by Ayrton Breckenridge
Something new has developed in journalism. It was originally called “PCM 10,” but this
semester it was changed to “Thunder TV.” Thunder TV is a new broadcasting show in
journalism. It is shown every two weeks to the staff and students at the high school and
shows events and news at PCM.
Senior Rory Van Gorp was one of the original founders of Thunder TV and helped get it
off the ground.
Van Gorp said, “It started when we went to the Iowa High School Press Association
Conference in Iowa City. A group of us watched workshops about student video news, and we were interested in it and wanted to bring it to our school.”
This years’ news cast consists of all the positions a normal news show broadcasted on
television would have. It has two lead anchors: Juniors Wes Cummings and Olin Meinders. The sports broadcaster is junior Nick Meinders, the weatherman is senior Caleb Peter, and the field reporter is junior Chance Palm. Behind the camera is director Van Gorp and sophomore editors Ayrton Breckenridge and Chase Spencer.
“The production is a lot of work. We have to write story ideas and scripts, shoot the
segments and then edit it. It takes a lot longer to complete [Thunder TV] than we expected. It also gives us another opportunity for our class to work together on stories that are shown to every class in the high school,” Van Gorp said.
The show includes weekly announcements and the week’s lunch menu. It includes
weather and weekly sporting events. Thunder TV consists of two feature segments. The
first one is the teacher of the week segment by Palm. Once the teacher of the week is
determined, Palm interviews the teacher about their time at PCM and asks other
interesting questions. The second segment is called the Outlook Spotlight which is done by the reporters and is about an interesting story in the school featured in the Outlook paper.
When asked if she liked Thunder TV, freshman Bess Telfer said, “Yes, I thought it was
funny, and it lets people know about upcoming events.”
The last time the school had any sort of news show was in 2013 with “Colten and David
In the Morning.” This consisted of PCM graduates Colten Jenkins and David Jennings who
compiled a weekly news program their senior year.
When the journalism class decided to do the show, they got advice from students.
Junior Hayden Johnston said, “Make it longer and add local news stories.”
The staff of Thunder TV is hard at work and is trying to inform the students about
their community. Another new feature to the journalism class is an updated Twitter
account. Follow the Outlook on Twitter: @PCM_Outlook for story updates and a link to the website to find all stories.
