The 2020-21 school year has been unusual for many NASH students. COVID-19 has made it difficult for classes and activities to function, and this year’s yearbook class has been no exception. In fact, perhaps no other class has faced as many challenges.

“It was challenging [for the students in the class] to communicate with the staff because if they were not in school, they could not track down students for information,” yearbook adviser Ms. Yakich said. “With NASH being so large, it is impossible for me to even know half of the students in the school, so I rely on the staff members.” 

North Allegheny’s hybrid schedule, as well as regular quarantines of students exposed to COVID-19, have presented unprecedented challenges for Yakich’s group. With a number of events being cancelled this year due to COVID, as well as all of last year’s spring sports, the student staff has had to get creative.

“Most of the spreads that we cover could not be done in a traditional manner,” Yakich said. “The staff and I had to come up with new spread ideas, or we had to figure out how to still incorporate sports that never had a season. This led us to using old photos, childhood photos, or just basic headshots of the students.”

As the yearbook staff races to meet their final deadlines, they know they’ve been fortunate to have had much-needed flexibility.

“The publishing company continues to be lenient with us this year since they understand the difficulties from the pandemic,” Yakich added. “That being said, it made it a little less stressful because I knew that there was some flexibility with deadlines.” 

Despite their many obstacles, the yearbook staff is on pace to making sure the yearbook is completed in time for distribution before the school year ends.

“The yearbook will be distributed on time, which was the plan from the start,” Yakich said. “I am proud, as the adviser, that the students put in the amount of effort and time that they did because it is not a class where you only focus on your spread for the 42-minute class period. The students consistently had to have their assigned spread in the back of their mind to achieve and gather the information needed for completion.”

Yakich emphasized that completing the book has been a massive team effort, and her staff have worked countless hours to ensure that it will be completed to the best of their abilities.

“The book cannot get done without every single person in the class. Each one of the staff members, as well as myself, contributes to the book in some way. As a whole, we all have overcome the biggest challenge, which simply was completing the 2021 yearbook,” she said.