Youth Coverage

For years, we have published a Classroom of the Week page that features a classroom from one of our area schools. In recent years, we have added the project to our Wilber and Friend newspapers. Those pages generally run in black and white so we do a photo page of class photos instead of their artwork. This has been a popular feature in our newspapers. People enjoy seeing what the children are doing. An added bonus is that we visit the schools a lot more in order to gather the content. Through that added contact, we have been able to gather additional story ideas and opportunities that we wouldn't have otherwise. Each page includes an opportunity to purchase a banner ad at the bottom of the page. The page is published weekly throughout the school year other than over Christmas break. Some years the project sells out early in the year. Other years, it can be a struggle to get all of the spots filled. I was at one of the local hair dresser shops a couple years ago. The hair dresser told me that's one of the first pages the staff looks at to see whose class is being featured and if they know any of the students. The page has also been successful in the Nebraska Press Association's annual awards competition in past years. While it is not unique to our publication, we try to maximize it creatively through presentation.