News class: students ‘press’ their point
As part of an HT initiative to interact with India’s teens on the eve of Children’s Day, the young editors sat through edit meetings, discussed the morning’s paper and hotly debated the choice of page 1 stories on Thursday.
Thrilling”, “an exciting journey”, “great sitting with the Big Boys”, “exciting doing reporting”, “great being able to choose a page 1 story” — it was indeed a day to remember for 21 young ‘consulting editors’ visiting Hindustan Times on Thursday.
As part of an HT initiative to interact with India’s teens on the eve of Children’s Day, the young editors sat through edit meetings, discussed the morning’s paper and hotly debated the choice of page 1 stories.
The students from various public and government schools of Delhi spent the day at HT House. While a few lucky ones got an opportunity to do reporting with HT reporters, others clicked snaps and picked up a few photography tricks.
“Attending the newsroom meeting with the Big Boys was really interesting. But I was disappointed. They had promised a lot of yelling but it was all very civilised,” said Srishti Kashyap, Class XII student of Springdales School, Dhaula Kuan.
While the students mildly discussed the paper’s strengths and weaknesses in the morning meeting, they had warmed up to the workings of a media house by evening. For instance, the choice of a story on a differently designed cricket bat for the front page was hotly debated.
“We don’t think a cricket bat deserves page 1 space. We would rather have the story of Orissa children, who have come to Delhi to talk about their plight in conflict-ridden Kandhamal,” the young editors said. And so the cricket story was pushed inside.
“It felt good to be able to decide what story can go on page 1. There are so many things we would like to change about our country but cannot right now. So we felt empowered after fighting for this story,” said Aakriti Shaproo from Vivekananda School.
The students spent the day looking at page designs, learning how to edit stories and interacting with journalists. “We really wanted to accompany the crime reporter and see how she works,” lamented Tanvi Girotra from DPS, RK Puram. However, she managed to go out with a reporter and talk to citizens for another story.
Mansi Sharma, a Science student of DAV, Shreshta Vihar, was not so lucky.
“I want to become a journalist but I did not get an opportunity to go out on any assignment,” said Sharma.
She, however, promised to be back. “Now that I have got a sneak peak into the print media, it has only whetted my appetite,” Sharma said.