On September 25th, the Wahawk Insider team collaborated with the Wahawk Girl’s Tennis team for a sports media day.
The Spark
After years of deliberation, senior Jay Esmael took action and co-founded the idea of creating a sports media program, which included media days for the teams at West High. This idea came to Esmael after scrolling through TikTok and seeing multiple videos of photographers creating a sports media backdrop.
Esmael was inspired by these videos and brought the idea to his adviser, Nicole Goodman. With Goodman’s approval and guidance, the organization of the media day took place. “Sports media is a growing industry that continues to capture the interest of our students! As we have started to make game day posts and increase our coverage, we have seen huge strides in our engagement,” said Goodman.
Building the Backdrop
Before officially pitching the project to his adviser, Esmael started designing potential logos on Canva, which would later evolve into the photo backdrop. With Goodman’s help, they reached out to girls’ tennis Coach Brenton Kuchera to coordinate the event.
Production began on September 23 and was divided into six teams, each responsible for different parts of the setup. Seniors Alyssa Muheljic, Brooklynn Berumez, and Jacyn Gomez, junior Anders Elliott-Ott, and sophomore Syndy Morin joined Esmael to bring the vision to life after Esmael pitched the idea to the Wahawk Insider class.
In the creation process, they faced a few unexpected challenges, including glue that melted the styrofoam and a shortage of printed designs, but the group quickly adapted to be prepared for the media day. In the end, the team created a 7½-by-4-foot collage backdrop. “It felt really great seeing that all of the work that we did finally paid off and that we were able to do this with the resources we had. It’s been in talks for a while but never came into fruition,” said Esmael.
The Media Day
With production complete, members of Wahawk Insider transformed the West High commons into a makeshift studio. Tennis players rotated through the photo station as student photographers captured both posed and candid moments. “When everything was done, I felt pretty accomplished,” said Berumez. “We had a lot of fun, and it was rewarding to see our work come to life.”
Those helping with the media day helped lead the posing of the athletes and took pictures of behind the scenes. Elliott-Ott took behind-the-scenes footage, b-roll, and he interviewed the players. “I really wanted to volunteer because knowing that we can make something so freaking cool, with what resources we have, just kind of motivated me to be a better journalist. When Jay brought up the idea of doing a media day, I thought it was right up my alley, and using the resources we have with the program and knowing that people will be motivated to get this done, it brought me a lot of joy,” said Elliott-Ott.
Why Media Day’s Matter
While media days are fun, they are more than just producing photos. They are important to journalism and building our program’s storytelling capabilities. “When it comes to sports we tend to think of a couple of athletes and forget the others. I believe that this can help feature students because we aren’t just focusing on a select few, but the team. With creating a media day we are able to feature other students that we otherwise couldn’t before,” said senior Muheljic who is also the Feature and Multimedia Editor for Wahawk Insider.
Junior Mackenzie Johnson, the Social Media Editor for Wahawk Insider finds that the media days will be most beneficial to her as she helps the student designers create game day graphics. “Media days are beneficial for both me as the social media editor and the graphic designers in Wahawk Insider. They enhance our ability to create high-quality graphics and elevate our work to a more professional standard. When we have access to photos of the teams, it ensures better coverage for everyone and simplifies the graphic making process,” she says.
This isn’t only appreciated by our student journalists, the athletes appreciated it too. “It was a pretty nice thing to do,” said Almina Rekic, a senior on the tennis team. “I got to experience some stuff that (I) probably wouldn’t experience in any of my other tennis seasons… it was just something where the whole team got together and just got to, like, mess around and basically do just fun stuff.”
Looking Ahead
Creating a sports media program takes a lot of time, work and effort. The sports media program is currently brand new and with that, the team hopes to grow and implement it into the school with big goals and ambitions in the upcoming years. “I see us doing a sports media day with each team that West High has to offer. As we build our journalistic interest, I think this program will continue to grow until we are doing comprehensive media days with each and every team!,” said Goodman.
