Have you heard of the new NA Eye newspaper?

At the end of the last school year, Mr. Hull, English teacher at NAI, and Mr. Caruso, English department head, decided to revamp NAI’s student newspaper and move it online.  With the help of Dr. Hyland, Principal at NAI, and Mr. Morris, the newspaper sponsor at NASH, the shiny new school newspaper will exist as an online periodical from now on, located at naeye.net. Obviously the “eye” part of the website correctly suggests that the site will exists to cover topics around the school, its people, and its opinions.

A talented group of freshman and sophomores are working hard everyday to successfully launch their site in the first quarter of the school year, after starting from scratch.

At the beginning of the process, students learned correct journalism practices, along with navigating SNO Sites, the class’s online publisher.  

For students in the class, being the inaugural class to produce the paper,  is both exhilarating and challenging. Maria Cima, sophomore, commented, “It’s really exciting to see your name in print, and your words on the screen.  I don’t think many people understand how much work it is to put a story together, though.  Photography, writing, interviewing, and coding it into the website is a lot to learn, especially when we were starting everything ourselves.  It is special to be part of this first class, though.”

Mr. Caruso added, “We have discussed more focused journalism courses at NAI and NASH over the last several years because we see such courses as infinitely valuable to both our students and the greater North Allegheny Community.”

Each student enrolled in the class has the chance to write their very own story allowing them to publish a traditional piece of writing and others might create video projects, pictures albums and much more. As a twenty-first century newspaper class, NAEye writers plan to not only write stories but produce news that will appeal to anyone’s eye.

These stories are continuously produced and published and are publicized through social network accounts like Instagram, Snapchat, Youtube, etc.

Some of the stories include upcoming events like formal dances and the homecoming football games. Other stories can range from current events, entertainment, school news, student polls and much more.

“

It’s really exciting to see your name in print, and your words on the screen.  I don’t think many people understand how much work it is to put a story together, though.  Photography, writing, interviewing, and coding it into the website is a lot to learn, especially when we were starting everything ourselves.  It is special to be part of this first class, though

— Maria Cima

“I signed up for this class because I thought it would improve my writing skills” Marcaela Allen said, a current sophomore in the newspaper class, adding, “and I’m thinking of a potential career in journalism.”

As students learn more about using the website the better they can write, edit and post. The class helps prepare them for possible career choices and allows them to transition more smoothly into current newspaper jobs because today’s society is mainly focused in online and digital platforms.

The newspaper classes [from NAI and NASH] are planning to go to Washington this upcoming Nov.30 to Dec.2 for a tour of the Huffington Post, NPR, and various other news organizations. This trip offers a unique experience to the students to be able to learn about the profession.

“It’s important that students at NAI are exposed to the creativity and seriousness of what goes into the journalism” says Mr. Hull, the teacher of NAEye newspaper and an English teacher.

Mr. Hull hopes that as the newspaper class continues to evolve, it will become a part of telling the stories of the most important parts of North Allegheny Intermediate: the people who occupy it.