It’s a month before deadline and CHS Advanced Publications staffer Maddy Black is working on her story pitch to Ward Media: coverage of the collaboration between the high school, the local fire department, and Wenatchee Valley College. Maddy is required to pitch her story idea and receive approval before beginning work on the article.
Maddy spends a month doing research, completing interviews and attending Fire Science classes in preparation for her article for The Echo. Supporting staffers Emily Sanchez and Paula Wasmuth photograph the class on Maddy’s behalf. Maddy drafts her article, receives feedback from editor Isabel Menna and advisor Ms. Robison, revises her article and finally submits the article to both The Kodiak Chronicle and The Leavenworth Echo. “The process is sort of strange this year because I am the one emailing Ward media my photo and article instead of both of the items going through Ms. Robison. However, Ward Media has made a good impression with me which helps take a little bit of my stress away,” said Black. In addition to the photo, caption and article required by The Chronicle, Maddy must also send a headshot to Ward Media before her article can be considered for publication.
Maddy knows that, even despite all of her hard work, if her article doesn’t meet the standards set by Ward Media, her article may not be published. She also knows that, even if it is deemed publishable, Ward Media reserves the right, as editors to make adjustments to her work.
Through this process Maddy, and other Publications advanced staffers like her, learn many valuable lessons: how to differentiate writing based on the audience, how to communicate with a professional entity, how to create and write a story pitch, how to engage in the writing process, and how to meet stringent deadlines.
All of this was born of a collaboration between Cascade High School’s Publications program and The Echo that began four years ago.
“The collaboration began when The Echo reached out to me and requested the work of students on staff for publication in their newspaper,” explained Publications advisor Ms. Robison.
For the first year, the team wrote informally for the paper. “I noticed that the paper would cover school events, but not very comprehensively. Events would be covered if the advisory or coach was willing to write for the paper and this gave me the idea to formalize the relationship between the local paper and the school. I requested that they allowed CHS Publications students to cover the ‘school beat. Publications agreed to provide The Echo with at least one article each month about an event at the high school and, they agreed to allow Advanced Publications students to have the scoop on all school-related articles,” said Robison.
This mutually beneficial relationship has been incredibly valuable for all concerned: CHS gets more equitable/comprehensive coverage of events, Publications staffers get professional writing experience and exposure and The Echo gets passionate, qualified writers.
When Ward Media took over The Echo this past summer, this relationship had to be reestablished. Luckily for everyone involved, the new owners were not only excited to continue the relationship, but ready to grow it as well.
“Ward Media has been incredibly supportive of continuing to support our student journalists,” said Robison. “In addition to reestablishing our agreements, they have offered to come into my classroom as guest speakers and to take on a paid student intern from the program.”
The Leavenworth Echo has been serving the Leavenworth community with its news since it was established in 1904. Over all of these years The Echo has had only four owners, including the most recent owners: Ward Media. They are excited to continue working with the Leavenworth community and Cascade High School. They also own many other media publications, including Cashmere Valley Record, Lake Chelan Mirror, Brewster’s Quad City Herald and the Wenatchee Business Journal.
Terry Ward and Amy Yaley are the faces (and owners) of Ward Media. Terry has been in the publishing industry for over thirty years. At 17, Terry got his first job at his local newspaper company. This started his media career. From there, he went on to further study the publication industry and started Ward Media. Amy Yaley has been working with small businesses for a long time and enjoys working with them. This will be her first year in the publication industry. She is excited to work with the Leavenworth community and the Echo.
Amy and Terrys’ goal is to bring this newspaper back to life for the community. They want to make a positive impact by covering topics that the community wants to hear about. They hope they can bring The Echo more into the community by providing platforms that the community can rely on.
"I'm really excited about Ward Media stepping into this role, because I think that Ward Media has high standards when it comes to journalism. I think they will be making some positive changes to the newspaper that will benefit the journalism community in this area in general,” said Robison.
Their plan on a digital side is to bring in all the region's news so everyone has access to what is happening. Ward and Yaley will be launching a website called northcentralwashington.com that will be a daily newspaper for Leavenworth and all North Central Washington.
On a smaller level through print, they believe that “Leavenworth cherishes this newspaper” and they will focus on keeping it local. “We believe that the print has a long shelf life for the community. We want to be very Leavenworth focused for the Leavenworth Echo,” said Terry Ward.
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