My Experience at the NorthStar Navigator

By John C.

This year has been my first year writing for the Navigator. I’ll be honest, I wasn't sure what to expect before I decided to join. Since I didn’t know exactly what to expect, I decided not to join last year, and now I regret not joining sooner. My goal with this article is to make sure others who are hesitant to join don’t make the same mistake I did. In this article, I will tell the story of how I decided to join the Navigator, and what my experience has been like. I will also provide information about how you can experience a Navigator live session in person.

One of my older brothers wrote for the Navigator several years ago. I remember how he would have video calls with the rest of the staff. I never really asked him too much about what the Navigator was like, but he did tell me he enjoyed it. Before I started my freshman year of high school, my mom encouraged me to join the Navigator. I decided not to because I wasn’t sure what to expect, and I didn’t think I would be able to write quality articles for a newspaper. That year, I had Mrs. Meyer as my English teacher. I would later learn that Mrs. Meyer is the teacher for the Navigator class. Over the year, I had several writing assignments, and, toward the end of my second semester, Mrs. Meyer asked me to sign up for the Navigator. Again, I was hesitant, but I decided I would give it a try, and see what it was like. 

When I first signed up, I figured I was going to be super stressed out trying to write an article in such a short period of time. I thought I was going to have to interview tons of people and write some huge article about some random topic that I was assigned. Essentially, I had no idea what the class was really like. Once I opened the class and looked around to see what sort of work I would be doing, I realized I had imagined it all wrong. I didn’t see hundreds of assignments due each week, however, I was still a little worried about my first article. On Friday, after the first week of class, I got to see what the Navigator was really like. I joined the Zoom call along with the other staff members and Mrs. Meyer. I was pretty shy and quiet on that first call, and I honestly still kind of am, but that’s mostly just my personality. Anyways, that call settled a lot of concerns that I was having about the class and the idea of writing for the newspaper. I saw that all the other staff members were very friendly, kind, and funny. I was surprised to learn that I was supposed to write an article within the first month of the class, which added stress to the only thing I was still worried about, writing articles. 

For my first article, I interviewed a student about what life was like living in Uganda. I was really nervous, and I wanted to make sure I had the perfect interview questions. Once I sent the initial message asking if I could interview this student, my shyness started to disappear a little bit. The responses I received were pretty short and uninformative, so I had to ask some follow-up questions. I asked Mrs. Meyer what I had been doing wrong and what I needed to fix. To my surprise, she said the questions I had asked were perfect, and I even asked the same follow-up questions she would have asked. I was really confused, and she told me that not everyone gives perfect responses and that I just had to learn how to make do with the answers I had. In the end, I was able to use a mix of the answers I had gotten and a little bit of research to expand upon that base. Thus, I had written my first article, and I realized that it wasn’t impossible and that I was perfectly capable of writing a good article. 

As the weeks began to fly by, I forgot about my stress and was able to see the Navigator in its full glory. I realized that Navigator was not a class where every student is chained to a desk, figuratively of course, and forced to churn out articles about random topics at full steam. Instead, I saw that the Navigator was actually a really cool place where I could have fun with the other staff members, and I actually had some liberty regarding what topics I wrote about. When I needed help figuring out how to send out a poll for one of my articles, the staff was very helpful and willing to show me how to do everything I was asking about. So, at the time I am writing this article, I no longer have any worries about the Navigator, and I only wish I had joined sooner. That is the story of how I joined the Navigator and what my experience has been like interacting with the staff and writing my articles. 

As I finish this article, I want to encourage any students who are reading this to join the Navigator. I understand if you are hesitant or have concerns, but I did as well. If this article alone has not been enough to convince you to join the Navigator, there is an opportunity for you to experience a real Navigator live session very soon. On Friday, March 10, the Navigator will be hosting an open house meeting. This meeting is only open to NSA students, and there is no limit to the number of people that are allowed to join. Even if you decide to come and you find that the Navigator just isn’t for you, this open house does count as an NSA connects. Here are the specific details you will need to know in order to join. First, this open house takes place on Friday, March 10, 2023, at 11 AM CST. Once you sign up for the open house, you will receive an email with the link and password for a Zoom call. It is very important that you sign up with your NorthStar email and log in to Zoom with that same name and email address. Again, only NSA students are allowed to join this call. The link below provides access to a Google Document where students can sign up for the Navigator Open House along with all the other Open House meetings taking place between March 8 and March 22: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1laaBgme9HgqWKmGx4hT6dHTl3Sj0EJd16LE3QBckfso/edit?usp=sharing 

That is all I have to say for now, but I hope you’ve enjoyed this article, and I hope to see lots of new faces at the Navigator’s Open House meeting. Thanks for reading!

John C. has been at Northstar for three years. He lives in the Middle East and is the youngest in his family. He likes to play sports, listen to music, and play video games. He has just recently started writing with the Navigator, and this is his first time working with a newspaper.

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