On Tuesday July 20 at 11pm EDT/PT, MTV will premiere a new weekly series called “If You Really Knew Me” based on the Challenge Day program. Each episode will be shown on MTV multiple times during the week and streamed on MTV’s website.
“‘If You Really Knew Me’ is an incredibly authentic and compelling docu-series that takes us on a 24 hour journey through a high school’s social transformation. It shows us what happens when kids from various cliques decide to break down the walls that divide them and commit to change,” said Tony DiSanto, President of Programming from MTV. “It’s an intense and dramatic experience, but ultimately uplifting and universally relatable for all of us who have gone through high school or are about to.”
Each episode takes place at a different high school with its own set of issues and its own unique set of cliques. In the series premiere, viewers go inside a Northern California school divided by race and cliques, a symptom of a newly-diverse student body that has grown from 500 to 2,400 students in just 10 years. As the season progresses; the show profiles a variety of schools struggling with everything from cyberbullying to small town rumor mills.
Discussion Guides (sponsored by Herff Jones) can be downloaded from the Challenge Day website at: http://www.challengeday.org/mtv/.
What’s this got to do with yearbooks?
We all know that yearbook sales are directly related to school spirit. If your school is not participating in Challenge Day, maybe Yearbook could sponsor it! Visit the Challenge Day website for more info: http://www.challengeday.org/how-challenge-day-works.php
Teambuilding is key to an efficient yearbook staff. Try watching the episodes together as a group, and downloading the discussion guides. Download the discussion guides here: http://www.challengeday.org/mtv/
If your school is already participating, don’t forget to cover it in your yearbook! Make sure to interview the participants for their point-of-view!
Angela’s side note: I participated in a Challenge Day as a high school student (A LONG TIME AGO), and it was definitely worth it. Let’s just say a lot of tears and hugging were involved. I highly recommend it!
You know ESPN hosts both Summer and Winter games of Extreme Sports with events like skateboarding, BMX biking, street luge, snowboarding and snowmobiling. Well, what about the Yearbook X-games? Once the book is done, have an X-Game Celebration after school. Have staffers sign up ahead of time for events like these:
Big Wheel Slalom
Skateboard Paddling
3-legged Cross Country Skipping
Nerf Skeet (Frizbee) Shooting
It’s a great way to burn off all that built up stress, and it’s a great prelude to a nice Yearbook banquet where winners receive their medals along with the other staff awards. Or, be really X-treme, and ask ASB if you can host the Yearbook X-Games for the whole school over a couple of lunch periods and have students pay a dollar or two to participate. Instead of gold medals, give away golden tickets to your yearbook signing party!
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “X” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
Yes, we know, YERDS and Advisers are very under appreciated, but there are other individuals on campus who deserve some appreciation, too — whether it’s a note, a gift card, or a nice acknowledgement at a staff meeting.
The custodian (who cleans up the classroom after the pizza parties on your late work nights)
The secretary (who answers a million and two questions about yearbook)
The counseling department (who runs off all the class lists and always knows what class someone is in)
The IT person (who answers all your panicked phone calls when the computers are whacky)
The bank clerk (who collects all the money from book sales, ad sales, parent ad sales, and fundraisers AND pays your bills on time!)
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “U” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
So your pages are nearing completion and all that’s left is that pesky index and the calla– . . . colon– . . . cloho– . . .
colophon
Yeah, *that* thing.
So what is a colophon?
It’s a recorded history of your book; what was behind the memories; how you created this publication. It includes as many details as you want or as few as you need, but try to be accurate. If your rival school picks up your 2010 book and is overcome with envy when they see your cover, tell them all that went into making it: the fonts, the colors, the cover material, foils, and embossing. This way they can do it for their 2011 book and YOU can take all the credit!
Many schools combine the colophon with thank yous and farewelsl to key people. Remember the particularly helpful teachers who didn’t yell at your 63rd interruption, the secretaries who helped you identify over 300 students, the custodians who cleaned up your deadline pizza parties, parents who brought all the junk food needed to get through the year, and your ADVISER! These people are more important to the creation of your book than the 100 lb. paper.
Check out a few examples here and bask in the glory of a job well done!
