Review of Glenbrook North High School's Torch

The Glenbrook North (GBN) newspaper, the Torch, has been the best newspaper sent to us yet by far. The paper has the strongest articles, creative and (mostly) original pictures, as well as the best layout of any paper we've seen. One of the best things about the GBN newspaper is that its articles are not only full and lengthy, but also that they are relevant to the student body and are written in various styles. For example, on the front page of the GBN paper is an article about how Illinois law has changed so that drinking tickets do not have to be reported to high schools anymore. At first, it may seem that the only link to GBN is that some high schoolers there have probably engaged in underage drinking; however, the author of the article starts the article off by including an example of how the old law prevented a starting player on GBN's varsity football team from competing during the season. Immediately, the author's audience is intrigued by how the change in the law may affect themselves, their peers, or other football stars in the future. After the initial hook, complete with a short summary and quote, the article goes into detail about the difference between the old law and the new law, as well as the reason for the change in the law. Again, the author uses quotes from credible sources on the topic. Additionally, the author interviewed other members of GBN's community and their thoughts on how the new law will affect student behavior. The article provides a complete overview of the "news" being shared with the audience, relates how that information can or will affect GBN students, and includes responses/reactions of people from the GBN community to that information. I think that this article is complete, finished and polished and is a perfect model of how we should think about writing articles in the Beacon. besides providing finished and professional articles, the GBN paper included a variety of writing styles. For example, the article "High school trends: stress and sleep deprivation" on page 5 was written as a narrative from the viewpoint of the author during a typical day at school. Compared with Luke Zarzecki's recent article about sleep deprivation in students, I wouldn't say one is better than the other simply because Luke's article was more informative and the GBN article was more creative, however, I did find the GBN article more interesting. Although some people may want to read and informational piece about the statistics of high schoolers' sleeping habits, I thought the GBN sleep deprivation piece added more to their newspaper than Luke's would because it provided a change in pace from the normal newspaper article structure. Thus, the input of a creative article conveying the same overall idea is more pleasant to read and adds more value to GBN's newspaper. Finally, I really enjoyed the Torch's use of graphics, pictures and drawings in their paper. The only pictures/drawings/graphics not taken or created by students that I could find were the picture on the front page of the paper and the pictures from the "Holiday Gift Guide" article. Other than that, every picture was student created, and yet the pictures were still professional and well executed. My favorite picture was the graphic on page 8 for the "Excessive sitting poses health risks" article, but I also really enjoyed how the Boys Swimming article on page 12 was made to look like a pool itself. Overall this paper was really successful and I think aiming to produce a paper of this quality is a good goal for our Beacon class.