“Everyone looks at their yearbook three times; when they first get it, when they get their friends to sign it, and when they find it in their attic years down the road,” said Shana Blankenship, the Yearbook Advisor at Stuttgart High School.
But for the Class of 2021, their yearbook is going to look a little bit different.
Every year Stuttgart High School’s award-winning yearbook program sells hundreds of books. In pre-COVID times, Zeitgeist, the club that creates the yearbook, acted as one of the most influential student-run organizations hosting or covering every event that took place. However, due to fewer in-person events taking place during the school year, they are hard-pressed to get photos for the publication.
To make up for that deficit, they have taken to crowdsourcing, asking students, staff, and family members to send in pictures of their own - anything that captures what life is like for a high school student during this unprecedented time. While this tactic was used before the pandemic to round-out extra pages in the publication, this is the first time it will be the primary source for content. It is one of several changes the yearbook staff has had to embrace this year.
During a pre-COVID school year, sports and social clubs would fill the bulk of the pages. Now, most of those pages are out of commission. To overcome these challenges, a new design principle was implemented when it comes to making new pages.
Gina Forzano, Stuttgart High School senior and co-editor-in-chief of the yearbook, explained the guidelines for the new pages.
“It must be photographable, or recognizable by photos alone, and it must have a place in the heart,” she said.
The yearbook staff has proven themselves dedicated to ensuring their fellow students have a yearbook full of positive memories to look back at in the years to come.
“Their innovative thinking and hard work have not gone unnoticed,” said Blankenship, remarking on the several awards the brand has earned, including the 2019 Balfour Book of Distinction.
Karen Burbach has been the printing company’s representative for Stuttgart High School’s Yearbook program for the past few years and she said there’s been a lot of ‘creating and recreating the wheel’ at Stuttgart. She also said their greater emphasis on the students' contributions from home is something unique to this high school and something she hasn't seen elsewhere.
“They’re submitting pictures and stories about what people have been baking or about their pets, and it really lets there be a new focus on the students and their families at home,” said Burbach. “It’s not just about events, it's got a true human interest element.”
Whatever the remainder of the year brings, the yearbook staff is confident that the product they are creating will reflect the perseverance, determination and strength of every student of Stuttgart High School to look back on for years to come.
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