OK, we know today’s students were born with a computer mouse in their hands, but when it comes to school technology, you’re pretty limited due to necessary restrictions from the school district. That’s why establishing a positive relationship with your school and/or district IT person can make a HUGE difference in the success of your year. As soon as possible each August, contact the school or district IT person and discuss the following:
Any newly installed firewalls
Installation of all software necessary for page production (including fonts, Adobe Flash, and any supplementary program software)
Permissions
Yearbook server locations, accessibility and size
Then, remember to nurture this relationship throughout the year with a birthday card, a thank you note, or an offer to buy lunch. It’ll go a long way in keeping your computers glitch-free!
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “T” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
Producing a yearbook is a lot of fun, but it also carries a great responsibility. A yearbook lasts forever and cannot be reproduced once the year is over. Because of this, every picture, every caption, every quote in every story, and even every graphic has to be true and accurate. Here are a couple of things to keep in mind as you record the year’s memories for your school community:
Check and double check names. No one wants their name misspelled forever.
Captions and Senior Superlatives are a part of the coverage. They are not a place for inside jokes.
It’s our place to record history, not make it up. Make sure your scores, quotes and sources are verified.
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “R” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
Although organization can be boring, it can save a lot of drama come deadline day. Here are some resources you can use/create to make Yearbook a little more organized.
Create staff Mailboxes. This is a great way for staff members to communicate with each other and keep materials in a central location.
Use your ladder and post it on the wall. It really can make things easier in the yearbook world. This helps prevent pages or topics falling through the cracks.
Create a proof binder that has a print out of all the pages you submit. It is a great way to keep track of what you have done and still need to do.
Create a yearbook finance binder that is separated in 3 parts - business ads, parent ads, and book sales. This way all of your yearbook money information is in 1 spot.
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “O” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
We know what it’s like: deadlines, missing pictures, lots of stress. Sometimes it’s so overwhelming that production seems to come to a standstill. So how do you keep your students going through even the toughest circumstances? First, appoint a staff social director, and then try these methods of motivation:
Celebrate staff birthdays and 1/2 birthdays (for those born during the summer months.)
Institute a “Staffer of the Month” award with a small token of recognition: a crown or sceptor for the day, a Staffer of the Month certificate, and a perpetual plaque or poster on the wall. Throw in a cake, cupcakes, doughnuts or cookies, and you’ve got a great 10 minute celebration!
Plan a theme (think The 80’s, Pirates, Disney, Valentine’s Day) for each deadline week or deadline work night.
Decorate the room, have students bring theme-related food, and play a mixed CD of theme-related music. You’ll be surprised at how much work gets accomplished when fun is in the air!
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “M” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
Hopefully by now you all have seen a copy of “Ideas That Fly,” the compendium of covers, themes, inside pages, and more from schools around the country. This beautiful book comes out once a year and then an additional soft cover addendum follows behind. Schools love using them as a resource in the classroom and encourage the students to look through the books for new ideas.
The yearbook adviser at Kennedy Middle School in Cupertino, however, turned it into a full lesson for her yearbook staff. Here were the steps:
1. Everyone received a copy of ”Ideas that Fly.” She explained what was in there.
2. The students picked out a spread they liked, read about the school, their theme, and any other pertinent information that was listed. Then the student listed things they liked about that spread. Why did they pick it? What ideas or inspiration can we get from the spread? What artistic elements were used? How did the graphics contribute to the theme?
3. There was enough time for 8-9 different students to share their choices and answers in front of the whole class.
This lesson hit at just the right time. They finished their first deadline and are about to start designing their next set of spreads. Hopefully they will go into deadline #2 with more ideas and ready to challenge themselves.
Let’s face it: the yearbook classroom isn’t just another set of four walls with cutsie kitten posters inside. Find ways to make it your “Home Sweet Home”:
Make sure you have a place for communication, using stacking plastic holders, envelopes, or actual mailboxes for each staff member (or team)
Add a room mascot and name it. Of course we’ve seen the standard stuffed animal, but also a growing ball of stickers, a store-bought piñata, and fish on a stick (made from construction paper, of course)
Make room for a “rant wall” where staff members can write funny sayings, quote other staffers during the year, and doodle.
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “H” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
Good coverage is hard to achieve when staff members sit in the room and hope that the stories will come to them. Sure, you can try to light some incense and pray to the gods of feature writing, but with your luck, you’ll probably just set off the smoke alarms.
Well if your school has a homeroom or advisory class, how about assigning each staff member to a teacher. That way the staffers “adopt” a particular homeroom class. It is the goal of each staff member to get “THEIR” advisory students into the book at least two times.
