The Grizzly Gazette is Golden Valley’s student run newspaper and journalism class. The Gazette has only been in production for two years, and hopes to continue for much longer. But what do the Grizzly Gazette teams do during class, and what is the process of running a newspaper?
The community team, one of four news teams of the class, was interviewed for their perspective of what happens behind the scenes of The Gazette.
The community news team writes about important events or any news that happens in Santa Clarita, Los Angeles, and the world. Community can focus on any local events or breaking news that outbreak in the world.
Each team is run and managed by what we call a Section Editor. This year, the community news Section Editor, Alyssa Ramos, shared her experience about the roles, struggles, and responsibilities that she took on when she was given this position. Ramos shared that, “Some roles I had to take on were editing all the articles in my team and making sure that everything was researched properly before going off to editorial team edits. I also had to make sure that my team was working on articles during the class period.”
A regular class period for section editors can consist of editing articles, approving storyboards, and managing agendas that have to be filled out everyday.
However, struggles may naturally come up that editors have to face.
An issue that she had to go through was that she is “more introverted so I found it harder to talk to and manage my team. But I had to overcome that so I could lead my team and guide them when writing articles.”
Photography is an important aspect of articles, so every news team includes a photographer that learns how to use the camera and uploads images to our journalism software. Ashlynn Escobar, the 2024 community news photographer, mentioned that she switched positions from being a staff writer for CEPAT last semester.
A struggle she faced since the transition was “how to use good photos and how to not get copyrighted.” Photographers must follow copyright rules stating that we can’t take photos off the internet and we must make collages. Escobar mentioned how she uses PicsArt to help with the photos. But something she loved about being a photographer this semester was, “being able to see different versions and styles of photos everyone wants.”
Staff writers make up the majority of The Gazette. They are encouraged to find their niche in writing, or a topic that we like to write or specialize in. Shadd Jimenez, a community news staff writer, shares that his niche is “writing about things that can affect the world as a whole, as community can not only be about Santa Clarita, but about global events.”
Jimenez mentioned that if he were not in community news, he would write for “CEPAT, so I can just write about jazz, because I’m a jazz musician.”
Our journalists are not confined to only writing about what news team they are in. We can write articles that are based in other teams as long as we work with that specific section editor.
Jimenez shares that his favorite article is “The Most Powerful Company You Never Heard Of”, but another article that he is working on now is “Widespread Child Sex Trafficking Exposed – ‘Sound of Freedom’”, which he emphasizes is “going to be very important” for others to read.
Journalism is a very fun and engaging class that promotes different writing styles, teamwork, and leadership roles. If you are interested in learning more about journalism and how to run a newspaper, make sure to sign up for journalism for the 2024-25 school year!
