Project by: Ruby Hutchins (11th Grade)
Project Advisor: Ann Carroll
Student(s)’s Advisor(s): Preethi Thomas Mcknight
Description of the Project: I’m creating a Good News Newsletter where I’ll include only good/positive news articles and send them to the student body. While the pandemic is dominating every single news source and is either indirectly or directly in almost every single news story, I think a good news newsletter would really be beneficial for so many students.
Final Product (e.g., documents, images, video, audio, poster, display, etc.): Emails twice a week with the newsletter sent to the whole high school body.
Here’s my last newsletter:
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Open in new tab Final Reflection on Learning:
I learned so much from creating this newsletter that no other project could have given me. I loved making these newsletters and I got so much positive feedback from so many students, teachers, and faculty members. Not only did I learn how to find articles on different news sites and figure out what parts of the news articles include making sure it’s all clear and relevant information, but I also learned how to design a newsletter which was really difficult at first but ultimately rewarding. I learned so much about having a color palette, organizing the layout of the text and pictures, and figuring out the font and size of fonts, and colors.
Update on Progress from Weeks 1-3 (include any photos or video if relevant):
For the first two weeks, I’ve been planning out how to make the newsletter in a display that is easily viewable and can help people be informed. I started with a google document where I used pictures and excerpts from different articles that I found and displayed them in an email that I sent to the whole school. I had an issue where the format changed on mobile phones so for the next one I decided to use Canva and then attach the downloaded PDF to the email. I thought this was a lot better than the first version and I got a lot of responses from people who said they really liked the new format
This is the copy of my second newsletter, and the first one that I made with the new format on Canva:
Update on Progress from Weeks 4-6 (include any photos or video if relevant):
For these past few weeks, I have developed and made 7 more newsletters and sent them out to the high school student body. I have also begun sending them to the middle school teachers in the hope they would share the stories (if relevant) in their classes which would give them something to talk about that’s unrelated to the pandemic. I got so many replies wanting more, and many articles that I could use in the next newsletter. I send them twice a week and all beforehand I collect positive articles that I can put in and figure out which parts are the most important and will jump out to readers. Ana (the middle school principal) shared a couple of the newsletters with all the current middle schoolers which was exactly what I had hoped teachers and faculty would do. I’m planning to possibly put in other types of information in the newsletters, including a possible interview from someone who writes/edits a more professional daily newsletter, and I’m planning to release a newsletter on field day that has apps, games, activities to do, etc.
Some of the newsletters that I have sent out over the past couple weeks:
Update on Progress from Weeks 7-9 (include any photos or video if relevant):
I continued to produce and send out my newsletters for these weeks but added a couple different things into some of the newsletters. For the weekend of field day and Memorial Day, I decided to instead of news stories, include apps and websites that people can use. I included a section with productive apps like Duolingo and Yousician, entertainment apps, throwback apps, (that many people likely used when they were younger), and websites you can visit if you’re ever bored in quarantine. I also did an interview with Gabe Fleisher who is a senior in high school and sends out a very professional newsletter to over 50,000 people every weekday. I asked him a lot of questions about his process, and where he gets his sources for his newsletter which I thought people would think is super interesting. I included this interview in one of the newsletters and I got many positive responses about it.
Some of the newsletters that I have sent out over the past couple weeks:
