Every morning from 9:12 to 9:16 a.m., students and staff at Tenafly High tune in to channel 30.1 and hear a drumroll jingle–the infectious intro to The Daily Tiger Rundown. Even though Tiger TV streams for merely four minutes every day, students participating in this elective spend hours upon hours creating these videos and planning the live broadcast. Behind the scenes, the process of putting together The Daily Tiger Rundown is quite the intricate process.

“A lot goes on behind the scenes that people don’t know about,” MTV (Media Television) Honors student said Alex Nanobashvili (‘25) said.

It all starts at the heart of the school: the library. Upon walking in, you’ll notice a room beside the printing-station with “THS Newsroom” printed above its glass walls. You’re now looking at the MTV classroom, equipped with a conference table, computers with large-screen monitors, and rolling chairs. This is where Mr. Moger teaches the class, and where honors students work on their quarterly projects.

“Each honors student makes four projects in a marking period. Sometimes we do interviews, sometimes we do news pieces, like the queen’s death piece. Every clip you see on the TV, like when we ask questions like ‘what’s your favorite candy’ or whatever is done by honor students, [r]arely ever beginners,” Nanobashvili said. “Sometimes when we procrastinate the projects, we ask Mr. Moger to ‘emergency film’ so we can get out of lectures.”

Moving on, as you walk past the MTV classroom, you’ll see the control-room. Located directly behind the printing station and Mr. DiGregorio’s office, this studio is where all the behind-the-scenes work of the Tiger Rundown is done. “There’s a switcher in the control room that switches between frames and cameras. There’s also a director that helps the control room function correctly, and there’s an audio person who controls the levels of audios and makes sure the right audios are playing at the right time.” Other than scripts and honors students’ projects, all other aspects of the behind the scenes of THS-TV are done live.

As you turn your attention to the center of the library, you’ll see an official-looking desk with two cameras set up around it. This is called Studio A and it’s the place where filming for THS-TV usually takes place. Other than the anchors (the people recapping the daily news on camera), there’s a whole crew working live in this studio. “There’s a teleprompter on every camera for the anchors to read, and someone controlling it. There’s also someone controlling the zoom-in camera, which is, like, used in the beginning and ending of the Tiger Rundown. And the most important job: the dude that presses the record [button],” Nanobashvili said.

When events such as Club Fair make Studio A unavailable to use for the Tiger Rundown, the production is moved to Studio B. This hidden room is accessible through a door behind the control room and is only used once or twice a year for the purpose of THS-TV. According to Nanobashvili, “there are five dudes in the actual studio: two anchors (the guys on the TV), two camera people, and the studio director. In the control room there’s a lot more people, though.” 

Although students taking the course may not receive a lot of  traditional “homework,” the elective does require them to spend time outside of the class in order to fulfill its requirements. For example, “there’s four periods of MTV, and whichever period is first block is the one that does the show. They have to stay four minutes after class and then they are excused by their second block teacher.” In addition, when it comes to major games, plays, and other extracurriculars offered by THS, students sign up on the volunteer list to film these school events for upcoming broadcasts. “We do all the jobs, by the way. Mr. Moger pretty much only writes the script we see on the teleprompter and teaches the class. The rest is up to us,” Nanobashvili said. Mr. Moger teaches for only the first four periods of the day, while devoting the rest of his time spent at THS to directing the tech crew of the school plays. With Mr. Millar (music director) and Mr. A.C. (play director), the trio work together behind the scenes to ensure a smooth production.

Well, ladies and gentlemen, that’s a rap on today’s tour of the behind the scenes of THS-TV. As always, don’t forget to tune in to channel 30.1 for your Daily Tiger Rundown.