web &
social media
1. Web
An idea on the brainstorming document where section members can type out ideas and suggest other ideas.
Speaking with my Co-News Editor Youqi Huang during our annual promotion video.
During the 2020-21 school year, the Epic decided to not continue a print publication because of the pandemic and only have a virtual publication through our website. While different, we adapted to it, and as a section editor, I became an honorary “Web Editor,” as all our stories were published through our website. Adapting to the change was difficult, but I was able to transition online, edit stories, and help writers in my section create graphics that would entice readers in.
The biggest change was our design process. While most of the time we used to draw on paper together, we had to do everything on Zoom. As a result, I used Zoom’s whiteboard feature to draw designs. I also connected my computer to my iPad, so I can easily sketch out ideas for my graphics. Because we couldn’t easily comment and share ideas about story graphics, I implemented a Google Docs system for every single issue for people to jot down ideas for one another. Since people are more hesitant to speak with Zoom, this allowed them to still share comments, and people could reference it later when they were working on graphics individually. The list provided good suggestions that helped with the design process.
The editing process was pretty similar to what would have happened with a print publication. I continued using online tools like Google Docs’ comment and suggestion modes to give feedback.
In terms of web responsibilities, I helped our web editors upload stories and fix errors on stories, which could be online layout issues. Through the experience, I was able to master the SNO interface and learn how to navigate and create pages/stories. That experience helped when we needed quick edits on the website, and I could easily go in and fix it.
News Editor, but online?
One of the Harvard admissions exhibits in the SFFA v. Harvard trial that I obtained through Justia.
Anderson Memorial Bridge in Cambridge, Massachusetts: home to Harvard University. The headline of my story was, "From Harvard to Proposition 16: The truth about race-based affirmative action in higher education."
The affirmative action history timeline integrated in my story.
The infographic that I made that highlight Lynbrook students' opinion on affirmative action.
Affirmative Action Story
For one of my favorite projects in the Epic, I wrote about the pressing issue of affirmative action. In 2020, California had a proposition on the ballot called Prop 16, which would reinstate race-based affirmative action in public education, hiring and contracting. With a direct impact on students applying for the UC schools, I wanted to write an in-depth article that covered the intricate details of what the term affirmative action means and debunk all the misconceptions and myths. I interviewed a myriad of sources, going on a journalistic journey that propelled my interviewing and source searching skills. Through my process, I interviewed state and local officials, professors, activists and of course students! This special project that I took on went on top of my regular workload and was a “web exclusive” story, and I really wanted to push our publication to use more interactive elements through our website. As a result, I pioneered the use of many multimedia tools that told stories even better.
The first was the timeline, which I used Timeline by Knight Labs to create. Because I didn’t want to simply write about all the intricate details of every single significant affirmative action case throughout history (there is a lot), I went with the creative, intuitive and interactive storytelling method. I used their template spreadsheet to organize and program the timeline before coding a link insertion into our SNO website. While common in other publications, our paper had never done anything like this before. Seeing how fellow websites like El Estoque often utilized it, I brought it to the Epic and became one of the first people to use this method of multimedia coverage in our online pages.
Additionally, I utilized our social media platform to poll students on their opinions on different factors of college admissions. This provided a way for us to gather perspectives and also hear back from different people who we wouldn’t have been able to find as sources. After doing so, I created an infographic and compiled all the data that showed students’ perspectives on the issues, using Canva to create it.
I also included legal documents in my reporting, showing students the clear raw information that different court cases provide, so they can see the information for themselves. Because I also wrote about the Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard case, which’s appeal was happening during the time of me writing the article, I searched for the raw data that Harvard’s admissions team compiled. While there were many news sources that summarized the evidence, I wanted to get to the root of the sources to fact-check data and show its validity or falseness to the students in my school who care about the issue. It was very difficult to find the raw data, but I discovered the legal website Justia had an archive of all millions of legal proceedings. After going through legal reports on Harvard’s websites and SFFA’s web page, I discovered hundreds of documents, or “exhibits,” which I individually looked at. After checking over 100 documents, many containing over 100 pages themselves, I found Harvard’s presentation of their predictions and would-be admissions statistics. It was a long search, but by utilizing the web, I was able to go beyond summarizing facts and show students the direct sources in an easy-to-understand and accessible way.
With the transition to an online publication and learning, it also came with more virtual events. Taking advantage of the web, I attended a virtual town hall hosted by the California Democratic Party, which invited top speakers who urged the passing of Prop 16 including State Controller Betty Lee, whom I asked 3 questions to.
Moreover, I utilized email to reach out to the people who were the lead expert witnesses for the SFFA v. Harvard case. Emailing UC Berkeley Professor David Card, who spoke on behalf of Harvard, and Duke Professor Peter Arcidiacono, who spoke on behalf of SFFA, I heard back from both of them. While Card declined to comment, I was able to ask questions to Arcidiacono through email. To make my questions perfect, I spend 3 hours drafting compact and detailed questions that would provide me with the most unique answers that people wouldn’t just know by reading major news outlets. The web program at the Epic and its many opportunities allowed me to pioneer many tools and reach sources with whom I never would have connected otherwise.
The cover graphic for my Adobe Spark story on Kamala Harris making history as the first woman of color on a presidential ticket.
Kamala Harris Story
For my story on Kamala Harris’ nomination to be Joe Biden’s vice presidential nominee, I wanted to break the news in a more fun and blurb-style way. That way it was more digestible. As a result, I utilized Adobe Spark, the perfect way of telling stories in an aesthetic format. By using Spark, I was able to include large photos and catch readers’ eyes. It also allowed for more design creativity, which I really liked. I included photos of Harris’ life and interviewed students for their perspective on her nomination, how it inspired them and its impact on Biden’s chances. The formatting made the quotes very striking, so others can learn about student interviewees’ perspectives. Unfortunately, Adobe Spark has been discontinued, so the page link no longer works.
