Senn students take field trip to SOC

Students from Chicago’s Senn High School recently returned to Loyola for the first time since 2019 for a field trip to the School of Communication.

More than 60 Senn students used professional video cameras and microphones to interview passersby along the Magnificent Mile, just steps from the School of Communication’s downtown Chicago campus.

The students also were recorded on camera reading news stories at the anchor desk of the School of Communication’s state-of-the-art convergence studio.

It was the largest number of Senn students to visit the SOC since the annual spring field trip started in 2014. Field trips were postponed the past two years due to restrictions imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic.

The students are part of Senn’s Digital Journalism program, a four-year International Baccalaureate curriculum designed to teach skills in reporting, writing and producing stories through digital technology.   

Loyola’s School of Communication, with financial support from the McCormick Foundation, has been partnering with Senn for more than a decade. School of Communication faculty and students regularly meet with teachers and students at Senn, helping with curriculum development, classroom instruction and equipment and technological support.

The field trip to Loyola’s School of Communication offered Senn students exposure to college-level instruction in digital journalism, said Michael Cullinane, the lead journalism instructor at Senn.

“The Senn students were up to the challenge to perform real interviews and broadcast reports just like the Loyola students would have to. They didn't hesitate to stop people for man-on-the-street interviews and conducted their Q and As with professionalism. A few of them told me that they'd like to be journalists in the future,” Cullinane said.