Sailing Through Student Creations With Longship Library

By: Janelle Pantilon, Features Editor

Longship Library is a student led magazine at Mills comprised of art, pictures, poems, short stories, and more brought to life through student creations with the goal of highlighting student expression.

Sparked from an idea two students shared, the magazine was established last fall. Juniors at the time, Justin Shih and Zhiyuan Ma, already had ideas from the previous year of developing a website for students to share their work. However they ultimately decided they wanted to turn this group into an official club with a physical publication. 

“What prompted me to really bring it to life was probably my passion in art and creative work in general, so I was glad to be able to design the magazine while letting other students express their creativity too,” said Shih (12). 

Longship Library publishes twice within a school year, once nearing the end of the fall semester and another in the spring. They print their magazine through Barnes and Noble which allows personal books and magazines to be produced in large quantities.

However before sending in the finished product and purchasing it, the editors review all elements of the magazine comprised together to ensure it has proper formatting and appeals to their chosen theme. It integrates the different styles of each artist and writer to truly emphasize its student led foundation.

“One of my favorite things about creating the magazine is how much creative liberties I get when designing the format,” Shih adds, “It’s also very fun to draw out the cover designs as it’s what you and everyone else sees when the issues are finally out and distributed.”

The club’s advisor, Ms. Schroder explains, “As an advisor, I love being involved in the publication process to see how the students develop a design for each issue and sharing ideas on how we could encourage more content from the student body.” 

Longship Library meets Thursday’s in the Library; always looking and encouraging more students to join the staff or to submit their personal works.

From only having an editorial board to now having several staff writers to produce stories for their issues, they’ve seen growth in their club since they’ve begun. There are also additional members who assist in the designing side of the magazine which has helped a lot and introduced new opportunities for students to develop their artistic skills.

“We are happy with the growth, but we wish we could increase our reach to more students and encourage them to submit work, too,” said Ms. Schroder.

Currently, submissions are open for Longship Library’s fall issue with a deadline of November 15th. If interested in the club or having your work in the magazine, you can reach out to Ms. Schroder through email.