DesigN
Designing for the purpose of journalism means having the ability to switch seamlessly between different communications platforms and video and visual design programs. The summer before junior year, taking advantage of NCSSM’s IT department and services, I was able to get Adobe Suite from the school and practice using it. For example, I practiced using Photoshop, Premiere Pro, and Lightroom to produce story graphics and video production during AAJA JCamp. In my work, I tend to use The Harvard Crimson and The Daily Tar Heel as inspiration. Here are three programs I use on an everyday basis:
Canva/Photoshop: To help boost engagement on social media, I designed Instagram posts on Canva/Photoshop using the photographs for each articles. If an article does not have a photo, I make an illustration for it. I prefer graphic design that is formal, classy, and to the point.
Premiere Pro: This is my go-to program for video-editing projects, reliable for using in both on-the-fly live broadcasts and for long-term filmmaking.
Adobe InDesign: This is my go-to software for editing and creating the layout (aka how our newspaper issue will look) that month.
Website Design
Created The First Website
In the fall of 2023, The Stentorian became a multimedia news source for the first time. I’d also like to add that all our endeavors in the student newspaper are entirely funded by sponsorship money and basic school funding for only designated for printing in black-and-white.
In the last three months of the 2023-2024 school year, our website and Instagram account have reached over 9k accounts/viewers and 44k impressions. The widespread community engagement and promotion of each published article has drawn renewed interest in the school’s events and in joining The Stentorian’s masthead among the juniors.
The virtual format allows the Stentorian to incorporate more photographs, videos, and charts in our articles (as we had never had color in our newspaper, save for one issue in 2013). For example, in my story about the NCSSM Class of 2024, I performed a statistical analysis on data given to us about college acceptances from the NCSSM Counseling department and converted that data into charts to include on the article on the website. This story had the highest amount of views and engagement (as of July 28, 2024): 410 views on the website, 142 likes on Instagram, and printed and distributed on all 1000 copies of that month’s issue.
The website also allows us to cover more timely topics on the news. Important stories about graduation, or latest budget cuts to different departments in school may not have been timely enough by the time we published our monthly print issue, but could be shared online.
For coverage of more controversial or worldly topics such as politics or the international protests, I take advantage of interactive links to provide evidence for my statements and encourage further engagement with issues.
Social Media Design
This year, I explored ways to increase the engagement and readership of our newspaper through a new social media (Instagram) account. Although there had been Instagram accounts for The Stentorian in the past, they were rarely updated and did not have a large follower base.
Seeking greater engagement on Instagram, I made a conscious effort to design posts for every published story in our print newspaper and post timely and relevant content relating to our school. We were successful; our new Instagram account (@ncssm.stentorian) has published 40 posts/reels since February 2024, gaining over 300 followers and setting records of views and likes on posts.
In the cases where stories do not have appropriate or available photographs to use as the feature image, I illustrate or graphic design digital feature images to use instead:
And here are six of some most-recent posts I made in my senior year now:
These series of posts show that my design style always leans towards a more chic, minimalistic vibe with words and photos. If there is a photo provided to me by the writers or our editorial board’s designated photographers, then I will use it as the post’s featured image. If not, our writer or any student with graphic design experience will be able to send us a visual that they drew or photoshopped out of a combination of many other photos. This allows our Instagram page to be home to a variety of different textures and genres to readers, of which many of them read different articles more closely because they recognize a specific familiar face or building in these featured images.
Editorial Design
I am the designated layout person for my editorial board, so when it’s the time of the month to put all our edited articles onto a beautiful newspaper spread, it is up to me to fit everything on either 8, 12, or 16 pages on Adobe InDesign. I did not have prior experience working with InDesign before becoming editor-in-chief, but I did learn how to use the program quickly from other student publications at my school. I got used to the program’s buttons and functions quickly as I practiced making different spreads and watched YouTube tutorials. This contributed to me finishing one issue per month using 3-4 days by myself.
As examples, here are the first and second issues of the 2024-2025 school year that I put together. Usually, the first, second, second from last, and last page are printed in color, so I use that knowledge to highlight special cover stories, action photos, or group photos. I also take special consideration of the prices that local businesses have exchanged with us in order to put different sizes and locations of ads in our paper.
Here are some examples of the ads I designed for our business sponsors:
Teresa Fang 