It’s not everyday that your teacher encourages you to go on Instagram and what you post counts towards your grade. A few talented students in the broadcast journalism class have come together to make an account on Instagram to post student athletes and their teams to express school spirit.
The first ever broadcast journalism class was created and piloted at Dominion in the 2019-2020 school year. The class includes making podcasts, videos that are posted on DHS Press’s website and now social media graphics posted on Instagram. The posts include the teams final scores, starting rosters, promoting game days or a senior night all to highlight the team.
Junior Rico Jones is the lead designer in the class and on the account, is who most of the students go to for help and for any feedback. Jones said, “It originally started as an idea Mr. Schwartz had. [He] thought a social media account would be the best way to give to students.” Jones is also an athlete on the football and basketball teams, so he cannot cover anything for those teams. Not only do the students make photo graphics they also make hype videos. The only student who films at the moment is junior Amanda Watanabe, she said “I think video is really fun. I like to film and capture all the emotions of sports.” The students get in contact with the coaches and set up a time before school that works for the team to shoot all the content. Watanabe said, “Both boys and girls basketball had media days this year. We did video and photos [as] part of our preparation but we also go to majority of the home games for each sport.”
Making each individual graphic to promote an upcoming game or releasing the score is a tedious process even more so when it comes to videos with longer clips. Head of the journalism department Mitchell Schwartz said, “I always say don’t start with a blank canvas, find inspiration and then make it your own.” Most of the students know how to piece together templates on Adobe when it comes to making the graphics, but Schwartz aides in providing feedback and tutorials. He said, “We don’t want it to look like clipart or like it’s made in a slide deck. Students are using professional programs and equipment.”
A lot of students have Instagram accounts and will repost themselves and their teammates in the graphics as the highlighted player is a surprise neither the coaches or athletes have access to the pictures taken making the posts entirely based on personal choice. Another lead designer junior Adamaris Revollo-Jaldin said, “I don’t pick and choose who to highlight, if it were senior night I do seniors.”
The account was created in the 2024 fall season and the students plan to continue on through the school year posting every week. Revollo-Jaldin said, “We’ll continue to be posting for any [Dominion] sports on this account.”
To view the student made sports graphics head to @domsportscreative on Instagram.
