Editing, Leadership & Team Building

I was always considered a leader by my teacher throughout my time in school but taking on an editor position my first year on staff was a little daunting especially since I was the only new staff member that year.

As a Copy Editor during my sophomore year, I worked with the other Copy Editor, Sports Editor and the Editor-in-Chief in creating layouts and editing each other spreads. I leveraged their experience and learned quickly on how to coach our reporters.

This paid off as into my junior year I became Co-Editor-in-Chief. I took on additional responsibilities to ensure the entire paper would run smoothly. My leadership skills were tested greatly during this time as now half the staff were brand new. It was an adjustment as I was used to working with experienced staffers but I was able to teach these reporters by remembering how the previous editor-in-chief worked to teach me.

(Photo by Ranae Duncan)

FINAL CHECK Preparing to submit the newspaper to be printed, Sophie Bacon and Justin Diep go through the pages one last time to look for any errors so they could fix them before going to print. (Photo by Ranae Duncan)

See the published story here

Coaching and Editing

As an editor, I wanted my staff to improve and I found the best way to do it was to work one on one with the reporters.

Here, one of my reporters needed assistance with approaching a story she was writing. I walked through with her a graphic organizer to come up with sources and some questions she could ask.

When stories are ready to be edited I have the writer upload their word doc to our shared OneDrive folder where I'll read through and make comments. I'll first look at the content and make suggestions about the story before looking at grammatical and AP style errors.

I will then sit down with the writer and explain my comments on their story so they understand what the edits mean.

I give the writer time to make those edits rather than myself do it so they start building skills to find errors on their own to improve their own writing.

Copy Editing

Even with spell check and autocorrect sometimes errors can slip through the cracks. Before we send off spreads to the printer all of the editors come together for a final proof night. Most of the time the spreads look good and minor mistakes are able to be caught before it gets published.

Here are two pages with errors that we missed in our original round of editing that we caught before it was submitted.

Here is a story by one of my staffers previewing an upcoming basketball game.

After uploading it to our shared OneDrive folder myself and then my advisor go through the story to make edits and comments about things before sending it back to the writer to make fixes.

The red text shows the edits that were made following my and my advisor's editing and commenting.

Team Building

The 2021-22 Orator Newspaper Staff hold their NSPA Best of Show Award from the 2021 JEA/NSPA Philadelphia Storytelling Workshop. (Photo by Ranae Duncan)

Members of the 2021-22 Orator Newspaper and Crusader Yearbook attend the 2022 Spring JEA/NSPA National High School Journalism Convention in Los Angeles. (Photo by Andrew Duncan)

Once a bear, always a bear. Bryan's student journalist pose in front of a Bear Country sign at the St Louis Zoo during their visit to the city for the Fall High School Journalism Convention. Bryan High's mascot is a bear and its campus is also known as Bear Country. (Photo by Gretchen Baijnauth)

Conventions

I believe what brought our staff together most was traveling. It was one of the few times we were all together that wasn't a late work night stressing to meet a deadline. Being away from some of the stress as a student and a journalist to just be people together brought us closer. These conventions also allowed for growth through workshops.

I've been able to go to three JEA/NSPA National High School Conventions with my staff. Together we explored the history of our country in Phildephia's Independence Hall, walked down Hollywood Boulevard as stars and visited the Gateway to the West in St. Louis.

JCamp

I took the summers to further myself as a student journalist. I was fortunate enough that my school paid for my registration for the Nebraska High School Press Association's JCamp's in 2021 and 2022. It was a first for me to interact with other student journalists within the state. Both times I went to the NHSPA's JCamp I took Scott Winter's Editorial Leadership track which brought editors from across the state to bounce ideas off each other to see what could work for our own staffs.

This last summer was probably the busiest summer I had. I was somehow able to balance taking a college class, a marketing internship, and many college prep programs but the highlight of this past summer was the weeklong experience I had at the University of Southern California with the Asian American Journalist Association's JCamp. This intensive program pushed me beyond my comfort zone and showed me what being a professional journalist is. I was able to speak to industry leaders including the L.A. Times Executive Editor Kevin Merida, CBS News correspondent Jamie Yuccas and CNN Digital’s national executive editor Josh Freedom du Lac. I was also able to pick the brains of the amazing JCamp faculty which were Washington Post Texas-based border correspondent Arelis R. Hernández, Bloomberg Middle East correspondent Ben Bartenstein, Wall Street Journal Photo Editor Timmy Huynh, CNN Special Projects Producer Julia M. Chan, Star Tribune Entertainment Critc Neal Justin, Star Tribune Assistant Managing Editor of Diversity and Community Kyndell Harkness ABC7 News Anchor Terrell Brown and the CEO of the Center for Public Integrity Paul Cheung.
A part of this camp that I enjoyed was a reporting activity. We were thrown on our own into L.A.'s Little Toyko to find a story. We had complete freedom to cover any topic and work with anyone in the group. I found out two other journalists were doing a similar topic so I brought us together so we could join forces. The story we created is linked below.

