Buckingham County High School’s Career and Technical Center (CTE) is creating the next top producers through their hands-on television production class.

According to TV production instructor Danny Slayton, the class has been in existence since 1998.

“This class has produced many short videos and recorded events around the school. The technology has changed considerably since the beginning, as this program started with digital and analog technology and has gone from tape-based storage to Internet mediums such as YouTube and others,” Slayton said.

Slayton has been the class instructor at Buckingham for the last 12 years. In addition, Slayton has taught courses in electronics.

“All CTE classes have a list of skills that must be learned and demonstrated, and these can all be done by filming and editing a short story written and directed by students,” said Slayton. Up to this school year, each class has produced a morning news show recorded the day before and shown to the entire student body over a network of TVs throughout the school. This year marks the first year we will transfer the news to a gmail account shared by all the high school teachers to be shown on new smart boards that are in most every room,” he said.

Former TV production student Makayla Davies said, “I was mighty proud of all the video projects Mr. Slayton assigned us. I was always better behind the camera. It felt like my place. It was kinda like finding an old camera as a child and playing with it and taking random pictures … It was just a sense of pride for something that you made yourself,” she said.

Slayton said that the most fundamental aspects for students enrolled in class include using different angles correctly, lighting and clean audio.

“We use basic editing in our class here to learn the fundamental parts of putting pieces together to make a story,” Slayton said.

Another former TV production student Josh Newton said, “My experience in TV production was awesome and one of my most favorite of my classes. We had a wonderful teacher, Mr. Slayton and an outstanding group of guys/girls always working together to finish the projects set before us,” he said.

The class has been responsible for aiding with events such as graduation, Miss Buckingham and the Medford Basketball League.