Journalism is an adventure and publishing a process — lessons that Christina MacCorkle and Lucy Maitland-Lewis learned in spades in producing their article on a beloved field at their school in California. Gymkhana Field is where generations of Thacher School students have ridden horses, but it may also lie above valuable oil. Which is where the U.S. agency that manages federal lands enters the picture. Their story went through multiple drafts as they dug deeper and deeper into the web of issues. The bottom line is that the field’s future is uncertain — an ambiguous conclusion that could frustrate some writers. But the authors learned from the experience and their story educates us as well.
Exercise: Ask your students to research the history of their school grounds and to find out whether there is a chance that there could be changes to the school’s footprint, and if so, why.