Journalism

Hello and welcome to my senior Journalism page.  In Journalism I acted as a staff member of the Animas Quill and helped to add content to the paper through a fiction serial that I wrote.

The first installment of the fiction serial can be found in the October 2013 issue of The Quill, which can be found on Page 21 of the link:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Bx2LzsKXecakNlE0ZTMtY1UtN0k/edit
In the serial, titled 'Errands', we are introduced to a pair of errand runners named Roland and Zinnia, who carry out 'errands' for the rich and powerful.  The first chapter introduces the main characters, as well as their primary mission.

The second chapter can be found in the November 2013 issue of The Quill on Page 22:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Bx2LzsKXecakU1l4MWJEM1ptUDA/edit
The second chapter details Roland and Zinnia's dealmaking with their new employer and the beginnings of suspicion towards him and the vagueness of the mission they face.

The third chapter can be found in the December 2013 issue of The Quill on Page 17:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Bx2LzsKXecakVFhDZ09mRUtUcGc/edit
Tasked with fetching a mysterious object from across the solar system, Roland and Zinnia begin their journey and attempt to piece together who their employer really is.

The fourth chapter can be found in the February 2014 issue of The Quill on Page 18, but cannot be linked due to the entry on the Quill's archive page looping back to October of 2013.
In this chapter Roland and Zinnia struggle to unravel the mystery surrounding their mission and discuss their backgrounds.  World building abounds in this chapter.

The fifth chapter can be found in the March 2014 issue of The Quill on Page 18:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0Bx2LzsKXecakXy01UE81WFBsbVk/edit
Roland and Zinnia finally discover the identity of their employer, but just as the fog seems to be clearing things get even stranger.

Those are the stories that I have published in The Quill thus far, feel free to read them if you have not.

          REFLECTION

I hadn't written fiction of any sort for a long time before taking Journalism, and the realization that I still had it in me to write a story that was good enough to be published in a school newspaper pushed me to write other things as well.  Thanks to this class I did not give up on writing and have been writing heavily all throughout the year.  Admittedly I have used more than a little class time to do this, but I have turned in both my stories and edits on time for every single issue and contributed content which I hope has made The Quill a funner paper to read.
I learned a great deal in my time at The Quill as well, and honed my knowledge of how newspapers work.  Something that I first experienced during my time at the Durango Telegraph during my LINK internship in Junior year.  The feeling of having responsibility in how the paper would ultimately turn out was a great motivational factor in making sure that the job was done right, and I feel that my work ethic was made stronger during my time at The Quill.
Finishing this year of school, as well as this school altogether has made me realize that I've been very lucky to have spent time here and that though I may not have used my class time wisely all of the time, I have ultimately made the paper a better publication through my time here on the staff of The Quill.

              SELF-ASSESSMENT

For this year I would ultimately give myself a B.  The reasoning behind this is because although I have turned in my stories and completed editing on time, I have not made consistently good usage of class time.  I was absent a great deal, often without an excuse, and this harmed The Quill because it deprived it of staff during what were often busy periods in the paper's publication cycle.  Despite those shortcomings I have contributed greatly to the paper and what it means to every last student here at AHS.