The Cometeer is published online once a month. The next publication dates are Monday, February 12 and Monday, March 11. Click here to view the newest edition of the Cometeer.
A word from the editor:
Tia Bethke
Editor-in-Chief, The Cometeer
It is with great excitement and a sense of accomplishment that we present to you this culmination of hard work and dedication. The road to our revived Cometeer includes not only our recent months of persistent work but can be traced back to the inception of The Cometeer. It was created as an extracurricular shortly after the construction of the current DDHS building in 1957 with 12 to 15 student members in its first years. Old yearbook pictures depict a classroom set up as a newsroom lined with baskets full of newspapers as students smile up from their typewriters.
It wasn’t just any school newspaper though. In 1967 The Cometeer Staff attended the Wisconsin High School Editors Conference in Madison and took second place among all school newspapers in the state. They won several other awards throughout the years including recognition from the Quill and Scroll Society.
The club was active up until 2020 when COVID-19 hit. By then the publication had transitioned from print to digital pdf form publication.
Unaware of all of this before exploring journalism as a potential career option last spring, I wondered, “Why do we not have a school newspaper?” And so, the idea to create a newspaper club at DDHS took root.
Additionally, my pursuit of journalism led me to a summer program with The New York Times. This past summer I spent two weeks in the heart of Manhattan, surrounded by incredibly talented student journalists from all over the world. I learned from seasoned journalists and editors and visited publications such as Cosmopolitan Magazine and The New York Times, returning home eager to share my insights with my community.
Initiating the creation of the club required support from DDHS staff and diligent planning. I was fortunate enough to gain the collaboration of English teacher Ms. Dennis, who embraced the project with enthusiasm. With her help we were able to attain School Board approval on Oct. 9. The subsequent process of assigning and suggesting stories, motivating people to contribute, and creating our website were all challenges we had to navigate as a new publication. Senior Nathan Hackett assumed the pivotal role of Technology Editor by creating and managing our website.
While The Cometeer attracts hardworking students, our most significant challenge was collecting content because most of our writers had not been exposed to journalistic writing previous to joining The Cometeer. Please bear with us as we embark on this learning journey of publication and enjoy our first monthly issue!