For five decades, Lethbridge College communications students have honed their craft in the Endeavour lab, creating the student-run newspaper and gaining valuable hands-on experience. Thanks in part to a $52,000 gift from Corus Entertainment (which also went to support student awards), the space recently underwent a facelift to transform it into a technologically advanced setting that replicates modern newsrooms. Here are few insights about what that space has meant to students over the years.
“The new space enables instructors to quickly share content with students. The individual screens at each station puts the software right up in front of them and we have stereo audio so students can clearly hear what we’re saying no matter where they are in the room. [Students also] can plug a laptop into the screen and that allows everybody else at the table to see what the one person is working on. And the casual atmosphere of being able to just walk around from desk to desk and see what’s going on is really good for networking.” -George Gallant Broadcast journalism instructor at Lethbridge College since 1997
“The new Endeavour lab is more comfortable and there’s more space for people to sit and work. Now, the lab has these nice, long, tall, rectangular tables with tall chairs. Each table has a computer monitor and if an instructor’s computer is set up to the projector, we can see what’s on their computer screen. It’s pretty cool!” -Sylvia Adam Second-year Digital Communications and Media student
“The Endeavour newsroom helped launch many careers, whether it was at newspapers or related fields. Each Tuesday it was common to see the lights on in the newsroom at 2 a.m. The paper had to be published and we learned the job wasn’t done until the pages headed to the print shop. But on non-publishing days it was a place to hang out. We even did the odd science experiment. There was an electrical access cover in the floor, and we decided to remove it. Before replacing the cover, Brian Smiley put in half of a bologna and cheese sandwich. To my knowledge, we never removed the cover again and for the sake of students at the college, it might be best to leave it that way.”- Randy Jensen Communication Arts 1979