To accomplish this, your staff members should get to know their adopted class. Start with a school-wide survey to find out about the students there and then send the staffers in to dig a little deeper to find the hidden gems. Once they get to know their group, class conferences should be full of people suggestions. For example:
Editor: We’re doing a story on sports that students play outside of school. Who do we know out there?
Staffer #1: A kid in my homeroom is a competitive gymnast.
Staffer #2: Yeah, one in my homeroom has a black belt in Judo.
Staffer #3: I’ve got an Irish dancer in my homeroom.
(etc.)
Hyde Middle School has been doing this since the beginning of the school year. They have three giant binders full of surveys and the students look through them for ideas. Recently I challenged them to a contest: find THE MOST UNUSUAL story or person in your advisory class. Three winners would be selected to win In-And-Out gift cards. Imagine their excitement when they found a student who . . .
–has collected over 400 Tech Decks (little skateboards)
–is a competitive rock climber
–volunteers at the Red Cross and an animal shelter 15 hours a week
–can walk on stilts
–has collected Legos since he was 6 years old
–collects sand from around the world
–is a synchronized swimmer
–competes in Brazilian martial arts
So find those stories and people hiding on your campus. Your readers will LOVE the book and learning about their fellow students.
Editor: AKA best friend, worst enemy, that mean person making me stay late, dude, student who responds to an urgent scream of “help,” late-night karaoke champion, and permanent fixture in the yearbook room. All editors should:
Besides the Editor-in-Chief, consider section editors, a photo editor, a copy editor, and a business manager
Model the best behavior for the staff. That means showing good planning, being on time, not putting things off to the last minute
Must be present at every deadline (clear your social calendar for the next few months!)
Has the fewest pictures in the yearbook, but the most power over what it looks like
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “E” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
The fall is a perfect time to design and order staff shirts or some other apparel. It helps create a team spirit, identifies students on campus, and reminds students to buy their yearbooks.
It’s especially fun when the staff can sneak in a little theme humor that the general student body doesn’t quite understand. Last year the Prospect High School book used the “Polaroid” photo look in their book and used the same graphic on their staff sweatshirts. Of course no one on campus understood the connection until books were passed out in June.
It’s always nice to put the students in charge of the design, like the student pictured below. Last year, a student at Cupertino Middle School had been learning how to silkscreen and actually hand-made every staff jackets!
There are lots of well-priced vendors on the Internet (www.customink.com has a line of American-made shirts), but also give your neighborhood silkscreen store a call and keep your business local.
It’s a very common issue in the yearbook world: what falls within your “fair use” rights and what is absolutely forbidden? Here is a very cute video–made entirely from Disney clips–that explains it.
Disclaimer: the rhythm is a little challenging, so you might want to have a student sit down and transcribe the soundtrack and then hand that out to the whole class when you show it.
Deadline, shmedline: it’s no big deal when you have the proper planning.
Work backwards, setting up mini deadlines necessary to achieve the final one
Plan your ladder well, consulting with your school calendar to check for school events and sports seasons
Always add up to 10% more pages to each deadline to allow for unexpected problems (if 36 pages are due, assign an additional 4 just in case)
Have deadline parties or celebrate when you’ve successfully met a deadline
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook”
project. If you’d like to download the “D” card, go to the “Adviser
Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
Regardless of your position on the yearbook staff, find ways to infect the room with a positive attitude!
Make a birthday board on the wall for all of the staff members. Be sure to celebrate.
Give out awards after each deadline like most creative copy, most helpful person, best photo on a spread, etc.
Make a slips of paper that say “Thanks for. . .” and let staff members write notes to each other
Two words: candy jar
*This entry is part of “The Yearbook Ladies’ A to Zs of Yearbook” project. If you’d like to download the “A” card, go to the “Adviser Resources” section of www.theyearbookladies.com
We’d love to hear from you! Share your questions, comments, and ideas below…
It’s a new year, new theme, new kids, new ideas… It’s so easy to get caught up in all the fun stuff and lose focus on what really needs to be done. Use this list of the 12 most important things that need to be done by October 1st to help your staff stay focused. (But that doesn’t mean you can’t still have fun!)
Open Your Kit
Your yearbook kit contains all the materials necessary to produce your yearbook.
Start with the “Start Here” Envelope.
Check the Kit Guide to make sure all items have been included
Use the order form on the back to order any additional supplies you will need.
