By J1 Student Margaret Hiatt

The Nebraska Schools Activity Association has created a program for their member schools called Membership Monday. The program has evolved over the course of its three years. 

Membership Monday looked very different three years ago. Schools would submit facts about themselves with a picture of their logo and a picture that they think represents their school. The NSAA would then post this information on their twitter and facebook. 

The program changed drastically this year. The marketing manager for the NSAA, Ashton Honnor, says that now it is a “three to five minute highlight video of all the awesome things going on at each school.” The change from social media posts to videos allows for more student involvement. 

Honnor says that a goal of the program it to “highlight the 307 member schools.” There is no one specific demographic that the videos are made for as they reach all different types of people. The videos could reach grandparents, parents, alumni, students, faculty, and potential students. 

One of the only requirements of the video is that it is produced by students. Journalism students across the state have joined in on Membership Monday to showcase the unique aspects of their respective schools. 

Journalism 1 students at Marian stepped up to the Monday Membership challenge. Four girls volunteered to be part of the video process. Junior Ellie Brabec details that the process was “difficult but rewarding.” Creating the video was a difficult process because of the limited time.

A challenge that the students faced was organizing interviews around differing schedules. 

Brabec says that the hardest part of the video “was the editing process after getting all of the footage.” The journalism girls took on a big project and learned as they went. 

The creation of the video allowed the journalism students to advance their broadcasting skills. Brabec says her “favorite part was collecting and sorting through the b-roll” footage. The b-roll footage displayed the various and unique parts of Marian life. 

In the video itself, Brabec says that her favorite part was the “b-roll behind the interview with Mrs. Ernst.” The team interviewed the president, Mrs. Michele Ernst, as well as the principal, Mrs. Susie Sullivan. The journalists asked the leaders about what is unique about Marian and the values that the school hopes to instill into their students. Marian focuses on developing the six core values into the students. Ernst and Sullivan explained how they see compassion, service, community, Marian identity, spirituality, and empowerment in every Marian girl. 

The team of journalism students hope that their video will “encourage aspiring Marian girls to come to Marian. Brabec says that one of their goals was to “show that Marian is a special place.” The girls worked hard to achieve this goal through showing the different programs and opportunities offered at Marian.