This is your school, and this is your news! So why don’t people take advantage of that? I did a small survey of about 50 students in lunch and commons to see what percentage of people were taking an interest in Prairie Ridge High School and the numbers were shocking, with only a mere 68% claiming to have even read the newspaper last year.
There have been some changes to newspaper this year. Unlike the years before, PR has decided not to print the newspaper except for the senior edition at the end of the year. All of the new articles will instead be uploaded to this website. Very few students I surveyed, about 35%, even knew about this change.
How have people taken this news? Well, 75% of the PR students interviewed said that they wouldn’t go online to check what’s happening in the PR papers. But why not? Some said they didn’t have time while others has no answer other than they didn’t want to.
Sophomore Ashley Alcock claims that she “doesn’t have the time to go online and read.” She thought that “it was very convenient to have the paper there in the classrooms so I could just read what I wanted to when I could.” This seems to be the case for most students.
Some would be willing to read it. Maddy Loch, a junior here at Prairie Ridge, said she would read the paper online because “it is easily accessible online and also is more convenient than carrying around paper only.”
Seeing as this new era is headed in the direction of using technology for more, I think it’s time to embrace this new concept of media. Huntley High School started its online newspaper and last year won the National Scholastic Press Associations Peacemakers award for it. This is the highest honor that any high school could want regarding journalism.
Having our newspaper online first in the district shows us being a role model to other District 155 schools. Now that ours has been online since the beginning of the year Crystal Lake South High School has also launched an online newspaper.
Mrs. Bland, our school librarian and head of newspaper, thinks that now is great time to start looking forward to what technology will do for the future of newspaper. It’s time for PR to take pride in itself and keep up to date with the people and the community by this new means.