TELLING THE STORY IN A YEARBOOK
Writing yearbook copy is very much like writing feature stories for other
publications, except the writer must wrap up all the important points
about a whole season or an entire year in a few paragraphs. The writer
must get the reader’s attention, tell the story with facts and numbers, and
use quotations to show the human element in each piece of copy.Writing the Lead
Five words.
That’s all you get, say the experts, to hook readers and interest them
in reading a yearbook story.
Which of these leads would get you to read on? Why?- Another year of school brought many...
- Number 1.
- During the long, hot day of a track meet...
- To those who were not interested...
- There is an old saying that...
- The schedule was from 8:20 a.m. to 3:26 p.m.
- “Can you feel it?”
- Leadership is the key to success.
- “New hallway, No skipping” read the sign...
- There once was a time when students...
- A second consecutive berth in the championship tourna-
ment... - “Live from HHS” sparked crimson pride...
- Dinosaurs, sandblasted millstones and neon lights...
- Beginning the season with no seniors...
- Despite the 5–7 season record...
Like news and feature story leads, yearbook leads are more reader-
friendly if they contain high-interest words. “Number 1” and “Dinosaurs”
are the top vote getters in this list. Leads that begin with there, the, to and
during are at the top of the list of boring leads.
News Features with Style
Yearbook stories are basically news feature stories. Their job is to
capture the essence of the year, season or event in a few paragraphs and
include all the important facts readers will want to remember in 10, 20
or even 40 years. How do you write copy that will turn today’s vote, party
or game into those picture memories?
Use the “chill factor.” Adviser Carole Wall says the copy should liter-
ally give readers chills all over. She suggests measuring the relative chill
factor of each copy block by sight-and-sound writing, status details and
specific details.
Sight-and-sound writing takes readers into the locker room, onto
the bus, backstage at the rehearsal or cast party, or into the journal-
ism room when the yearbook pages are being created. It describes the(^412) MIXED MEDIA
UNITED STATES, 1972—Sony
introduced the videocassette
recorder (VCR) for educational
and business uses in 1972,
followed by a version for home
use in 1975. The first home
VCRs sold for $1,300.
Sales boomed over the next
decade while prices dropped
to one-third the introductory
cost. By 1988, about half of all
American homes had VCRs,
and basic models were selling
for $300.
Television viewing habits
changed as people recorded
programs and duplicated tapes
for their own use. As viewers
experimented with “time shift-
ing”—recording programs and
viewing them at a later time—
Hollywood realized it had a
new market for movies. Video
rental became the hottest new
business in town.
Some businesses, such as
HBO and other premium cable
television services, saw declines
as the VCR craze caught on.
Inexpensive movie rentals and
reasonable purchase prices for
tapes of timely releases changed
viewers’ television-watching
habits.
The VCR changed school
media production, too. In the
1980s, many schools experi-
mented with video yearbooks.
Special events such as proms
and graduations also were pre-
served in video packages.
By 2007, the era of the VCR
was coming to a close, as DVD
recorders were becoming more
popular for recording video.