We’re not perfect

“When will the paper mention it?” “Why didn’t they talk about this?” “I can’t believe how much the paper sucks.”

Yeah, we have heard it all before. We didn’t mention the story you wanted or you completely disagree with what an opinion columnist said or you think that the newspaper deliberately fixed the recent NISG elections with our magical powers since we endorsed the winning ticket. