On the very first day of class, cherubs conducted an interview and wrote their first story in two hours. After a long day of traveling to get to Evanston, they looked at their computers in disbelief as they typed out as many words as they could.
This was not an isolated event. Throughout the program, cherubs worked with many short deadlines which forced them to adjust to the standards and timelines of a real newsroom.
“I don’t think I’ve ever produced so many words in such a short time,” Lucy Camp of Mountain View, California, said.
Camp admitted it took time to acclimate to the fast turnaround many assignments required. Camp, like many other cherubs, was used to having a couple of weeks or even close to a month to write and edit an article for her school newspaper.
“Normally, I’m the person that’s working on her draft at 11 p.m. the night before it’s due,” Camp said. “The fact that I’ve now gotten accustomed to going ‘OK, I have two hours. I can get this done in two hours,’ is kind of insane.”
Other cherubs said this was an easy change to get used to because of the other classes they have taken. Natalie Chernoff of Huntington Beach, California, said she was already used to writing in a short period of time from her AP classes, and instead enjoyed having short deadlines in the middle of the day.
“The weird deadline times were good because I feel like with 11:59 p.m. deadlines, I’m used to being really tired by the time my work gets turned in,” Chernoff said.
With some deadlines right after lunch and others before nighttime lectures, cherubs had to manage their time to get everything done. For some, that sometimes meant eating snacks or DoorDashing food to the dorms instead of eating at the dining hall.
Claire Ales of St, Paul, Minnesota, planned out her day in advance.
“I’d be like, ‘OK, I’m going to spend an hour on this today and then after that I’m going to get something to eat,’” Ales said.
Claire Lin of Reno, Nevada, said many cherubs were able to manage writing college essays on top of their assignments. She also practiced piano every day, but said she made sure to have some free time when she was not completing assignments.
“I also do want to take the time to enjoy my summer as a 17-year-old before I have to go to college,” Lin said.
