- Modern day heroes
- Unusual pets
- Unusual jobs (or students who meet famous people as a result of their part-time job)
- Making a comeback—students or faculty who have overcome incredible odds.
- The rescue team—librarians who save your necks during research paper time.
- The library—how much is lost each year due to theft, or books not returned, or vandalism. What is being done to curtail this?
- Brian drain—the most difficult classes
- Making the grade—feature on the students who make A’s in the class or from the teacher no one makes A’s from.
- Favorite classes. Why?
- The high price of education—classes that cost additional money like photography, art, computer classes…
- The cost of belonging—activities where you have to pay additional money to represent the school— summer camps, cheerleading uniforms, pompon, dance lines, minor sports, etc.
- Student entrepreneurs
- Volunteers—students/faculty who perform service work in the community
- School traditions
- Athletic superstitions
- Selling yourself—athletes who are real press hounds because they need the publicity to attract college scholarships
- Being recruited—athletes and non-athletes who are heavily recruited by schools, military, etc. Keep track of all the literature received from colleges, etc. Figure postage costs…
- The school junker—the car that’s held together with twine, etc.
- The neatest car in the school—not necessarily the most expensive but the one with the most personality.
- Games teachers play to get your attention or to make a point
- Embarrassing moments in the classroom—for teachers and students
- Breaking curfew
- Excuses—those that students give teachers and those teachers give students
- A day in the life of….your school, the homecoming candidates, the cross-country team, the principal, etc. A journal approach to capturing the day the way it was.
- Sneak attack—a story about tennis shoes (sneakers) in your school. Consider running a survey to determine the average number of sneakers owned, the average cost, and then figure the total cost of sneakers in your school. It’s probably a multi-million business in your school.
- First dates
- Long distance romances—how difficult is it to keep them alive? How expensive are your phone bills? How many letters/e-mails written in a week, etc.
- Techniques for getting noticed by a guy/girl.
- Excuses given from breaking a date
- $5 date
- $500 date
- Over achievers–what drives them to work so hard?
- Students with parents who work at school and the flip side of that–parental reaction to having their children as students/athletes.
- Large families–over 12. How large is the grocery bill? Do they ever get new clothes or do they end up in hand me downs? How long do they wait for the restroom in the morning?
- Heros in hand-me-downs. Junior varsity teams who work hard but seldom have anything new for themselves.
- Team trainers
- On the road again–travel with an athletic team to do a color story on what the road trips are like.
- Bands–students or faculty who have their own bands or play in bands.
- Famous alumni
- Leaders and pleaders–organization leaders who have to beg to get people to do things
- Being clubbed to death–so many clubs and so many choices. Getting overextended in club work.
- Your first credit card
- Driver’s test
- Being stopped by the police
- The class clown–there’s always one who is really a comedian. What makes him tick?
- Unusual hobbies
- Gameaholics–students who spend all of their time and money on video games or board games
- Student hangouts
- Exciting summer trips or spring break trips
- Students who are taking college credit while still in high school
- Unusual relatives within the student body
- Shopping–an obsession
- Purging the urge to splurge–on shopping, eating, whatever. How do you stop?
- School rivalries
- Parents with unusual jobs
- Tanning booths
- Strange and unusual piercings
- Teachers with second and third jobs
- Married teachers who teach in the same school
- Car accidents and tickets
- Being a twin/triplet…
- Making a difference–people who have been an instrumental influence on students’ lives
- Skateboarders
- Stressed for success–students who are intent on achieving academic success, college entrance exams, etc.
- School mascot
- Parental pressure on coaches to let students play–student reaction to this too
- Fashion and fads
- Weather and its impact on school events
- How much it costs to run a school
- Being a custodian, cafeteria worker…
- School epidemics
- How long it takes to get ready in the morning
- How much money the school receives in scholarships
- Cell phones and student use
- Divorce–impact on students
- Teen marriages
- Peer pressure–how students deal with them
- Homecoming Week/Prom Week
- Single-parent families
- What’s cooking–spend a day with the cooks and write a color story about their job. Include specifics on how much food it takes to prepare the students’ favorite meal. What time do they start their day, etc.
- Fast food. How often do students eat it? How much do they spend? What’s their favorite fast food meal.
- Cramming–techniques for studying for tests. How often do students feel they have to cram?
- Procrastination–everybody does it. What rationalizations do students/teachers use to put things off?
- Students or teachers with outstanding accomplishments
- Foul-ups behind the scenes at plays
- Time investment–the number of hours that goes into the preparation of a 12-minute halftime show
- Student musicians who began at an early age–hours they’ve practiced, glad they spend that kind of time…
- Internet and mass media invasion
- Student involvement in environmental protection
- Teenage suicide prevention
- Bench warmers–the athletes who may not see much playing time but are an important part of the game because they keep the team psyched. These are the folks that hold the team together.
- Student jobs–strange work stories
- Freshmen fears
- Tricks played on freshmen or underclassmen
- Competition and how it affects students
