Lights! Camera! Action! Broadcasting students in the high school are all too familiar with the meanings of these three little words.

In producing a daily news program, these students have the opportunity to pull back the curtain and get a sense of how TV news actually works, as each day they produce a morning broadcast.

According to Joel Dynda, supervisor of The Morning Show, students "produce daily news for the entire high school, including daily events, club meetings and even lunch menus."

"We tape it fourth period and then run it first period the next day," he said. "Taping takes anywhere from 5 to 10 minutes but it's the prep work that takes the most time.

"This includes preproduction, production and post production which means editing, graphics, title slides or email addresses."

Several students take the class as an independent study.

"Senior Olympia Haupt writes the script with me," said Dynda. "Much of the information is emailed to us."

Haupt is not the only one to opt for an independent study.

Jaedon Muhl worked on a senior video along with Myra Rodriquez and Taylor Kocher.

"We set up an email and we had people send photos to us. It's almost done," Muhl said. "My sister is doing the music."

Other students prefer the more traditional route "Kids get an opportunity to do all jobs and the anchors are assigned on a rotating basis," said Dynda.

The Morning Show features two anchors for each broadcast.

"Anchoring is my favorite," said senior Jaime Cleary. "You get to be on screen and provide information that makes it easier for people to do what they need to do."

"We do have freedom. We get to walk around the school and film news," she continued. Her parents support her work on the program. "They said, 'Oh, you're doing so well.'"

Junior Ben Hoover also enjoys the freedom that is inherent in the class.

"There are no bad ideas. If you have an idea for a project, with classmates and tweaking, you could put out your ideas," Hoover said. "That's what makes it different from other classes."

Students also have other reasons for taking the class.

Junior Tristen Hancock said, "I'm just interested in the studio angle. I just want to be an artist and work in as many forms as I can [but] I'm not a fan of being an anchor."

Hancock feels what he's learning has a practical value.

"This is probably something I will do in my spare time, editing pod casts and peoples' U-tube videos," he said.

"I'm not going to throw all my eggs in one basket, though," he continued. "Animation was a really a good job but now it's a failing industry."

Hancock who has signed up for as many art classes as possible still sees "advertising as a good possibility."

Hancock isn't the only one with his eye on the future.

Laura Kotula will be attending Kent State University where she plans on majoring in digital media production.

"I would really like to be working on movie sets, as an editor or director," she said. "I just filmed the polar bear plunge at Seaside Heights in New Jersey and it received very positive feedback on Tiger TV.

"I [also] post all my stuff on a YouTube page."

These projects depend on collaboration.

"Right now, Laura [Hill] and I are working with Frites, an eatery specializing in french fries that just opened a store in the Lehigh Valley Mall," said Kotula. "They hired us to do commercial kind of stuff, like throw little clips together for their website.

"I'm just starting to film weddings.

"I'm looking to work with people and build a client list. Eventually I want to get my name into the film business."

Kotula is not alone.

"I want to go into visual effects in post production work, hopefully behind the scenes of movies," said Maria Haddad.

This summer, Haddad will be attending a three-day conference sponsored by the National Congress of Science Technology Leaders.

"One of the presenters, Bill Westenhoeffer, won several academy awards, one for visual effects for the film 'The Life of Pi,'" Haddad explained.

Haddad first took broadcasting in eighth grade when she came up to the high school for math.

"My parents want what is best for me, but they also want me to get a stable major like engineering," she said and she plans on taking this to heart.

According to Dynda, many students who worked on the Morning Show are already putting some of their skills to good use after graduation.

He cited both Alex Bobbyn at Penn State and Dylan Rex at Hofstra University as two students who worked on the Morning Show in high school.

"Laura Kotula, who has done good work, is going to college to study film," he added. "Some of the kids, Don Luke Winzer, Charles Andrews and Laura Hill, finished first in a regional computer fair at Lehigh Carbon Community College.

"They did a public service announcement on suicide.

"Mike Sikora took charge of that one. He's now trying to arrange a trip to PBS headquarters."

The three qualify for the state level, which was held at Dickinson College this past May.

Dynda said he and Sikora work together "pretty closely.

"We talk almost every day. Broadcasting brings us together. Students have to take broadcasting first."

Both meet in their broadcasting classes during period four.

"Tiger TV is actually the second level of broadcasting," he said.

The broadcasting class has a variety of tasks that are required including assignments in electronic news gathering on anything that happens outside of the studio.

Students can cover "anything in the school, outstanding achievements or special events in 60 to 90 seconds," he explained. "Each kid has to do two public service announcements anywhere from 15-60 seconds in length. Occasionally we'll [even] run them on the Morning Show."

"They can try to persuade someone or simply be informative with statistics on anything I approve," said Dynda.

"They can take the cameras home or anywhere in the school. They can use graphics and text. They can use humor" but above all "they have to have quality."

Necessarily, broadcast students must become familiar with the equipment.

"The equipment is great. We're still using the equipment that was originally bought because of the high quality," said Dynda. "Switchboard, soundboard and monitors are good quality even though they're twelve to fourteen years old."

But much of the equipment is heavily used.

"You have hundreds of kids using the cameras and computers," said Dynda. "Hopefully, the cameras could last another 20 years."

Technology is a game changer but not always in a good way.

"Prices have dropped on almost everything but I don't like videos from cellphones, because of the sound quality," he said. "[You're] not able to understand the reporter."

"We don't get too complicated," Dynda said. "Two cameras are available but mainly we use just one, though occasionally we'll do weather and sports."

Dynda said in addition to having two anchors, someone has to run the teleprompter.

"We [also] have a person who edits the show," he said.

Dynda, who majored in technology education, said he learned it all on his own.

When he was working in Montgomery County, he said his principal asked him to teach video production and he ended up liking it.

"I like change. I never do the same thing twice, " Dynda said. "If they want , community members could go to the school webpage to see what's going on," said Dynda.