October 13 2022

Little Tokyo's Fashion Scene

With the emphasis on streetwear becoming a bigger trend in American culture, the appeal to many customers has arisen. One shop captures this trend with inspiration from Japan and Southern California. Japangeles in the heart of Little Tokyo is an L.A.-based streetwear store that opened in 2010 as a small stand but was able to expand to a storefront in 2017.

Yuen, an associate of the store admired its uniqueness and emphasis on the importance of the in-person experience of not only Japangeles but

The AAJA JCamp class of 2022 on the University of Southern California's Campus. I learned alongside some of the best student journalists in the country at this program.

The 25 of us were split up into smaller group led by a facility member. I had the fortunate experience to learn closely from Bloomberg Middle East Correspondent Ben Bartenstein.

Me reaching out to the yearbook editor in chief to see if she would also want to meet the new advisor.

The New Advisor

The hardest part about my time as a student journalist was not those late nights trying to meet a deadline or trying to reach a hard-to-contact source. It was learning Ranae Duncan, who taught me everything I knew about journalism from the moment I stepped into high school take a new position at a different school.

It was hard to see the teacher I spent the most time with leave. Some in the journalism program decided that the change of advisor would be too much for them so they decided not to return. That thought crossed my mind as well. I knew that this change would be hard and I was unsure at the time if I even wanted to continue. I even thought about transferring schools to the one Duncan was moving to.

Looking back I believe I made the best decision. I decided to stay with the program at Bryan. I felt it was my responsibility to stay with the program to make sure it survived. The pandemic took a massive toll on Bryan's historicity award-winning journalism program and losing the advisor that built the program up for the last decade was just another blow. I knew if I had not returned the program might not exist.

I took that summer to reflect and think about what I want the journalism program to become. I knew things would not be the same as last year without Duncan but I tried to make the best out of it.

To try and ease the nerves of myself and the new advisor I as well as the yearbook Editor-in-Chief decided it would be a good idea to meet with her before the school year starts to first just get to know each other and try to shape the program with a mix of fresh ideas the new advisor would bring with my own experiences being on staff.

Following this meeting, I met with with the two people I knew were returning to the staff to set some expectations. I wanted to make sure they understood that things would be different and we'd have to be okay with change.

Testimonials

Gretchen Baijnauth

Bryan High School Journalism Advisor (2022-Current)

"His leadership doesn’t just happen on his newspaper staff. When the yearbook editor-in-chief dropped the class at semester, Justin asked me and the class what help they needed. He has been in the room helping them with stories, design and photos. Often if others are unable to take photos, Justin is the first to volunteer. That willingness to go above and beyond has helped both publications."

Olouwatobi Noukpozounkou

The Orator Reporter (2019-20), Section Editor (2020-21), Senior Editor (2021-22)

“Justin has been a hard worker that’s dedicated to journalism even before he was in newspaper. He always made sure to get meet his deadlines and get his work done to his best ability. He’d also help the newer staffers out whenever they couldn’t figure out what to do next. He was a very critical member of our staff."

Ranae Duncan

Bryan High School Journalism Advisor (2010-2022)
"Justin has so much initiative, perhaps, the most that I've seen a student have in my 13 years in teaching. He is 100% someone I can count on to get the job done and done right. He goes out and gets the story and isn’t afraid of contacting whomever he needs to, from the mayor’s office to city council, or even officials at the OPS Teacher and Administrative Center. His other teachers and I hold him in high regard. I have had many conversations with other teachers about him and we all agree that he is “that kid” that we wish all of our students would be more like. He is punctual, responsible, respectful, an eager learner, determined, and self-sufficient."

Keyana Burries

The Orator Editor-in-Chief (2020-21)

"Justin was a very vital member of our newspaper staff. Granted I only got to be his chief for a year, I knew with him on our staff I was passing the newspaper down to someone responsible and reliable. Whenever I needed something done that I couldn’t get around to, Justin was always up for the task or would volunteer himself for the heavy workload. He is a hard worker that always gets the job done correctly and timely. His articles were always turned in at deadline every issue and was always up for a challenge. He is a dedicated hard worker."