As the last full day of HSJI is slowly coming to a close, I thought I would type up a quick reflection of my week here as a member of the PR Team.

Getting here on Sunday, a day prior to all the other HSJI students, we (Jessica Kelly, Tess Plazek, Jaelyn White and myself) set off to work almost immediately, wanting to begin our coverage for the week right away. Starting off, we worked on a Adobe Spark story of what students could do here in their downtime, which included taking a walk to Kirkwood, taking a picture with at least one of three statues (Ernie Pyle, Herman Wells or Hoagy Carmichael), and/or checking out the Eskenazi Museum of Art.

During our time here, we also worked on a farewell story to Ernie Pyle Hall as we will be the last student journalists to work here. Additionally, we created a multimedia story introducing Franklin Hall, the new location of the Media School. We provided a tour via video, a closer look with some photos, and a written story.

As this is also the 70th annual year of HSJI, we put up a more in-depth story about what has happened here over all this time and what has changed since. We have also posted multiple student profiles so viewers can get an inside look to students here that we picked at random, and even posted a video of ourselves showcasing a less serious, more silly side, so they could get to know us a little better. If you follow us on Twitter (@HSJIatIU) and/or Instagram (hsji_iu) you’ll see that we’ve been tweeting and graming all week and have most likely seen links to all of the stories I mentioned above and more!

From my own perspective, I have gained so much from my week here. What’s so cool about being on the PR Team is that we may not have daily classes like everyone else, but we are working independently as a team to report on stories and put them out there as quickly as possible. I always learn better when I am doing things hands-on, and this week was certainly no exception. I have had to go beyond what is in my comfort zone, and from that have only grown and benefitted. I cannot wait to return home to my own publication and implement what I have gained from this experience, and I hope for any HSJI student reading this, that you feel the same way.