Contact Photographer
Schedule a meeting with you school photographer during the first few weeks of school.
Discuss your full color needs and be sure he understands the importance of deadlines
Give him your deadlines. Predate them one week as a safety margin.
Discuss what you expect from him and what he can expect from you. Find out what services he is willing to perform and schedule his services for important school activities, such as homecoming.
Have senior portraits or DVD delivered to your school at least 10 days prior to your senior deadline
Set dates for underclass and faculty portraits and determine when you will receive your Quick Panel Plus CD
Determine Deadlines
Check your deadline packet from your reps. Make a note of your deadline dates and number of pages due.
Check your deadline packet to determine when your color pages are due, if your book is not all color.
Check with photographer to determine when DVD of senior portraits
Develop a Theme
If you have not yet chosen a theme, select a small group of staff members, preferably returning ones, to work on the theme.
Have them discuss what is new and different this year, and have them make a list of these changes in order to find a theme that fits your school and is unique to this year.
Conduct brainstorminwg sessions with the entire class and present the group’s ideas.
Plan to have the theme appear in some way on the cover, the endsheets, the opening section, the division pages, and in the closing.
Make a Ladder
Before any pages can be assigned, a page ladder for the entire book must be completed.
Check your publication agreement to see how many pages there will be in your book. Obtain enrollment figures for your school from the administration.
Decide on the number of pages you will need for seniors, underclass and faculty.
Make a list of every club, sport, organization, and event you wish to include.
Compute the number of pages needed for each section. Be sure to leave enough space for your opening, closing, divider pages, index and advertisements
Use a pencil for your first draft of the ladder; or laminate it and use a dry-erase pen, or use the HJ Planner program.
Design the Cover
If you attended the Spring Cover Workshop, be sure to finalize your cover design.
Consult your yearbook representative to see what types of covers are available and within your budget.
Decide on the type of cover that best fits your theme and ask your reps to show you examples.
Assign a few staff members to develop a sample design.
Once the style and design are decided, determine exactly what type of material you wish to use, the color of the material, the applied color or colors, and meet with your reps to put it all together.
Decide whether you will order individual name stamps or name plates for the books, and choose the color for these name stamps/plates.
Select Endsheets
Several choices of endsheet materials and styles are available to you including company designed full color, colortext, and solid color. Check with your rep to see what options best fit your budget.
Select an endsheet that will complement your cover and will carry your theme forward. Be sure that the endsheet colors coordinate with the colors of the cover.
Discuss other endsheet options with your reps such as printing on the endsheet, four-color endsheets, die cuts, short-trim endsheets, foil stamping, embossing, and tinted embossing.
Sell Ads
Make a card file that contains the name, address and phone number of every business that has advertised in your book over the last five years as well as merchants who have advertised in other yearbooks in the area.
Add cards for businesses that are owned by parents of students in your school.
Expand your file further by adding businesses in your area from the Chamber of Commerce directory for your city and from the yellow pages. Pass out an equal number of cards to every staff member, letting them select those that they know.
Students must contact each business. Require that a business card or design is submitted for each ad sold.
Give commissions or a bonus to students who sell ads.
Plan Full Color only if you’re not doing an all-color book
Take four Roughing-Its, staple and fold them down the middle. Number them from 1 through 16.
Take this 16-page signature and use it to “rough in” your title page, opening spreads and student life spreads and/or any other signatures that will include color pages.
Plan the color for one flat or the other or both. Try alternating 4-color with spot color on different flats.
Plan to cover activities on your color pages that will occur at least one week before your color deadline.
Refer to your “Basics” booklet (in Your Kit) for more explanation on signatures and flats.
Make a Style Guide
Have each member of the staff make a notebook of graphic and typography samples collected from magazines and brochures. (Ask your reps for a list of good publications.)
Review the samples and choose ideas that the staff would like to include in the yearbook.
Make a style guide for each section that will include the layout style for that section, the type of headline to be used, and the style for copy and captions.
Using Roughing-Its, have staff members use photos and copy from magazines to mock-up double page spreads for each section of the yearbook.
Organize Staff
Select and Editor-in-Chief who is experienced, knowledgeable, and most of all, a coordinator of people. He/she must be able to encourage others to perform.
Choose a good writer with strong personality as copy editor and a good organizer as photo editor. Finally, you should have a financial editor or business manager who is very responsible and who can also motivate people to work.
