Anchor and host Tajah Coleman-Jones doesn’t skip a beat. She’s rehearsing the tail end of her monologue and waiting for her cue. She stands between two goofy graphics that have McCain and Obama battling to the left and right of her on screen. She wraps up without a giggle, gets some feedback from Burke, and the cameras point to Samantha Scott and the campus pundits.

Scott is talking questions with Stransky. She is fifteen minutes from moderating a panel discussion that will have a campus Republican and Democrat discussing political positions. The idea is illicit dialogue. Stransky proposes some adjustments that could leave more room for some back and forth between the students. After a few minutes of negotiation, the two agree that the revised format works better.

“We had a bunch of hands-on practice before we taped, but I thought that we would do a step-by-step run through,” Scott says. “We just keep taping until we get it right.” Exactly, says Burke. “We learn by doing!” And, he adds, “we learn by making our own mistakes!”

Stansky is back in the control room, headset on, instructing the floor manager to take it from the top. Will Hayworth is buried in piles of paper he prepared for the discussion. This gets a reaction. The crew is having fun with him—nothing that can’t be edited out “in post”. Hayworth is undeterred. He’s intent and studying until it’s time to go live.

Scott says that even though it’s just a class, “you can feel the energy,” she says, “it feels like we’re broadcasting.” This makes her a little nervous.Watt helps them loosen up. “Just keep talking when we’re live. Don’t worry about anything, we can do a lot with editing for this piece” he says.

Three, two, one live! Watt is back to the control room watching the discussion on one of the monitors. He points out where Stransky should dip in for editing next week. “I’d probably start from this point…” he directs. She makes a note of it as Burke works with staff technologist Steve Bohrer to zero in on some sound difficulties.

Two hours have passed quickly. Despite Watts’ earlier prediction that the EAS crew would need to keep a tight shooting schedule because everyone would “make a quick escape the moment the clock struck 5:00 pm,” there’s no discernable rush. Students in the control room are divvying post production responsibilities: final cutting, editing, cutting the “B rolls” – non-critical footage used for fill-in shots between segments – together. In the studio, Scott and the pundits are taking their time wrapping up the panel discussion.

Moving at a speed that would make any professional proud, the election special is a wrap. The class is already in the preproduction stage of their next project: filming a short, comic fiction piece written by one of the EAS students, Patrick McKeown. The setting: a community TV studio. The subject: a Johnny Carson-wannabe in the process of taping his first show.