Hawk Talk featured at OCHigh.com

Original article HERE.

By LOU PONSI | MyOCHigh.com

Every Tuesday, Mark Switzer’s classroom at El Dorado High transforms into a TV studio.

Desks are rearranged, cameras positioned. Makeshift lighting rigs form a rectangular arch over a long table used as an anchorman’s desk. Students type up scripts that will be displayed on a teleprompter.

A student producer asks for quiet.

“Hawk Talk” is in production.

Anchormen Jonathon Mejia and Nader Bazir rattle off announcements interspersed with knowingly bad jokes, coming off more like Ron Burgundy than Ted Koppel.

“Hawk Talk,” a creation of El Dorado’s media production class, covers events and personalities on campus the way FOX 11 covers Los Angeles

“It has a huge impact on the school,” said Switzer, a social studies teacher who leads the media production class. “I think it helps in terms of school spirit and general interest.”

“The coolest part of this whole setup is that it is pretty much in the guys’ hands. They have taken ownership of the show.”

The 18 students in the class learn how to use advanced cameras and video editing equipment. They spend five hours in the classroom weekly, plus another two to 10 hours outside working on the 8-minute news show, a video yearbook and other video projects. Tuesday lunch periods are used to prepare the makeshift studio.

“I think it is a real advantage for the kids who want to go on to college and become film majors,” Switzer said. “They will already be familiar with some of the equipment they’ve been using here.”

Switzer, who has no background in video production, started the program two years ago after he received positive response to a student film festival he organized.

To raise money for equipment, the students shoot events at other schools, charging a fraction of the cost to hire professional videographers.

Their dedication pays off. At the FilmEd Academy of the Arts’ Orange County Film Festival, a showcase of O.C. high school films held in January, El Dorado earned nominations in 12 categories.

Switzer was named Mentor of the Year.

“He totally deserves it,” said Janell Le Francois, a junior who acts as executive producer. “If you look at our classroom, it is just a regular classroom, and we transform it to a studio … he is always thinking of more effective ways to do things.”

After realizing the amount of work that goes into video production, Le Francois has reservations about pursuing a career in the field, but still cherishes the class.

“It is tons of fun,” she said. “Everyday, we are learning something new about the class or each other, and I don’t think that is an overstatement.”