I learned many things at the GSPA Conference on Thursday, not the least of which was that there is such a thing as a high school hipster; and they are, in fact even worse than the regular kind. More relevant still to the issue of journalism are the things that were actually discussed in the sessions.
In the session Literary Magazines: A Best Works Approach, Kristy Cates spent a large part of the time talking to the high schoolers who were there and getting them to share ideas that they used in their own high school literary magazines. She opened by inviting everyone to write down what should be in a literary magazine and what should not. She said that the key questions to ask are: What are you trying to showcase? What are you trying to promote? Are you trying to be exclusive?
This last question is especially important for a literary magazine. What it means is that does everyone get published or are you more concerned with getting high quality content in your magazine. This is probably more of an issue for high school publications since it is not expected that everyone has an equal opportunity to be published in a professional publication. Still, you should not be too exclusive because literary magazines are seen as a way for people who don't usually have a voice to be heard.
Obviously, artwork is an integral part of the layout and design of a literary magazine. It is important to settle on a design template and theme early on and leave it open so that it will work with all future editions and any artwork that might be featured in your magazine.
In Newspaper Design, Nicola Corbin started out by showing different examples of newspapers from all over and pointing out some design flaws such as too much clutter or too much white space, though negative space is still a very important design element.
It is also essential to choose the right pictures to go along with your stories. They must be interesting but they must also further the story.
In all the conference provided a great opportunity to learn a variety of things from various informed sources. As it was a journalism seminar geared towards high school students, I was able to get some really good material for my article on technology in high schools.
I like what you said about the question of exclusivity in literary magazines. I feel like that idea is almost counter intuitive to most magazines who are trying to gain as many readers as possible. I suppose literary magazines are more akin to The Economist or Oxford American that strive to attract a more elite intellectual crowd. In my magazines class we learned that part of The Economist's ad campaign is to boast about its elite readership. I find it interesting that this has been a successful marketing strategy for them and could be for literary magazines too.
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