For the first time in over 60 years, students will receive their U-Highlights yearbook at the end of the school year. The U-Highlights team has decided to deliver the 2025 yearbook in the spring, instead of at the end of the summer as it has for decades.
Because of the timing, the yearbook will have two parts. The bound yearbook will include events from September to before spring break. An attachable spring supplement covering spring sports and activities, including graduation, will be distributed at the beginning of the 2025-26 school year.
The decision to change the delivery of yearbooks was made by the U-Highlights editors-in-chief, junior Daniel Chang and senior Amelia Tan and managing editors juniors Ruby Koyner and Clara Blucher.
The editors hope an early release will give students a sense of closure on the year.
“It will be exciting because it’s a nice way to wrap up the end of the year,” Clara said. “It’s a nice thing for the seniors to reflect on their time this year and for everyone to reflect on how the year went right when it ends.”
A factor in making this decision was the opportunity for students to sign yearbooks at the end of the year, an important tradition that is lost with summer delivery. The U-Highlights team hopes to plan a signing party for seniors in the first week of June and will distribute yearbooks to ninth graders, sophomores and juniors in the last week of advisory.
“I think one huge thing that maybe seems a little silly but isn’t when you think about it is the fact that high schoolers can’t sign each other’s yearbooks,” U-Highlights adviser Jayna Rumble said. “I think that’s an underrated tradition that people miss when you’re here at Lab.”
Along with the benefits, the new delivery method also brought an intense new deadline schedule, according to Ms. Rumble. However, this year the U-Highlights team was determined to make this change and prepared to work hard.
“Our team this year was a lot bigger than last year, and we have a lot of competent people who knew what we were doing,” Daniel said, “and so we thought it would be a perfect opportunity to switch over.”
