At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, spectators were limited and/or prohibited from seeing games. Mr. Anderson wanted to do everything he could to allow friends and family to watch students participate in activities. He purchased all the necessary equipment to allow the middle school to stream the events live. Once we had the equipment and the capability, he needed students to run and manage the equipment so he asked Mr. Rose, the yearbook advisor, if those kids would be willing and able to do it. Mr. Rose and the Yearbook students agreed and have been taking it over since that time.
We stream every athletic event live including football, volleyball, basketball and the upcoming McNair track meet. In addition to having the events on camera, we also added the ability to add commentary to the events and have had various students providing play-by-play and color commentary for each basketball game this winter. We routinely have hundreds of views on the stream as well as the YouTube channels which out performs most high school channels.
There are fourteen 8th graders and eight 7th graders that have worked the cameras and provided commentary during these games. They set up the equipment, run the cameras, computers and sound equipment. They also troubleshoot issues and are responsible for tearing down and cleaning up after the games. They are there before the games, during the games and after the games.
We also had 18 students attend two different daylong seminars put on by STRIV. At these events, they listened to various keynote speakers and participated in breakout sessions. CMS was one of only 3 middle schools that attended these events, the rest were high school students.