Along with breakfast brought in by a fellow classmate, the New Trier News is always present in every Advisory on Friday mornings. It’s that one time of week where students interested in the state of New Trier can read articles detailing new administrative decisions and consequences along with updates on sports teams currently in season. But next year, New Trier students will have new ways to access all that information, with the launch of a new online school newspaper.
The website can be reached at the address newtriernews.org. It will focus on providing a broader view of life at New Trier, and will serve as the online home for the Freshman Focus, the Sophomore Journal, and the New Trier News. These three papers, usually only available in print, (and in the case of the Focus and the Journal, only available to certain grades) can now be viewed by any New Trier student.
“Moving to an online format is the direction the whole journalism industry is heading towards”, said New Trier News sponsor Carlo Trovato, who also teaches the Advanced Journalism class. “New Trier is actually a few years behind in that aspect.”
Many local high schools now have online newspapers in addition to print newspaper. Evanston Township High School has The Evanstonian, and Hinsdale Central has The Devil’s Advocate. The convenience and savings of an online newspaper have convinced many schools to venture into new territory, which raises the question of when the time will come when schools stop printing physical newspapers altogether.
“At some point it seems inevitable that the New Trier News will be online only,” said Trovato. “The ideal situation would be a New Trier News mobile app, so students could have the paper with them at all times.”
The online format provides some new, exciting ways to tell the news. The website will support video, opening up opportunities to post interviews and video news segments, creating possibilities for the kinds of content that the online news will run. The inaugural issue of online news will be the annual graduation issue, typically the last print issue of the year.
In addition to online news, New Trier will contribute to other online newspapers. Patch is a nationwide news organization that focuses on bringing local news to communities. There is a Wilmette-Kenilworth Patch, and a Winnetka-Glencoe Patch, which contain articles written on important current events in these areas. New Trier and Patch have recently entered into a partnership, where Patch will run four articles a week from The New Trier News on the local pages, and post a link to the online news.