After 17 years of teaching English classes at Central Middle School, and more recently West Shore, Jodi Capron has stepped in as the yearbook adviser for the first time. The class was previously taught by Mark Schledorn, but as he also teaches journalism, news magazine and TV productions. Capron took over yearbook to lighten the workload.

Yearbook is different in many ways than a core class like English, which Capron is used to, so it was a completely different environment that she was stepping into.

“Its more like project management or coaching,” Capron said. ” It took me a good few weeks to lose that anxiety as a teacher of not having set lesson plans each day. I had to get into the rhythm of realizing that my editors in chief pretty much handle everything, and I’m just there to make sure everyone is doing what they need to be doing.”

Even though the editors are often in the spotlight, it can still be a lot of work for the adviser.

“There are days when I don’t have much to do and there are days when the class period flies by because it’s more hectic,” Capron said. “We’re just coming up on our first deadline which is the most stressful part of yearbook. I can only imagine that it gets more stressful as final deadlines approach, so it’s either very little stress, or very high stress.”

Capron said she hopes she gets to teach yearbook next year and for many years after, based on the experiences she has had so far with the class.

“I hope that it works out,” Capron said. “I think that I’d have to mess up pretty badly to not end up doing it again, and the first year is always very difficult for everyone.”

Students are already getting acclimated to the change and enjoy working with the new teacher. Chloe Lemstrom (11) is in her second year of yearbook and said there were no issues or complications with the change.

“She’s really nice and she seems like she has a lot of good ideas for yearbook,” Lemstrom said. “She is definitely excited and motivated to get things done.”

By Kelsi Minter