Founded in 1984, duPont Manual High School’s Journalism & Communications Magnet is a unique and exciting high school program that has grown in the last decade to become a model of 21st century learning, challenging students to be innovative, enterprising, creative, and well versed in media and technology. J+C students take exciting and instantly applicable communications-related courses under teachers with professional experience. Click here to visit the J+C webpage and learn more about this nationally recognized program.

The following items are required to apply to the J+C magnet:

Two Written Essays  (maximum 500 words each)

• Statement of interest essay: The Journalism & Communication magnet prepares students for any career in which verbal and visual communication is important. Why are you applying to J&C? You can choose to include descriptions of any personal experiences, interests, and/or ambitions that have led to this decision.

• On-demand essay: You will attend an on-demand writing session in January 25 at 6 pm in the duPont Manual High School’s cafeteria. You should bring lined paper and a pen or pencil, as you will hand write a response to a prompt that will be provided on-site.  We ask that you prioritize attendance to the session over conflicting activities.

Applicants should have received an invitation in early January to join the on demand writing assessment, which took place on Jan. 25. If you did not receive an invitation or missed the event for other reasons, please email Liz Palmer and Email Kristafer Abplanalp. 

Performance Task

Submit a digital document that includes one to three of the following examples of original student work in the categories below. Make sure your sharing settings allow others to access your document and any links to work (such as YouTube videos) you include. 

Pick up to 3:

• Graphic art or page layout (1-3 designs or layouts)

• Photography (3-8 photos)

• Creative video (1 video)

• Speech (1 video of your speech performance)

• Podcast (1 podcast)

• Short story (1 short story)

• Poetry (2-4 poems)

• Journalistic writing - including news or feature articles, editorials (1 piece)

• Non-fiction writing - including personal narratives, written speeches, reflective pieces, research papers (1 piece)

• Multimedia - a combination of media forms in one work (1 piece)

Rules for submission:

• For each work, provide a brief statement that includes the name of the app or program in which you created the work, the reason why you created the work, and the work’s intended audience. (It’s okay to create new work solely for the purpose of this application.)

• You may not submit any work that was co-created with any adult or other student.

• You may not submit work that was created with any template that uses a preset font, color, image, or layout.

• At the top of the document, you must include this statement: “I, ___________, declare I am the sole creator of the work below. No part of this work was plagiarized, edited or produced by another student, parent, adult or other individual.” 

• You must upload a submission from a single category for a complete application, but you may have up to three submissions from three separate categories. Please note that some submissions require multiple examples to constitute a complete submission. For example, the poetry category requires 2-4 poems to constitute one single submission.

A completed Activities and Interest survey
List your most important activities first, especially those that relate to your magnet choice. Be sure to include any leadership positions and record volunteer time in months or years. Please include any work, volunteer, sport, club, awards, recognition, and anything else that helps us know more about you outside of school.

Recommendations
TWO recommendations from teachers. 

• One must be from your current or last year’s Language Arts teacher.  Collect your recommenders’ email addresses. It will be submitted on your application.

• One can be from a teacher who is familiar with the student's academic performance, abilities and commitment. Collect your recommenders’ email addresses. It will be submitted on your application.

IF YOU ARE A JCPS STUDENT:
We will obtain your attendance, transcript, school administered test scores and grades from JCPS. You do not need to provide this information with your application. However, if you have taken the ACT or SAT and wish to include your score report, please do so.

IF YOU HAVE NOT ATTENDED A JCPS SCHOOL, please submit the following with your application:

1. Attendance records for the past three years

   • Any standardized test scores, including ACT or SAT if available

   • Transcript grades for the past two years

   • Most recent grade report for the current year

Please note – Attendance is part of the application review. If your student has had a significant attendance issue in the last three years, you may include a brief letter/documentation to explain the absences.