Ensconced in the newsroom of room 1105, an air of intense focus and pure hustle is pertinent as an untiring group works towards their next deadline. Here, the background of fingers clacking away at laptops and soft voices collaborating provide a harmonious symphony familiar only to the members of the Stampede, Millard North’s award-winning yearbook publication.

This talented ensemble is dedicated to their year-long assignment, the school yearbook. Editor-in-Chief senior Ishani Karki leads this squad, along with junior Carley Stych, the staff’s design editor and junior Mia Kosel, the photograph editor.

All-nighters and energy drinks are not unfamiliar to Karki, as this time of year brings the time for final edits to be sent to the printer, ready for distribution in mid-May.

“Personally, I dedicate numerous hours to the yearbook. I normally dedicate maybe two hours per day on average, but during deadline week I genuinely spend the majority of my 24 hours working on the yearbook,” Karki said.

The yearbook class is only offered in fifth period, which provides the staff with extra work time if they wish to use it. Most do; during these three periods the crew chats, eats, conferences, and collaborates.

“It’s [the yearbook class, study hall, and lunch working period] a really casual, yet focused environment… Everyone is usually working productively, whether it’s on pages, photo editing, or planning what to do next… [but] we are still very conversational,” junior staff writer Meredith Hedrick said.

Photographers hold a different role in the yearbook staff, solely taking photographs, editing, and deciding where to place them on the pages instead of writing and revising stories like staff writers and most editors.

“I would say I dedicate over 20 hours to yearbook because I also go to sporting events to take photos. It really all depends on the game or match that I’m at,” senior picture manager junior Addalynn Beatty said.

All of this development is impressive, but could not have been executed without the creation of the overall yearbook theme.

This year’s theme is 10/10, meant to symbolize the school’s quality and success in both academics and athletics. 10/10 also holds a double meaning though, as the school’s address is 1010 S 144th Street, so this rating not only means the school is a 10 out of 10, but it also represents where the school is located in the city of Omaha.

“The yearbook theme is 10/10 because ‘ratings’ are super trendy this year, and obviously we want to give our school the best rating,” Karki said.

Karki credits Stych and Kosel with helping come up with the yearbook’s clever theme. Over the summer, the group worked toget1`her to come up with a theme that achieved each yearbook objective and checked every box a yearbook theme should.

“We [Karki, Stych, and Kosel] knew we wanted slants and a more clean, less organic feel for the book, so Mrs. Crotzer suggested doing something with our address 1010, a unique number,” Karki said. “Then Mia came up with ‘10/10’ because it incorporated our address, was super trendy, used that visual slant with the slash we wanted, and showed off our Mustang pride,”

Altogether, Karki recognizes the entire staff’s equal contributions to the yearbook and feels that the production of a successful publication could not have been done without the input of everyone on staff.

“I am most proud of the theme development award… Theme development is the biggest category for the yearbook and it really represents [us] as a whole. We could not have done it without a productive staff that contributed amazing ideas to developing the story found within the book,” Karki said.

The Stampede’s hard work doesn’t go unnoticed though; through the Journalism Education Association (JEA), the cumulative yearbook staff gained an honorable mention award for theme development, and that same theme qualified for the 2024 NSAA State Journalism Championships.

“I think we’ve put a lot of work into piecing all of the details together and I think our theme has come a long way,” Stych said. “It’s very exciting to have the opportunity to go to state and represent not only our school but our yearbook staff as a whole, who has put so much effort into making our theme come alive,”

The yearbook staff did in fact represent Millard North successfully as the yearbook theme placed 5th with its 10/10 theme, helping bring home the runner-up trophy for the entire journalism program.

“Placing 5th was surprising for all of us… We saw the themes the other schools had… [and] knew we had some tough competitors,” Karki said. “When we won as a whole school we were all super shocked… For us to be a part of that achievement is really huge. We were all supporting each other… it was really fun to see the whole journalism community come together,”

All in all, Stych, Karki, Beatty, and Hedrick similarly love and cherish all aspects of the yearbook process, through the deadline weeks, peer edits, late nights, early mornings, and lunches shared together.

“It’s also just really cool to be a part of creating and developing something that is meaningful and unique to our school,” Stych said.

Yearbook journalists agree that being part of the yearbook staff is an eye-opening experience that exposes them to group organizations and activities they might not have been aware of.

“Being a part of the staff… you get the opportunity to interview so many different types of students,” Karki said. “You become aware of things other students don’t always see. [You] learn to appreciate the dedication and passion so many different kids feel for their activities.`”