This September, there has been a camera crew traveling around Poly Prep’s Upper School campus. The crew was brought to Poly in order to create a video for the school’s website that would authentically capture the lives of students at the Dyker Heights campus. Throughout the week-long filming process, students were able to engage with the crew and even participate in the construction of this project.
The Engagement and Communications Team brought in the camera crew from a creative group, called Runway4, who filmed content contributing to a three-part episode series to capture the experiences of Poly students within the Lower, Middle, and Upper Schools. with each division given their own chapter. Laura Grimm, the senior manager of the communications team, added that “the concept behind this trio of videos is a day in the life,” here at school.
The communications team gave the camera crew simple directions to effectively capture student life without including any biases. To do so, they also gave students little to no instruction on how to behave around the crew. This approach aided the visual representation of the Poly community in a way that was as natural as possible. “[The goal] was really to capture the life of Poly authentically,” said Jennifer Slomack, the director of engagement and communications.
Slomack’s intention for the video was to visually display student life at Poly for new applicants who are looking for a community in which students really enjoy all aspects of school. “[We were] trying to capture that students are happy here, above all. [As well as the fact that] they are serious in classes,” she explained. The overall goal of the video was to show, not tell, the life of Poly; most importantly, it was to be done accurately. The team refrained from writing out the experience one might have at Poly, and instead, they wanted new applicants to explore it themselves through the video. This meant that the video needed to have a specific creation process in order to allow the viewer to feel as though they are welcome in the Poly community. The production process of the video was fairly simple, since there was minimal scripting involved, according to Slomack. The camera crew specifically angled their cameras so they shot level to all the students. Additionally, some students even got the opportunity to wear a camera, which portrayed Poly through a student’s eye. “We really wanted the viewer to experience Poly as if they were a student walking through the halls,” added Slomack.
The communications team made sure to holistically capture all of the programming offered at Poly, from classes, to sports, to instrumental ensembles, as well as the visual and performing arts. It was imperative that the crew could visit as many classes and after-school activities as possible.
In the spring of this year, the Runway4 crew filmed a similar video at Poly’s Lower School campus, located in Park Slope, Brooklyn. The short video can be seen on the school’s website, and is structured similarly to the videos being created for the Middle School and Upper School. The project includes all aspects of the Lower School from science, to dance and music classes, with each clip captured from a student perspective or angle. The video is composed of short clips from around the school, layered with upbeat music that was carefully selected to match the energy of the Lower School. After the video was filmed in the spring, it took the team around two months to complete the editing process. This process entailed many things, such as color correcting the images and choosing clips to use in the final cut of the video. Finally, after completing the editing process, the Lower School video was put on the website earlier in the summer.
The student perception of the crew can be seen as a reflection of the project’s overall goals. Sophomore Margaret Cochran said, “I think it was really cool how they’re making the video about every different part of our school, and how it’s not about one specific thing, so you can see the variety.” Even though the crew immersed themselves in the student life, most people didn’t find them too distracting in classes or extracurricular activities. Sophomore Samantha Menkes said, “I feel like they did the best they could, but they have to get in the way either way.” Overall, student interaction with the crew was pretty positive, and according to Slomack, no students objected to wearing a camera, making this process a lot easier for the team. Naturally, some students may have shielded themselves from the crew, but nothing that interfered with the overall creation of the project.
The Middle and Upper School videos will be up on the Poly website as a resource for new applicants to understand our community by late November. “I’m excited that this shows Poly in a really authentic way that gets people excited to actually come to campus and meet our admissions team and meet our students and meet our teachers,” Slomack said.