smALL Things Considered

Slated for publication in the 2024 Warrior Yearbook

Reflection

Creating this theme is by far my most difficult accomplishment. Overnight I went from what you see on the left, to what you see on the right. Totally different, I know. Or are they? Both convey the same message of considering the small things behind who we are, but in two vastly different directions. We are Chieftains, but I wanted to focus on the history and culture behind it without being distasteful.

I thought it was time for something different. The past two years we've had what I would consider school spirit books where our colors are, you guessed it, black and orange. On both, the cover either had a Chieftain or our signature block U. I tried to switch it up this year and give us all a little something different.

Pre-MIPA sketch

Final Cover

Cover

Front Endsheet

Title Page

The Process

At the end of last year, when this process began, I was told that I had to make our theme about the Seven Grandfather teachings (read my story about it here). I was never a fan of the idea, but I did what I was told and based our theme around the Chieftain. But I was sick of the orange and black, and I wanted to see some people on our cover. I thought by adding a picture with the Chieftain that it might work, but nope. I still wasn't satisfied.

It wasn't until the night before my theme presentation at MIPA's Summer Journalism Workshop that I found what I really wanted to do. I wanted something that tied in the Chieftain and the changes at our school but also didn't make it the book's only selling point. That was when this year's theme was born.

I wanted something students could see themselves in, not just as one student, but one of the 1,335 that make up Utica High. What better way to do that than put a crowd shot on the cover? With that, I included theme pages like our page that features only students without a mugshot, giving them another chance to be featured. But that wasn't our only theme page. We also had a page called "Consider This" which featured students' hot takes.

I tried to recognize some of our weaknesses from the past years and rectify them here by encouraging our mod designs and headlines to fit the theme. I even made a whole 16-page practice page with pre-made mods on it to help design faster and more consistently as well as an example page that shows our fonts and their sizes, colors, and copy and paste -able elements.

This year I really wanted a theme that embodies the changes we were going through. Overall, yes, we are still the Chieftains. But there is so much more we have done within the school to honor and respect the Chieftain. The small things.