Among the clubs at Camas High School (CHS), a new club focused on journalism is making its way onto the scene. Its founders are The Camasonian’s copy editor Seha Jang (11), and her friend Esther Nyaturu (11). Jang and Nyaturu are revitalizing a club that previously existed in CHS.
“There was already a journalism club here at CHS, but it just didn’t have enough participation and it was kind of disbanded,” Nyaturu said. “But we decided to start it up again as an outlet for our interest in journalism.”
The club is advised by CHS teacher Kate Gooding, who runs the Camasonian and the school yearbook. While journalism is already a class at CHS, the club piques the interest of many students who may not have been able to take the class.
“I didn’t really have space in my schedule to do it, so the fact that I was able to do it outside of school hours and sort of on my own time was a really cool way to get the class function without taking the actual class,” CHS Junior Orrin Brown said.
The goal of the club is to have a similar function to the Journalism class but with more accessibility schedule-wise.
“The students who created this club wanted a place for kids who couldn’t take our class to have a space to be able to write stories as well, just to be more inclusive in our community so everybody gets a chance to access journalism,” Gooding said.
Along with an extended outreach of journalism to the community, Jang and Nyaturu have several other things that they hope to accomplish within the club.
“We’re taking an artistic detour,” Jang said. “We’re incorporating more artistic elements into journalism like photojournalism, cartoons, and more op-ed related stuff. More in terms of literature itself, not just strictly journalism.”
Including some of these artistic elements also opens the floor for people with an interest in journalism but not a ton of writing experience. Junior Lyra Bajaj is a photographer for the CHS yearbook and shares her interest for the club.
“[Photojournalism] is kind of what I wanted to start with but then I also kind of wanted to expand,” Bajaj said. “I want to expand my vocabulary and just be better at analyzing writing.”
Outside of art and literature, the club also hopes to incorporate unique projects of its own.
“We’re considering doing some kind of magazine or paper, just something to showcase all the work people have done over the course of the year,” Nyaturu said.
The magazine would be similar in style to the Camasonian’s annually published one, but with individual differences unique to the club.
Along with project goals, Nyaturu and Jang hope to curate a space that involves people in journalism and the world “outside.”
“[Our goal is] to foster a healthy humanities atmosphere for students who are interested in media, social issues, and the community,” Jang said.
Meetings will take place on the third Tuesday of every month in Room 108 during Student Support.