Divide up the remainder of the staff into sections of the book: Student Life, Academics, Clubs and Organizations, Sports, Seniors, Underclass, and Faculty. Be sure that each section has a good writer and a computer expert.
If you wish, you may select editors for each section.
Sell Books
Decide whether to have a one-day sale or a one-week sale. You will sell more books in a short period of time than you will sell all year.
Prior to the sale, put up posters, make announcements over the PA, send letters home and in general, try to get the students excited about the yearbook.
Remember to include dates and prices in your advertisements.
Juat before the sale, have a yearbook rally and have guest speakers talk about the importance of their yearbooks. Be ready to take orders that day.
During the sale, assign several students to man the tables at convenient locations.
Between setting up your classroom, staff meetings, planning lessons for all the other classes you teach, and just general denial that summer is over, it may be hard to get back into yearbook mode again. If that sounds like you, or if you’re new to this whole yearbook thing, here are 15 ideas for the first week of school that will get the ball rolling:
Expectations - Review your class requirements, grading policies, any planned staff work nights/weekends and the importance of making deadlines.
Information - Complete a staff directory that includes phone numbers, other contact numbers (i.e. email, cell phones, work numbers), class schedules, birthdays, parent’s names, etc…
Theme - If it isn’t already decided or in the works, discuss theme and cover ideas
Critique - Go through last year’s book and have students list and discuss things they liked best and the things they would change
Deadlines - Finalize and post the ladder. Color code it by deadline and list specific spread assignments, which pages will be sent with each deadline, etc. Indicate which pages are going to be printed in color and/or spot color.
Sell - Discuss and plan your book sales campaign. Have students brainstorm ideas to increase book sales.
Ads - Discuss and plan your community, parent, and friendship ad campaigns. Decide whether every student must sell a certain number of ads, if they get bonuses/commissions, how to organize, etc…
Team Building - Start each day with 10 or 15 minutes of icebreakers/team building activities. This will help students get acquainted and get over any fears, shyness, etc. and begin to become a cohesive team.
Ideas - Have each staff member bring in 5 ideas from magazines that could be used in the yearbook. Or, have each student bring several magazines and have a “look for ideas” class.
Practice - Have students refresh and reinforce their design skills by drawing layouts and pasting up photos and type from magazines.
Photograph - Buy disposable cameras, have students shoot photos around campus and “discover” who your best photographers are.
Improve - Have students rewrite 5 captions and headlines from last year’s book. They should try to make them more informative and adhere to the caption writing formula.
Brainstorm - Have students come up with and discuss ideas for feature stories, profiles, polls, and side-bars
Delegate - Ask what special contributions/talents each staffer plans to give to the yearbook. From this conversation, decide each staffer’s strengths and what each student’s responsibilities will be.
Bond - Try to plan one outside of class activity. You could go for pizza, go bowling, go roller-skating — anything that will allow staffers to get to know each other and just have fun.
One of the major “issues” of almost every yearbook staff is communication and organization. There just has to be an easy way to keep track of what everyone is doing and an easy way to communicate swiftly and easily with everyone. Just because you assign someone to take pictures or conduct an interview does not mean that it will get done or that you will remember to follow up. The next thing you know, the spread is due and you were not aware that some element is missing until it is too late. No matter how wonderful your staff is, or how organized you are, some things just fall through the cracks. And then, how do you communicate with the parties involved? Well, here are a couple of places that address those issues. One is from Google, and one is from a company called Behance. Check ‘em out.
1.Schools from all over the globe, including 2 right here in Northern California are using Google Apps to stay organized and connected. If these apps work school wide, think how useful they would be for your staff ! Maybe you can be the one to get your entire school using free email! Check out the Official Google Blog at: Official Google Blog: Schools get the “App”titude across the globe
2. Our friend Dmitri Conom at Bellarmine College Prep shared this organizational tool. Action Method Online is like a virtual Project Manager. It was created to “help organize the creative world to make ideas happen.” It is a combination of best practices from companies world wide, and woven into one package. First check out http://www.behancemag.com/Tip-10-Realizations-For-Productivity-_-Making-Ideas-Happen/5745 then check out the official website: www.Actionmenthod.com.
3.Of course Herff Jones’ Planner for use with InDesign is also be a great tool. While it does not have all the elements of the other two applications, it does help organize your ladder, page assignments and deadlines. It is yearbook specific so doesn’t offer areas for Action Plans and Project Timelines. Here’s what it can do:
Rearrange the pages in your electronic ladder without retyping a thing. Move, add or delete pages and the rest of the book adjusts automatically.
