In high school, I was on the yearbook staff as a photographer and a writer. Whenever we would sell books or when distribution came around, we would have to deal with a mob of people. If someone couldn’t get a book due to limited amounts, they would offer someone double the amount for their book.
I loved being on the yearbook staff and people were always cooperative because everyone wanted to be in the book. It was a token of your high school experiences bound into a single item. So naturally when I found out that Ibis Yearbook was hiring, I wanted in. After sumbmitting my resume and samples of my work, I became a staff writer as well as a member of the PR team.
As a member of the PR team, I had to be one of those annoying people in the breezeway who passed out fliers begging people to take their yearbook photo. This was a huge 180 from my high school experience because a) in high school, everyone went during their English class to take their photo and b) here, NO ONE wants to take their picture for the yearbook.
This year I’m one of the Lifestyles Co-Editors for the book, which puts me and my partner in charge of the biggest and most content heavy section in the book. We also rely on photo submissions, which we have to beg and plead for. There have been times when we’ve had to hold a certain spread because we didn’t have enough photo submissions to make a decent spread.
The amount of apathy towards the college student media is one of the most frustrating things I’ve experienced in college. Nowadays it’s trendy to act like you don’t care, and it makes being in student media a difficult job. Especially because every semester we get calls from grads asking if they can get a book from their graduating year because they didn’t care enough to get it during their senior year. So much for “no ragrets,” huh?
What’s even more frustrating is how our student media publications are praised everywhere but not our own campus. Ibis Yearbook is an award winning book. We have swept so many categories where only our content placed in first, second, and third. Distraction Magazine and the Miami Hurricane are also award-winning publications who both do an amazing job at keeping the student body up to date on events happening on and off campus.
I’m completely aware that nothing is going to change overnight, but if people could see the amount of work and talent that goes into student media, maybe there would be more appreciation towards it. Your yearbook is already paid for in your tuition, so you might as well pick one up!