Mitchell Fox November 5, 2020
Released December 7, 2020
**This is the first article of The Woodlands Woodstock Returns**
On many occasions, I have been asked by parents and students the same perilous question: “What is Woodstock?”. While I would like to make a sarcastic quip about the music festival held in the summer of 1969, I tend to revert back to the same basic answer; “It’s the school newspaper!”. And that it is. We are a club dedicated to publishing articles and content to inform the Woodlands community of the great clubs, sports, events and achievements of the school. And it is with that definition that we began to realize that the best way for us to succeed is to make sure that Woodlands students and staff know what it is that we do. So here it is.
The Woodlands Woodstock has been around for a long time (even we don’t know for sure!) and has served the purpose of acting as a source of news and stories from around the Woodlands community. The intent of our work is to inform Woods students of the events and clubs they can take part in, while also informing parents and prospective students of the many opportunities presented to Woodlands students. On top of this, we hope to bring the achievements of Woodlands students, clubs and events to light as there are many to be informed of, and many that do not necessarily get the recognition they deserve.
To do this, we try to write a large variety of articles. To begin with, many clubs have been covered over the years, and this year we hope to provide accelerated coverage of club events, as well as online tournaments and competitions. Similarly, sports play an important role in the Woodlands, and we try to cover them to the best of our ability. This includes bringing forth the stories of incredible performances and highlighting the teams that many Woodlands students and staff may be unaware of. The most significant topic of Woodstock articles, however, is likely the large spirit events held by the school and its clubs. For example, the International Bazaar is likely the biggest event of the year at the Woodlands, and we try to cover it as such.
However, articles are not everything for the Woodstock. Each year, we try to provide coverage and memories that will last through the use of images and other forms of media in our articles and printed editions. We know that full-page articles are not typically of interest to many students, so we attempt to provide a deeper coverage through the use of multimedia. This year, we also hope to supply a large variety of new content, including popular newspaper elements such as comics, trivia or advertisements for clubs and events.
Of course, all of this work is not worth much if it is not published and brought forward in an effective way, and that is something we are trying to solve this year. In the past we have struggled with viewership as a result of not putting our work out on social media or our website often enough, so this year we hope to provide a more continuous array of articles. The printed editions are popular with parents during Open Houses and such events, but we know that students are less inclined to this form of media. Thus, we are attempting to make our website much more interactive and effective, while also using social media to showcase our own work as well as updates on various clubs and events.
All of this is well and good, but we know that the one difficulty of all clubs this year is figuring out how to run a club and publish their work during a global pandemic, where everything is done online. Fortunately for Woodstock, this provides us with an opportunity to grow our newspaper by becoming an important source for updates on clubs and events. For this reason, we plan to make our social media accounts and website more popular and effective, and to add a ton more content overall. There will be some new forms of media used this year, which is something that we are undoubtedly excited for.
As for club meetings, we plan on holding some meetings via Google Meets, but also to shift our focus to a more individualized experience for our writers. We will focus on giving members the chance to write about the things that they want to write about - or to do the things they want to do - without the pressure of being a full-fledged member of a club with meetings every week. We will remain in contact with our members with the hope of creating a close-knit community of passionate individuals, but we do not plan on adding any more stress to the lives of students in these difficult times.
There is undoubtedly a lot to take from this long article, but the most important thing for you to know is that the purpose of the Woodstock is to be on the side of all Woodlands students. We want to be a source of news and updates, but also of inspiration and pride for the great things that this school can accomplish.
Stay tuned as we hope to be putting out a variety of content over the coming days and weeks.
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