The Lessons of a Former Yearbook Advisor

When I was a yearbook advisor several years ago, I realized that there are a few things that you don't mess up--senior ads and senior superlatives.

At my school, students voted on senior favorites, which were not the same as senior superlatives. Senior favorites were students who were "the most likely..." and one male and female were chosen by their peers for each category. Senior superlatives were students who submitted an application of sorts listing all of their extracurricular activities who were also vetted against their discipline record. If they had participated in a certain number of clubs, activities, honor societies, during their high school years and stayed out of in school suspension (ISS), then they were eligible to be a senior superlative. This distinction was created to recognize those students who may not be at the top of the class but who had still contributed to the positive culture of the school.

The deadline wasn't arbitrary; the yearbook staff had to plan for pictures, gather a committee of teachers to make final decisions, and still meet the yearbook page deadline. Inevitably, I would have parents approach me after the deadline wanting to submit their students' forms. This was not a fight I chose to fight, and all forms were accepted.

My first year as advisor, I made the mistakes of not triple checking a list to make sure no student was accidentally left off and confusing senior superlatives for senior favorites. According to the previous advisor, senior superlatives could not have discipline records. Misunderstanding the distinction between senior favorites and superlatives, I had the principal go through the list of seniors and remove any who had discipline infractions resulting in ISS. The list came back to me much shorter. This was the list I used to allow students to vote on their senior favorites, not realizing that I had mistaken one recognition for the other. The morning of the vote, something was niggling me in the back of my mind. I finally went to the previous advisor to question her about the process. When I repeated what I had done, she realized that I had sent the list of seniors to be vetted for the wrong award. All seniors on track to graduate should have been listed on the voting ballot. By this time, seniors had voted. I immediately announced to the school that I had made a mistake on the ballot and that we would have to re-vote the following week during homeroom.

Unfortunately, one of Momma's precious dumplings went home and reported that his name was left off the ballot for senior favorites. That night, I got a phone call around 10 p.m. from Momma. I listened with the phone several inches away from my head. I apologized. I accepted responsibility for the fiasco. I explained why I made the mistake and that I had already trashed the original ballots and was preparing new ones for homeroom the following week. I apologized again to no avail. I was told that the student, his brother, sisters, mother, and father were all traumatized because Precious Dumpling's name was left off the ballot. I doubted this admission as I had taught Precious Dumpling the previous year, and getting him excited about anything would have been a miracle.

The coup de grace was when she told me that everyone in the small town where I taught hated me tonight, at that very moment. Having heard all I wanted to hear, I said, "Well, it's a good thing I don't live there and don't have to worry about it." Then I slammed the phone down. The forward thinking gal that I am, I immediately called my principal, though it was ten p.m., and informed him of the conversation.

He poo-pooed my concern until the next morning when he received a phone call from the superintendent because the mother had already called the board office that morning complaining about my mistake. Fortunately, I had owned up to the error immediately, made arrangements to rectify the mistake, and kept my principal apprised of every detail.

Did I learn any lessons from my stint as high school yearbook advisor? Yes. I learned that I worked with high school students, and I often reminded people of that when they complained about something in the yearbook. I also learned that I could quickly shut someone up by offering to step down as advisor so the complainer could take over as yearbook advisor the following year. It helped that I really meant what I said. I also learned that Precious Dumpling is always going to be precious to his Momma, no matter what he does, what he says, or how he looks. So don't forget to include his picture in the senior section, don't misspell his name in the book, and heaven forbid leaving his name off the list.