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Holton Students Showcase Their Creativity in Scroll Publications

  • Lower School
  • Middle School
  • Upper School
Holton Students Showcase Their Creativity in Scroll Publications

The Holton-Arms School cultivates the unique potential of students through the “education not only of the mind, but of the soul and spirit.” There are many ways that this mission is woven throughout the school, and one tangible outcome of this is Scroll + Scrolling. Scroll, the annual literary magazine of the Scroll Club, publishes writings and artwork submitted by Holton-Arms students. The Club, founded in 1905 by Miss Arms, is the oldest club at the school and is dedicated to “the reading, writing, and speaking of good English.”

Scroll is the Upper School’s national-award-winning literary-arts magazine. It features writings by Holton students. Many pieces come from classroom assignments across grades 9-12 and others come from writing assignments at Scroll Club meetings. Students submit pieces for inclusion in Scroll. The Scroll editorial staff looks for original, powerful, insightful work as well as a range of genres. They then choose artwork that exemplifies the best work of the artists and that also speaks to the ideas or images of the written pieces.

Melinda Salata, US English Teacher and Scroll Club advisor said, “ I love the motley nature of Scroll. We never know who will submit their writing, who will share their artwork, and most of all, who will walk in the door and become the inspiring editor who pulls everything together in a glorious fusion of words, images, and creative graphic design.”

Initially published as a print magazine, in 2012, Scroll + Scrolling was launched as a hybrid print and online magazine. Scroll + Scrolling has won the Columbia Scholastic Press Association’s (CSPA) Gold Crown Award eleven years in a row. “Scroll has evolved into a wonderfully innovative showcase for student writing and art,” said Ms. Salata. “At the annual CSPA Spring Convention, other advisers, who teach publication courses, have told me they use Scroll + Scrolling as a learning tool to stretch their students’ ideas about what is possible.” Furthermore, at the CSPA Spring Conference, the workshop on magazines has routinely featured and extolled Scroll + Scrolling—the speaker projects the cover and several pages from the magazine and talks about both design and innovative features.

The stories, artwork, and poems of Scroll + Scrolling can be found here. 

Evolving out of the popularity and success of Scroll + Scrolling, both the Middle School and Lower School launched their own publications. For her senior project in 2015, Ellie Currie ‘15 worked with the LS students to publish the first issue of the Lower School Scroll. Her initial project launched the continued publication of the Lower School Scroll. The Middle School followed, and this year marks the third issue of the Middle School Scroll. Both maintain the guiding Scroll philosophy by featuring the writing and artwork of students from their respective divisions. Under the guidance of Lucia Hassell-Lee, Director of Technology Integration, both of these publications shine with the creative ideas of Holton’s younger students. “One of my greatest joys is seeing students starting in 5th grade blossom their skills over time with a strong foundation, preparing them for the Upper School's publications like Scroll, Scribbler, and Scribe.”, says Mrs. Hassell-Lee. Students who previously would have begun high school with no graphic design experience now enter with a solid base in core principles like layout, balance, white space, contrast, and alignment. Students involved in any of the Holton publications leave ready to take on the Graphic Design career field with a strong skill set and memories filled with the joy of learning.”

This year, the theme of the LS Scroll and MS Scroll is “Beautiful Chaos.” The Graphic Design Team thought that this theme was very applicable to the Holton community we want, a safe space where everyone brings their different views and perspectives together to create a beautiful community. Once the theme is selected, the LS Scroll Writing Club, under the direction of Eileen Shelton, Grade 3 Teacher, begins work writing pieces that reflect the theme. 

More recently the LS Scroll Writing Club has grown to include Upper School students who provide support to Lower Schoolers during writing workshops. Two US students who worked with the LS Scroll Writing Club are Anna R. ‘26 and Ximena O. ‘26. They shared, “We deeply enjoyed guiding the students through the writing process by helping them develop their ideas, find appropriate descriptive words, proofread their work, and submit it to the Graphic Design Team. We enjoyed working with the students because we interacted with a different division and we watched them grow from their first draft to their final product. We flashed back to our time in Lower School as we relearned how their thought processes work and what kinds of characters (often themselves) present interesting stories. We supplemented each session with a theme to help the students learn how to write with a focus on that day’s idea and from that, to understand how to move past the overwhelming fear of a blank page.”

You can read the Middle School Scroll here and the Lower School Scroll here

Congratulations to all of the students involved in the process of bringing these publications to life. And, thanks to the writers, poets, and artists who submitted their work for consideration. 

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