When our Vol. 4 EiCs worked up the courage to ask, "Mr. Simons - can we stop going to summer camp?" things changed dramatically for our crew here at CPPHS — because they founded Camp Tesserae, camp done our way. Now, three years in, we debrief last weekend's camp, a DIY, two-night event for our editors, staff and me that sets the stage for the first days of school a few weeks away. If you take your kids to a regional camp, have your own camp, or do nothing at all with your staff in the summertime, I hope hearing about our approach might give you some ideas of a camp- or workshop-based approach you can try with your program. Simply put: you don't need to do it our way, but we definitely encourage you to try something!

Keep the conversation going with me at [email protected]— I'd love to hear from you.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

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Senior quotes, senior superlatives, senior wills, senior portraits, senior tribute ads and more — lots of high school yearbooks go out of their way to keep traditions alive that have proven dangerous, even career-ending, for advisers and staffs in the past few years. In this episode, we explore alternatives to senior quotes and superlatives with a strong emphasis on journalistic content that goes far beyond that quote from Beyoncé that a senior's been thinking about since seventh grade, or the one attributed to Hitler that forces the entire book to be reprinted. There's a better way!

Keep the conversation going with me at [email protected]— I'd love to hear from you.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

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S2E10 - Livin' the Rep Life with Sabrina Schmitz

During a quick break at Camp Orlando this week, I sat down with yearbook rep all-star Sabrina Schmitz, who works with more than 70 Walsworth schools in Central Florida. We talked about how advisers can best make use of their relationships with their reps, what's new and cool in resources for staff culture and productivity in yearbook labs, and much, much more. Sabrina's passion for yearbook — and yearbook kids — really shines in this interview; I hope you'll listen!

Keep the conversation going with me at [email protected]— I'd love to hear from you.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

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S2E9 - A Really Big Talk with Logan Aimone

I tried for a meaningful, all-encompassing title for this one, and it escapes me. Therefore — join us for an insightful, wide-ranging and practical conversation with Chicago-based adviser Logan Aimone about empowering our student journalists in their work, establishing productive relationships with administrators, and growing and supporting your staff to a place of journalistic credibility as they embrace the rights granted to them in the First Amendment. We get into a bunch of other things, too — there's something in there for everyone!

I hope you'll take a listen, and keep the conversation going with me at [email protected]— I'd love to hear from you.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

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S2E8 - End of the Year Potpourri

It's been awhile!

End of the year activities have dominated my attention for a month or so, keeping me away from the microphone — so in our first episode in awhile, we talk about end of the year topics including dealing with mistakes in your book, supporting your staff through distribution feedback in the community, and opportunities to celebrate your staff as the year wraps up. Joining me are Susan Massy of the Lair yearbook in Kansas, and Joe Humphrey of the Hilsborean yearbook in Florida.

I hope you'll take a listen, and keep the conversation going with me at [email protected]— I'd love to hear from you.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

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We're buried in final page proofs and sprinting toward our final deadline — or is it a marathon? Either way, this week is a quick double-shot episode as I visit with two advisers who, like me, are just back from three days in Manhattan at the [Columbia Scholastic Press Association's] (http://cspa.columbia.edu) 95th annual Spring Convention. It was a great three days, and my guests Brett Hastie (Brookville HS, Virginia) and Robin Christopher (Del Norte HS, Calif.) share their highlights from the convention—if you've never been, you'll find it a great listen! Congratulations to both Brett and Robin's staffs for their Crown award honors at the convention!

I hope you'll take a listen, and keep the conversation going with me at [email protected]— I'd love to hear from you.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

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It's THAT time of year — and like you, I'm working at a furious pace with my staff to finish the book. So this week, you get a bonus episode from just about a year ago: Top 10 Ways to Finish the Year! For spring delivery books, that bit of lag from finaling the book out toward graduation shouldn't be a doldrums or limbo — it's a time rife with opportunities for development and growth for your staff and program.

The "mood board" project that I describe in Tip #6 can be found here: Mood Board Assignment Please feel free to adapt that assignment in whatever way is best for your staff.

Also, you can learn more about Quill & Scroll, the international journalism honor society mentioned in Tip #10, here: quillandscroll.org

What did I forget? What activities do you use in your own lab to wrap up the year? If you have questions or comments about the Top 10, or about yearbooks and the podcast in general, please be in touch at [email protected] — it'd be great to hear from you.

Please leave a review and rating at Apple Podcasts and spread the word on Twitter (@YearbookWhys) and beyond!

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(Note: apologies for an earlier edit of the audio that had a bad music mix near the end; fixed now. -Mike) When a veteran adviser posted to Facebook about issues her staff was having with reluctant or outright non-participating potential interviewees, it led to a chorus of "Us to!" replies from around the country, including from today's guest, Margie Raper of Highland Park High School in Dallas. She and I have both seen our staffs confronting more of these kinds of issues in our coverage, so we sat down to talk through it and see if we could get some perspective on how to support our staffs. We hope you'll take a listen, and keep the conversation going with us at [email protected] and [email protected] — we'd love to hear from you.

Find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

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I think you'll be as impressed as I was when you see Tigrium 2018 for the first time — it's the yearbook produced by adviser Sarah Tricano's staff at Holy Trinity Episcopal Academy in Florida, and in this episode, we go one-on-one with Tigrium's current editor-in-chief to look back at "Est. 1957," their 2018 edition.

Caroline Dixon heads up Tricano's 2019 team at HTEA, and she shares the inside story on how their 60th anniversary book came to be. Caroline's team is sharing PDFs of their 2018 book with us at tinyurl.com/ybkpods2e4 — open up the spreads and follow along as we hear how they did it!

It'd be great to hear from you — you can reach me at [email protected] and find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

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Every year, more yearbook staffs choose to take a more journalistic approach to their coverage — and they're going way beyond the most basic who, what, when, and where! If you're taking your staff down that path and want to support them in crafting a more journalistic product, you need to listen to this conversation with 2018 Distinguished Yearbook Adviser of the Year Rebecca Pollard! She offers practical tips and perspective hard-earned in a near two decade-long career in Texas.

At the top, I offer some resources and highlight some of the work done Jan. 30 relating to Student Press Freedom Day. You can learn more about the day, the New Voices movement, and work being done on behalf of student journalists and advisers via the JEA Scholastic Press Rights Committee and Student Press Law Center.

It'd be great to hear from you — you can reach me at [email protected] and find the podcast on Twitter at @YearbookWhys. Please share the podcast online or with friends in your yearbook network, or leave a review on Apple iTunes; it helps others find the podcast! Share a review here: Apple iTunes

This podcast is powered by Pinecast.