Story link: Special COVID-19 coverage by The Crusader staff 

Student names: The Crusader Staff, led by Steven Rissotto, editor-in-chief

Adviser name: Susan Sutton, CJE

School name: Archbishop Riordan High School

Publication name: The Crusader

Describe your work on this piece: Our coronavirus coverage has been a good indicator of our performance level all year long. We’ve covered a new field installation that cost millions, the biggest transition in school history and now the largest pandemic in more than 100 years. We came up with this idea collaboratively, hoping to fill a large gap in our content collection since we would no longer be on campus. There were obvious obstacles: how we would motivate the staff, different story ideas to keep readers interested, and the process of working on another issue in addition to the planned one. Thankfully, everyone has been on board, and it has been awesome seeing everyone buy in the way we hoped they would. The mainstream media has been under scrutiny for their coverage of the pandemic, and we hope to be a primary news source for people from a student’s perspective. The feedback has been outstanding. We’ve received letters of praise from a number of individuals and groups, such as faculty and staff, fellow students, parents, alumni and outside organizations. This has been an extremely difficult experience for us, but when there’s news, The Crusader rarely misses a beat.

What else do you want readers to know about your work? This Special Edition is a collaborative effort by The Crusader staff of Archbishop Riordan High School, a Catholic high school in San Francisco. The student newspaper, and the school, is celebrating its 70th year.