite ways to tell a story. In my work below, it is evident that my execution of a broadcast has drastically improved. Also, I am now co-anchor of the MWHS Wildcat News, our school's weekly broadcast.
NEWS
Click to play each broadcast.
This was the first broadcast I ever completed. For the first time, our German program took part in a two-way exchange program. Students from Germany came and studied at our school for two and a half weeks. After edits from my adviser, my partner and I decided to have this broadcast be bilingual and had two of the German exchange students translate all of our voice overs.
Each year a few of the football parents get together and decorate the boys locker room hallway for the week of playoffs. Before creating this broadcast I had no idea how much work went into what I just thought was a typical school tradition. My partner and I had to interview several parents and read through old documents to uncover the unique story of the playoffs hallway.
SPORTS NEWS/FEATURE
This broadcast is one of my favorite broadcasts I have done yet. Initially I was at the game solely to take photos, but when my adviser came he told me that I should turn it into a broadcast. I did not have a tripod to work with, so I had to shoot everything by hand. It was a challenge to keep my hand steady enough to get clear shots, but in the end we completed a broadcast that I am extremely proud of. Recently, this broadcast has also received a superior award in the 2019 Neb. JEA Winter Competition.
The dance team at my school has a surplus of talent and qualifies for Nationals every year. Before heading to Nationals, all of the Neb. dance teams have a showcase. Since all of their competitions are out of town, the dance team rarely gets covered, so my partner and I decided to do a story on their showcase. While filming my partner and I struggled to find a quiet place to record our interviews because there were around 500 people in attendance. Our final product ended up better than we expected.
FEATURE
This is the first broadcast that I created entirely by myself. When I first heard about Kayla I was amazed that she was in a professional ballet production at such a young age. I traveled to Lincoln, Neb. to get the necessary footage of her rehearsing. Upon interviewing her I discovered that she did not dance with anyone else from around the area which made it impossible for me to get any onscreen, secondary interviews. Despite the fact that Kayla is the only source, I am still content with the story.
Before winter break my adviser had told me about a senior that spent her off-blocks volunteering in our school library. After the break, I decided that I wanted to discover more about why she spent her free time working in the library. The biggest struggle was trying to film unique footage to act as B-roll. Also, my partner for this broadcast was new to the class, so throughout the process of producing the story I was also trying to teach her how to create a broadcast.
PSA
Every year the junior and senior class boards work with one of our rival school's junior and senior class boards to organize the Hoops for Hope basketball game. The two schools compete against one another to see who can raise the most money, from T-Shirt sales, for the American Cancer Society. In this public service announcement (PSA), I worked with my fellow co-anchor to help bring awareness to the event and its importance. I also created the info-graphics that we used in the broadcast.
This broadcast is not the traditional PSA. With an activity fair for the incoming class of freshmen coming up, my adviser tasked my co-anchor and I with creating a promotion video for our school. We had to sift through dozens of folders of videos to find a wide variety that showcased everything that our school had to offer. As a senior, this video was both entertaining and sad to create because it reminded me of everything that I would never have the opportunity to do again.
This school year, our district adopted the slogan #BeKind. A few weeks into the school year it was evident that many of the students didn't fully understand the message that #BeKind represented. My partner and I decided to create an informal PSA that would help the student body grasp the true meaning of the slogan and hopefully make them take the movement seriously.
ANCHORING
On this edition of the MWHS Wildcat News, it was my first time ever anchoring. I was beyond nervous, but tried my best to hide it. The more I anchored the more comfortable I became on camera.
This was the first week that we had microphones to anchor with. It took a few weeks to learn how to get both microphones to work simultaneously, but now that we figured it out we always use them.
This edition is one of the more well-rounded broadcasts we've produced. We retouched our logo, kept the introduction and used the microphones. We also managed to get all of the filming done within twenty minutes, our personal record so far.
For this edition of the MWHS Wildcat News, we implemented a more official introduction to our broadcast. The week before I had created the introduction and had one of my classmates record the voice overs. We now use the introduction each week. We also decided to add our news logo to the corner for the duration of the broadcast.
Above is an example of one of the scripts that I write each week for anchoring. Typically, I work with my adviser and co-anchor to decide which stories will be airing in that week's edition of the MWHS Wildcat News and then I will write the script. The following day we will record the anchoring segments and then edit the entire broadcast together.