Fluco Beat Celebrates 1,000 Articles

Last month, the Fluco Beat, the student news site of FCHS, hit a significant milestone in the history of the FCHS Journalism program when the site published its 1,000th article.

The achievement was met on March 14 with junior Maddy Eubank’s “Teaching for the Long Haul” article, which highlights staff members Jane Ford, Feda Morton, Gary Greenwood, Jocelyn Stevens, Terrie Wood, Lisa Lucas, and Ethel Opie, all of whom have taught in Fluvanna County for 25 years or more.

Students in Elizabeth Pellicane’s Journalism program have been running the Fluco Beat since it shifted to an online format in 2014. The news site covers school or community-related events, and includes opinion and literary pieces, all written by students from Pellicane’s Journalism, Mass Media, and Creative Writing classes. The Fluco Beat editors are Journalism students who write, edit, post, and run the website on a daily basis.

Since its transition from a print publication to a website, the Fluco Beat has received numerous awards from Virginia High School League (VHSL), Quill and Scroll (an international high school journalism honor society), and School Newspapers Online (SNO).

In 2015, the Fluco Beat was given a first place award by VHSL. The site also earned an International Second Place award from Quill and Scroll in 2015 and again in 2018. This year, the Fluco Beat has received a Site Excellence badge from SNO, and is one article away from gaining a Best of SNO badge. These badges are awarded by SNO for an intriguing website design and high quality articles.

The current site editors, Blake Berry and Syerra Milliman, are working toward gaining a few more SNO badges as the year comes to a close and plan on submitting the site for evaluation from Quill and Scroll again this year, in hopes of receiving another award.

“As one of the editors of the Fluco Beat, I have watched the site grow over the past few years and it’s great to have been a part of that. Being here to watch our thousandth article happen is really crazy to think about,” said Berry.

Both editors will graduate this year and hope to pass on their experience and knowledge to aspiring Journalism students and Fluco Beat editors to continue the site’s path toward excellence.