Traditional high school journalism may be fading away, but students in an after-school class at McClymonds High School in West Oakland are publishing news, reviews and slices of life in a new blog.

Mack Smack posts tend to be short and sweet — sometimes consisting of a couple of photos and a sentence or two. My favorite one is about 4-year-old Makhiya Jones-Robinson, who cheered on the football team with the Mack squad this fall.

The class is taught by Nadine Joseph, a writing coach for the Oaktown Teen Times, and the blog is edited by Pamela Tapia, a senior. As a new subscriber, I hope they keep it up. I look forward to seeing what they have in store for 2011.