by Moriah Starks
Wingspan news magazine and La Pluma literary magazine staff traveled to South Texas Press on Thursday, October 25, to see the first issue for the 2018-19 school year roll off the presses. For many students, this was the first time to see, hear, and learn about printing operations.
Students worked for more than six weeks to put together the issue, which also features the inaugural issue of “La Pluma,” the new campus literary magazine that features writing, artwork and photography from students across the campus.
“I was excited to look at the finished product, the growth from how far we’ve come, and how literary magazine exceeded my expectations,” Editor-in-Chief Marie Lanoux said.
The first issue consists of eight color pages with a full-color cover featuring the artwork of Gabriella Castro. Two thousand copies are printed and distributed during lunch shifts to all students.
“The cover shows a lot of beautiful fall colors…it’s full of life and catches everyone’s attention,” staff writer Sophia Alvarez said.
Students learned the steps in press production including; downloading files, brighting pictures, press plates, paper spools, a paper trimmer also known as “the guillotine,” and the four color process.
“It surprising that each color has to be layered in individual plates. There is no way to combine the four basic colors onto one plate It’s crazy how many steps you go into making a single eight paged high school news paper.” Junior Cambree Flores said
During a tour of the facility students saw offset presses, digital presses, web presses, sheet fed presses and antique presses.
“Watching the web press print the papers was interesting because it shows how the colors change each time a pressmen adjust the amount of color needed for the paper,” Yasmine Rodriguez said.
The culmination of the tour was to see Wingspan roll off the web press, get bundled and bring it back to campus.
“It honestly felt really great to see all the hard work come to life right in front of us,” sophomore Harlee Ortiz said.
