The Wildcats’ daily announcements have been running for over 10 years, and constantly change through leadership, technology and content, while aiming to grow and intrigue students more every day.
The announcements were previously run by Gwen Sidley, who retired two years ago. Currently, Joshua De Bets, who teaches digital filmmaking and CTE Digital Communications is in charge. Though he operates the announcements, it relies heavily on student participation as students write the script and produce the show everyday.
“[Digital communication students] are here every brunch,” De Bets said. “[They’re working hard and making sure we go live on time.”
As different students join and leave, fresh ideas are brought along every year as older ideas retire. One tradition that has since been left behind is something known as “The Friday Show.” This was a special five-minute film every Friday that was pre-recorded by the students in their own time.
“One of my favorite films that I worked on when I was a senior was filmed in a forest,” ethnic studies teacher and paraprofessional Frank Smith said. “We were looking for dead bodies that each had announcements on them.”
While Smith misses these Friday specials, he also enjoys how the current announcements include more emphasis on weekly interviews, through student-to-student topics such as favorite songs and even “no-shave November.”
“I love when they have little segments with students,” Smith said. “It gives the viewers a little slice of life at Woodside.”
The announcements are usually two to three minutes long and cover school games, events and club advertisements.
“I personally wish the announcements were longer,” freshman Genesis Garcia said. “They help me relax and are a fun treat.”
Garcia likes the humor and effort students put into the announcements, despite their brevity. She also suggested adding elements like birthdays, special days like National Donut Day and information about scheduled games.
“It could enhance the announcements and increase student viewers at school games,” Garcia said.
Along with ideas from students and teachers about the announcements, De Bets said that there are a lot of innovations that the student crew is currently working on in order to increase student enjoyment.
“In the past couple of years, a lot of students were not as engaged in the announcements,” De Bets said. “There were a lot of technical issues and sometimes it was hard to hear what they were saying.”
Some ideas De Bets had to improve student engagement were organizing announcements differently, incorporating creative student ideas and mixing traditional content with new features, such as mental health public service announcements or teacher interviews.
“Every now and then, I like to try and mix it up and include something different that the students can either laugh at or appreciate in some way,” De Bets said.
This semester, De Bets had some ideas for incorporating creative student ideas that will keep audiences entertained. One idea he is putting into effect includes giving all 19 announcement-making students a broadcasting date that they have to create five minutes of content for. De Bets also said that the students are making new openers. The students get to choose a TV show they like and then recreate it with a group on campus.
“This way it won’t just be people reading out the announcements,” De Bets said. “It’s actually going to be something more unique [and] something that’s hopefully going to get the student body more engaged [watching] it.”
De Bets said that they still have a lot more to come up with, and though being content creators is tough, they do their best to keep things fresh and exciting.
“We have so many great ideas,” De Bets said. “Soon enough, you’ll see them all come to life!”
