Sophomore Andrew Catti stepped back in time when the school’s TV production staff recently traveled to Daytona State College for the Florida Scholastic Press Association District 3 workshop.

“My favorite thing from FSPA was the dark room,” Catti said. ”We put film from like an old camera and we make pictures from the old cameras, and it was very cool and dark. I liked it.”

Throughout the day, students attended various sessions where they learned about different aspects of journalism. Seniors Anna Wilder and Madhav Pamidimukkala even taught a session.

The workshop took a whole school day, and during this time, journalism students had an opportunity to learn things they might not be able to learn on their high-school campuses.   

“It’s good for people that are on staff, especially when it’s their first year there,” senior Shawn Humphrey said. “We can only tell them so much, so when you have outside influences that are telling them different things or if they are telling them the same thing, they know it’s not something we are saying to say it, or they have gotten bored with hearing it after having heard it so many times. They have a chance to hear from people from other schools and students from other schools that are working in different ways and just getting touch with them, getting context. So it’s a good thing.”    

Daytona State College is located about an hour and a half away from campus which meant parent volunteers were enlisted to transport the students. 

“We were scrambling at the last minute,” senior and director of WCTZ News Macie GoldFarb said. “I remember [adviser Mark Schledorn] was stressed because to be a volunteer driver you have to be fingerprinted with the school and not enough parents were, and by that time there wasn’t enough time to be [fingerprinted]. We ended up having enough parents. We actually ended up having too many.”

It was an eventful day for students with many new experiences, like trying the college’s food.

“They had pizza during lunch. The crust is really good on the pizza. The campus store is right next to that area, so if you don’t like the pizza, they got some nice Ramen for you or candy bars,” Humphrey said.

The next FSPA event will be the state competition in April at the Wyndham Resort hotel in Orlando.

By Caroline Cahill