Calling it a day

I've spent half my summer waking up early (OK, 7:30 a.m. is sleeping in for a teacher) and driving to downtown Indianapolis to represent my school and the IHSPA, and most importantly, learn something about another side of the craft I've been entrusted to pass along to my students.

Less than two weeks from now, my staff will convene and the things learned here will be seen in what they do. The deadline checklists, the way to utilize multimedia as an alternative to daily publication, the idea of editors working with writers to craft stories, a more detailed story idea form ... all of that will be incorporated into our class and our staff.

We have more than doubled the number of intro to journalism students at New Palestine this year, and I'm excited about the future. They don't know it yet, but they'll be gleaning a lot of good things from this experience, too. It has helped focus me as a writer, as a writing coach, as a teacher and as a leader.

I'm very, very grateful to Dennis Cripe and Diana Hadley for allowing me to be a part of this, as well as the Hoosier State Press Association and the Indiana High School Press Association (and, in a great coincidence, one of my sources is an ex-IHSPA president). Also, I'm grateful to IBJ editor Tom Harton and online editor Andrea Davis, with whom I worked very closely to craft some of the stories that will be posted in the future. This experienced pushed me out of my comfort zone and made me a better journalist -- which will make me a better journalism teacher.

I have a bunch of stories in the hopper, so as noted yesterday, I'll keep writing as they are published and tell a little bit about them and how they came together. Tomorrow, I head out of here to a more comfortable place for me, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, where I'll be covering the Brickyard 400 for our local paper. No doubt, I'll be taking the lessons learned here into covering the race this weekend.

Thanks for reading!