December - Full throttle

Posted by Krystyna Hunt in

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Joanne and I have been going like gangbusters on the remaining assignments and left the other two eating our dust. Dayna is eager to learn how to work and participate and is glad to be assigned tasks. Joanne and I designed the look and purpose of the media kit, magazine and newspaper and passed some writing and layout work to Dayna.

However, again we have hit the great divide between the Mature and the Immature. Ross has disappeared. Far fewer students are in class now. Prof Marilyn tells me this is the time they start dropping off and neither the college or the teachers may know about it. The teachers just have to keep a regular roll call going to know who is and is not coming into class. Ross is one of these people who may or may not have dropped out of class, or is just skipping a lot of classes.

Like many others who have learned to goof off in high school and be passed anyway, he is not bothering to come into class, return emails, and return phone calls. He certainly is not with Joanne, Dayna and me in the library searching through reference books and image libraries. He is not picking colors or fonts or calculating the number of article inches that can fit on a page. He has not submitted one article or one photo and certainly not one idea.

Joanne has finally run into him somewhere and given him one page of the newspaper to work on, and to write restaurant reviews for the section of our magazine we designed for restaurant reviews. He emails the reviews in and that is one thing he does.

It is time to present the media kit. We have had to design a presentation folder, brochure, business card, letterhead and sales letter for this magazine and newspaper we are publishing. This is for the Adobe Desktop Publishing class and goes toward 30% of our final mark. The other two are for the Design for Newsprint class, where we have also been taught magazine layout. Joanne and I have done maybe 80% of the work, Dayna maybe 19%, and Ross maybe 1% except only .5% has been turned in.

Prof Ellen makes it clear she wants to know who did how much work. Well, Ross did nothing on the media kit - nada, zip - and I say so.

Later on Ross vexes his indignation. He was a part of our group, how come we didn't include him in the group!??! Ellen told him he better have something he designed handed in the next week, or he will lose the marks. Ross just expected us to cover for him. Just like a 10-year-old he was part of our "gang" and the gang was supposed to include him in the rewards even if he didn't come out to play. He thought we would cover for him = and I think the other 2 sould have - but I come from different priorities that does not have peer loyalty as its first rule - so I guess he was wrong.

Now the next step is due. The newspaper needs to be presented to Prof Marshall in the Design for Newsprint class. Except that he hasn't sent in the page he was supposed to design and fill with articles and photos. Again, we email and phone him to send us his page. Marshall wants to see the whole thing. No response, he's mad at us and doesn't want to play with us anymore.

Joanne gives him an ultimatum. He still talks to her, he no longer talks to me - I am too much like a teacher, expecting him to be responsible. Joanne tells him if he does not act like a functioning member of the group, he is out. We will not contact him any longer, we will have to do his page for him, and he will lose another large set of marks. Joanne tells us how tired she is of constantly checking for emails that he never sends. The rest of us are working but part of our energy is drained because we have to keep him in mind and keep wondering where he is all the time.

Ross answers his first email, ever. Yes, he's in. He has worked on his page of the newspaper and sends the attachment. The paper has to be presented in one day and Ross shows up at his first meeting with us, the next morning, to review the whole look. Joanne has taken on the editing duties, and she works until past midnight coordinating our collective effort so that the newspaper looks cohesive.

The next day, the 4 of us present our newspaper and Marshall likes what he sees.