Best of SNO x6
Throughout my time in the Epic, 6 of my stories have been awarded the Best of SNO badge. The website accepts less than 10% of submissions and selects works that tell important stories in a unique and sophisticated manner. The six stories that were honored were my stories on sleep deprivation, America’s presidential debate history, affirmative action, illness survivor Aditya Suresh, a local Stop AAPI Hate rally, and a review of No Time to Die.
My affirmative action story on the front page of Best of SNO after being republished.
JEANC Best of the West 2nd Place Website
Additionally, in our virtual year, JEANC awarded my publication as the 2nd best online news site of the year for our nicely curated and designed website format, which we spent a lot of time updating over the school year. We have many in-class and section critiques, to which I contributed lots of suggestions and even lead when they were in my section.
Our second place plaque proudly sits on the wall of the Epic classroom, room 611.
2. Social Media
Revolutionizing social media coverage with the Photo Schedule
The first major change that I implemented as Editor-in-Chief was the revolutionizing of our social media coverage. We had previously had only graphics because of COVID-19, so seeing how students like photos on Instagram more, I decided that we can only post photos on our social media. To show an example of what good photography and social media coverage was, my fellow Ed Board member Sharlene and I took photos of the start of the school year events. We used the knowledge we learned from Homestead High School’s The Epitaph adviser, who was an expert at social media coverage, to take high-quality photos with detailed captions that explain what was happening. The first major opportunity for our staff to take photos was our school spirit week, so I made sure that every day was covered by at least one student — that way, we have photos that we can post each day. Finding individual people was really hard, but it was all worth it because, during that week, we had the highest engagement and our follower count climbed by 200.
However, I knew we could have found a better way to do
photojournalism, spontaneously thinking of a photo calendar. Being in student government, I had a list of all school events and copied it on the calendar. Knowing that we had “Beats” with every group on campus and that many events weren’t written into stories, I thought that social media would be the perfect place to tell those important stories to the broader community. Then that quickly continued into other school events and of course sports games. Over the past semester, the photo calendar has been extremely effective. There are always people signing up for events, and people always put their names down next to the event they want to cover. As a result, we have already covered over 70 individual events and sports games through our social media coverage, not including any of our written papers and online stories. Additionally, we grew our followers from under 500 to now over 1000.
The social media posts have a clear structure that I implemented. People will take the photos, upload them to drive, write the captions and send then send them to an Ed Board member who approves everything. Then the staffer is allowed to post on social media. After kicking off the program, my Ed Board member Crystal Qian took on the execution, turning my vision into reality. Now, we have some of the best high school photo social media accounts, and it encourages students to take photos whenever they want. Something that wasn’t a big part of our paper, photography, is now something that people look forward to and actively engage in, making photojournalism and social media coverage a bigger part of our paper.
Our photo schedule is organized by dates and includes event details, allowing staffers to easily know if they can cover the event.
A gallery of photos we took during the last week of Jan. 2022, which included our school's spirit week, rally, dance, Lynbrook Idol, dance competition and soccer game.
Seeing an organizer cross out items on a clip board, I asked to take a photo of the program, which I posted on our paper Instagram page, providing students with a live schedule of the event.
Live Coverage
I love social media because it is the most timely and effective form of providing news to our student body. As a student journalist, I take advantage of the opportunity to share events live with others. When covering a Stop AAPI Rally at the San Jose City Hall, I utilized Instagram stories to provide the most up-to-date information about what was happening. While covering the event, I communicated with my editors to see if there was anything they wanted me to clarify and add so I could get the most detailed information. I started off by taking videos and photos of things happening. Then I made sure to explain what this event was about and where it was happening with simple texts. Showing them different angles and speeches that people delivered, I was able to bring people into the event as it was happening. As a journalist who wasn’t afraid of asking questions and finding stories, I identified organizers and asked them about what was happening. I even got a photo of their speaker’s list and when it would be happening, which I posted on our story to provide readers with a behind-the-scenes look at the event! Our principal even reacted to our post with the :O emoji!
Our infographics provided the Lynbrook community with important statistics about vaccination rates.
School-wide Vaccine Poll
One of the social media projects that I organized was a vaccine poll for our student body. As the incoming Editor-in-Chief and current news editor, I worked with my news editor successor Amy to draft questions and plan out a poll to distribute to students. Utilizing social media and our school’s homeroom time (for school-wide announcements), we gathered hundreds of responses about students’ perspectives on vaccine and vaccine status. Then, we compiled the data, using Canva to create infographics, which we posted on social media. At a time when vaccines were just becoming available, using social media to connect with students was a great way to let them know about what was happening in their community, especially when most people were remote.
Working on this social media post was one of my favorite mini projects because it combined my interest in journalism and student government.
ASB Officers
One of my proudest social media coverage posts was my coverage of the ASB Officer elections. As a member of the student government and an avid follower of the elections, I had a strong connection with every single candidate running for office. When the election closed and results weren’t sent out to the whole student body like the past 3 years I had been in Lynbrook, I wanted to know the results and share them with the student body, so they too can know who their elected officials were. Using my connections and friendships with the candidates, I learned that individual candidates had found out whether they themselves had won or not, so I reached out to those I knew, becoming the first student to find out about all the elected officials, even before the ASB president-elect! Getting that information, I created an Instagram post with social media to announce who had won the elections and who had made it off to a run-off. After a day, the school sent out the official result, which we had already published. I later heard that the Epic’s quick coverage prompted the official announcement, which put a smile to my face.
Gallery of Posts