Add page information like staff assignments and layout specifics to make your ladder as detailed as you’d like. List team members, copy placement or secondary coverage ideas–you can add all the details you want.
Sort and print your ladder by page, deadline, subject or staff member.
Build and label all the yearbook page templates for your book. No more templates without school name, job number and production method!
Track your yearbook page submissions to the plant. You’ll be able to review the status of every page and eliminate surprises when you think the yearbook is finished.
It’s a great organizational tool, and it’s already in your kit. Just load the CD onto ONE computer, and you are ready to go.
For a full demonstration, call your Herff Jones Sales professional. You can even get a chance to play with it yourself!
So, it’s May, your books done, and all you’ve got left is distribution. What are you going to do with all this time? Well, there are 3 ways you can take advantage of the yearbook “down time”:
Bring in some movies for the kids, call this your extra prep, and catch up on all the stuff you didn’t do all year because you were busy with yearbook
Have the kids put all the skills they’ve learned this year into other areas: creating a magazine, website, etc…
Start next year’s book now, and be ahead of the game in the Fall!
If Option #3 sounds appealing to you, here are 11 specific things you can do to make sure your staff is ready to roll on the first day of school:
Recruit your staff now - Ask your Herff Jones rep for a “Staff Recruiting Packet” if you haven’t done so already. It’s filled with posters, application packets, and everything else you need to recruit a quality staff. If your school won’t let you recruit, ask if you can simply recruit your editors.
Decide your theme and cover - The underclassmen on your staff have been waiting all year to have a real say in the book. It’s time to let them strut their stuff. Start brainstorming theme and cover ideas. Write down ones that have potential. Have the staff start collecting magazine lay-outs, brochures, etc… with design inspirations. This is also a good way for you to start choosing your editors for next year.
Write down what went well and what didn’t - Do this on your own, with your editors, or with the whole class. Don’t count on remembering everything. Make sure you write it down. (Although you’re calm and relaxed now, remember how rushed you are in the beginning of the year.)
Re-do any forms that didn’t work well this year - Sales letters, camera sign up sheets, etc… If there are any forms you use that need improving, now’s the time to do it. Remember to save the new version with a date or version number, in case you run across the old file again.
Register for yearbook camp - Most camps have registration deadlines or early bird discounts. Make sure you have all the information you need to register your staff for camp.
Train your staff - Now is a great time to work on photography, design, and copywriting skills for your staff that will be returning next year. Bring in some professionals in the community, if you can. Or use this time to beef up your technology skills. Learn some InDesign or Photoshop tricks that you might want to use in next year’s book.
Review this year’s budget and make plans for next year - Make sure you know what your final invoice is going to be, or at least a good estimate. Make sure you’ll have enough to cover it. If not, what adjustments do you need to make for next year. If you’ve got money left over, think about how you might want to spend it!
Plan your book marketing and sales for next year - Start planning next year’s sales now! Plan a Yearbook Sales Kick-Off event toward the beginning of the year. Come up with a sales slogan. Create video advertisements for morning annoucements. Get all the details taken care of now so that information can be ready to send home as soon as school begins! (TIP: If you sell enough books at the beginning of the year, you might be eligible for an early payment discount with your printer. You can also better estimate how many books you’ll need, so you don’t end up buying more than you can sell!)
Sell Senior and Business Ads over the summer - Just because they go in the back of the book doesn’t mean you have to do them last! In fact, if you sell your ads over the summer, your staff can already begin working on pages as soon as school starts (without having to wait for events to happen). This means you will have your first set of pages ready for that first deadline! And if you’re a Herff Jones customer and you send in pages early, you can get credit for future late days! (ask your rep for more details)
Open next year’s kit and toss out this year’s out - Your publisher kits should be arriving about now. Go through all the new stuff, and toss the old stuff out. There is no reason to keep old kit materials lying around! Take time to learn what’s new for next year, so you don’t get caught by surprise the day before a deadline, or miss out on an exciting new feature!
Clean out your photographs and file cabinets - Start next school year on a clean slate, archive all your photographs and then delete them off your harddrives. You don’t want them getting mixed up with next year’s photos! Also, have editors clean out section/editor cubbies, mailboxes, etc…
If you have any end-if-the-year tips, we’d love to hear them! You can add your comments below…
Loading ...