By Michelle Yang
On March 23, 2013, a group of students and teachers met in a diner after filming a shoot. There an idea was born: a television show entirely run, filmed, and edited by South students.
You may have seen these students at the back of the auditorium at concerts, musicals, or plays. Some students stand behind  cameras propped up on tripods. Some wear headsets, and others scramble around to find a better angle for their camera shot.
Now they are creating their own TV show. Mr. Robert Zahn, director of educational television for Great Neck Public Schools, is the producer and the mastermind behind the project. He wants to expand and showcase
the GNPS program. He said, “We can show [the district and community] something that has not been done before.”
The show is unique in that it is self-produced. Sophomores Abe Rosloff and Michael Shen are the student executive producers. They organize students into groups, send people to film, and help students along the way. Rosloff said, “[We] want to show that high school students can do something like this.”
Students collaborate in groups, ranging from ninth to eleventh graders. Each group is assigned two or three stories to cover, usually on clubs, sports, or small music and theater events. In addition, a teacher spotlight, a highlight on a South teacher is also filmed.
After filming, each group edits their own project in South Middle’s studio. The final product of each group is a 40-60 minute long show that integrates TV anchors on screen with the news stories that the students have filmed. The crew hopes to air the show on the GNPS TV channel by December.
By creating this show, students are learning how to film, edit, and produce high-quality projects. “[Students] can [leave having] ownership and a sense of real accomplishment in their own triumph,” Mr. Zahn said. “We have an amazing crew, an amazing team, and an amazing program.”