Now with larger class sizes, Ernesto Zita’s Video Production classes are introducing more student-centered content for daily announcements. 

“This year is definitely different than last year,” Video Production teacher Ernesto Zita said. “Our number one thing is to make the announcements and get them out, so with students from last year being more skilled, it’s been quicker for us and especially for me by how they’re now skilled enough to teach the new students to film and edit.”

In one segment called Wednesday Winners, students spin a wheel for an opportunity to win a gift card, vending machine items, or a candy option, followed by a task to do. 

“We kind of just started looking at Tuesday Tunes from last year,” McCullough said. “[We] took the basic idea of having it based on the day of the week and decided to work from there. It has been fun hosting the segment and doing it with my friends. I’m definitely looking forward to hosting more segments like this.”

Announcements are filmed prior to the day it officially airs. With these extra segments being added, student content needs to be filmed days in advance before the official announcements. 

“The only difficult part for us is going through people and picking one randomly to go grab from their class and do the segment,” sophomore Riley McCullough said. “Other than that, it’s a pretty straightforward thing for us and for [them]. They know what they’re signing up for and it’s easy for us because we don’t have to explain too much, but also have fun interacting with them.”

Despite giving students creative freedom, Zita emphasizes the type of content that can be put on the announcements.

“Everybody wants to do something funny, and it’s great fun for a few minutes, but it has to have some substance behind it; therefore, I shoot down a lot of ideas,” Zita said. “I have a few students that have written a mystery series that they’re going to do throughout the year and I would like to see more of that [type of] content in the future, I feel like it’s professional and exciting, like a whole movie production. It’s been great seeing them work extremely fast.”