On Thursday, we went to The St. Mark’s School of Texas and sat in on multiple journalism classes for their newspaper, The ReMarker. Through the past couple of years with my involvement with the FL, I have learned that Ms. Plows is obsessed with The ReMarker and especially with their adviser, Ray Westbrook. She is always saying how they have one of the best papers in the country and she consistently uses their paper as examples of what we should be doing as a staff. To Ms. Plows, The ReMarker is the 1992 Dream Team and Ray Westbrook is equivalent to Michael Jordan. After touring their campus and meeting most of their staff, it is clear why they are considered one of the best papers in the country.
St. Mark’s is an all-boys private school that is pretty similar to Malvern. They have a beautiful campus and one of the most impressive parts is that they have their own journalism wing. This wing is only used for journalism classes and for students who want to work on something for the newspaper. There are three different advanced journalism classes and one beginner journalism for freshmen. This was the biggest difference I noticed between St. Mark’s and Malvern. They have dedicated class time to work on the paper and reporters are committed to getting work done because their grade is dependent on making the deadline.
That being said, the staff of the ReMarker is extremely dedicated. Each month, they produce a paper that is almost double the size of ones that we publish. Each member of the staff is expected to design their own page. I also noticed how every single student was able to discuss in great detail how they run their student paper. It seemed as if Mr. Westbrook might sit back on some of the advanced journalism classes and let his students run the class. The editors that we met were some of the nicest high school students I’ve ever met and were really open to discussing their paper (and also the Cowboys/Eagles game on Sunday night). We all learned new ways to schedule our calendar and how to create an intense but fun environment for The Friar’s Lantern.
The Friar's Lantern Trips 