By Claire Shenk ‘25
During the early hours of November 4th 2025, editors of the Valley Voice, including myself, embarked on a journey to New York City. We had been invited to attend a conference at Columbia University. The convention centered around helping build high school publications, such as school newspapers, literary magazines, and yearbooks. Students from schools all around the U.S attended; it was encouraging to meet other students interested in similar topics.
The conference consisted of five sessions with a vast range of lectures to choose from; each session had intriguing names and descriptions. Not only did the conference teach us some tips on how to grow our club, it also gave us a little taste of what college could be like. Throughout the conference I felt like an adult roaming through the beautiful Columbia campus. Every session consisted of new topics and ideas, each speaker was passionate and well educated.
Most of the lecturers at these sessions were college professors or professionals within the journalism field. I attended a lecture where a retired professor was talking about student press rights. Another session I sat in on was focused on poetry and we practiced writing in the perspective of a fictional character of our choice.
After the conference, I was inspired by the enthusiasm this trip brought to the table, as were many of the editors on the Valley Voice. “ It definitely prepared me for what journalism is like in the real world,” Olivia Hernandez, editor of arts and entertainment stated, and I couldn’t agree more.
This experience was not only a fun team bonding experience, but it also taught us a lot of helpful information to expand the Valley Voice. Ms. Lapp, the club advisor, hopes to include this next year for editors to help continue to build up the club and encourage student journalists!