When Oak Grove High School’s Joy Davis took over The Warrior Yearbook three and a half years ago, she was intrigued by the photography and design possibilities and what she could do to help the publication with her technology background.

A graphic design and web design teacher, Davis said the design aspect is what originally drew her to the yearbook.

“I’ve always been interested in design,” she said. “That’s my first love, especially the photography side of it. I enjoy that probably more than any of it.”

Without much previous journalism experience, it’s been an interesting process, said Davis, who holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in business technology education from the University of Southern Mississippi.

“I’ve kind of been self-taught and picked up things along the way though workshops and books,” she said.

Whatever the MSPA Adviser of the Year and Lamar County Excellence in Education award winner has done to find the skills to make a successful yearbook program, it has obviously worked.

For the past two years, The Warrior Yearbook has been featured in Balfour Publishing’s Yearbook Yearbook for the best of 2013 and 2014.

“When I took over yearbook, it was pretty much a scrapbook,” she said. “The first thing I did when I took over was I threw everything away. We didn’t need that.”

Next Davis said she started looking at what other schools were doing and asked her Balfour rep to show her examples of good books.

“I started showing my students it was not difficult, it was just a different way of doing things that they were fully capable of but had never seen it before,” she said.

From that point Davis said she started making changes each year, growing the yearbook from each year’s previous product.

“I think the yearbooks from when I was in high school to maybe 10 years ago didn’t have a whole lot of difference,” she said. “They stayed the same for a very long time. In the last eight to ten years they’ve really taken a shift design-wise and engaging the reader.”

One of the things Davis thinks helps her publication be successful is the selective application process. From a school body of 1,800 students, 12 are chosen to join the yearbook staff after an application and interview process. There appointment is a two-year position, and the staff always has six juniors and six seniors.

“They’re interested in it and they want it,” she said. “They’re dedicated, and it’s a close-knit group.”

The skills students gain from working on a yearbook run deep and include more than just journalism, Davis said.

“I think it’s like running a business,” she said. “They see every aspect from start to finish from the marketing side of it to communications to the community, faculty, staff and students, and from the financial side of it to photography and design, it’s just an all encompassing thing.”

Davis said the students are learning life skills they take with them even after the yearbooks are printed and handed out.

“There’s just a sense of responsibility,” she said. “They see the product from start to finish. They go to yearbook camp in the beginning and choose a theme, then they hold it in their hands in May. They get to see a whole year’s work in their hands.”

Davis said she’s had students go on to study journalism and graphic design, some even rising to become yearbook editors at their respective universities.

“Some of them have gone on to make a career of it, and it just thrills my soul,” she said. “For my students to see other students from Oak Grove to move on to those sort of areas in college and in their careers, I think that motivates them. It’s not just something I’m telling them, but it’s people they know who have gone on to be successful.”

Davis said her tenure has been rewarding and impactful, and she values the experiences she had.

“I even had a parent say ‘Yearbook was the most valuable thing my child did in high school,’” she said. “That meant a lot to me because I see it and I feel it, but it’s nice to know other people recognize it.”