For use in a WIP, did anybody here work on a high school newspaper? If so, I need to know how often a high school newspaper is published, whether it had paid advertising, and how free a hand the students had in writing content. Could you write about sex, about religion, or about politics? Gossip?
My HS published something every 2 weeks. It might only be 1 side of a legal sheet (8 1/2" X 14") of paper (run off a Mimeograph machine in the office. Remember the smell of the purple ink?) or it might be 2 or more sides of 17" X 24" newsprint run by the local weekly paper. That usually depended on how much advertising we were able to get. The paper was run by the students, but supervised by 3 faculty advisors to make sure it was all clean. If it was on the newsprint, we could include B&W pictures. Another local HS only printed one 4-6 times a school year.
For use in a WIP, did anybody here work on a high school newspaper? If so, I need to know how often a high school newspaper is published, whether it had paid advertising,
This is pretty dependent on school size, funding, how active the staff are, etc.
Mine was essentially a two sided page once a week in the fall (amercian football as the primary driver) and less frequently in the spring/winter. No paid ads, but was funded via students panhandling (bake sales, car washes, etc) and was overseen by one person.
and how free a hand the students had in writing content. Could you write about sex, about religion, or about politics? Gossip?
None at all. In a larger school, they may have had more freedom (but not much), but essentially the press was the instrument of the state in my case (and in most imo)
Sex/Religion/politics would be a pipe dream.
Now, in college those are a BIT more viable. Those generally have some paid adverts, more regular schedules, and more in depth articles including some actual (though very basic) journalism. some discussions of sex/politics/religion might be allowed, but you'd still be on a leash to keep you from going to far and it would be heavily dependent on where you lived
For use in a WIP, did anybody here work on a high school newspaper? If so, I need to know how often a high school newspaper is published, whether it had paid advertising, and how free a hand the students had in writing content. Could you write about sex, about religion, or about politics? Gossip?
Hey yo. Proud high school journalism geek here. The school paper at my high school had a reputation for being above average. We actually had businesses around the school calling in asking for advertising space, so I'm still afraid of people who went through our program thinking it would be that easy to sell ads to a newspaper!
As for what stories they could write, well, they had to be approved by the faculty advisor, and if you wanted to write something that could be considered controversial, he would let you do it. But he would tell you privately that the likelihood of publication was low, yet he'd encourage you to write it and grade it accordingly. The school paper also had a good relationship with a local neighborhood paper, and there were often chances of seeing a well-written story that the school could not publish being published in the neighborhood edition.
I've had it happen a couple of times, and I still have several copies of those neighborhood papers somewhere in a box.
I won a couple of statewide competitions, including one from back then. I spent the night with a friend of mine who had recently been kicked out of his home. He was hustling to finish high school and basically living out on the streets. He was a great guy and went to UTAustin and graduated. He's got his own family and works as a dentist. He's still my family's and my dentist.
A pleasant conversation with my wife came when she wondered why I was so vehemently behind our kids visiting that particular dentist. I showed her the story.
For reference, this was in the mid to late 70s.
Eight pages, I think biweekly. Definitely paid advertising - many of the local businesses bought ads as community support. The faculty advisor, who'd been there for thirty+ years, okayed everything that was printed, so nothing outrageous.
Ours varied from 6 to 12 pages of letter-sized paper, corner-stapled. The frequency varied considerably. Sometimes it was two weeks between issues, sometimes two months. I think it depended mostly on who was on the newspaper committee that year, how many of them there were, and how enthusiastic. When the issues were driven by only one or two very enthusiastic kids, the frequency dropped when they had major projects, essays, tests, or social events competing for their time.
One option that hasn't been mentioned is that some high schools had one or more 'underground newspapers,' with entirely different standards as to what could be published, levels of resources, etc.
My high school had at least two, one from the 'countercultural' community (nominally 'punk'), and one from a somewhat more 'fight the power' perspective. The latter was fairly well known to be sponsored by one of the teachers, and it was at least believed that he facilitated the use of school resources to print it. The teacher in question was, for various reasons, essentially immune to being fired over something as minor as some mimeographing (even if it was to copy a newspaper critical of the principal, school board, etc).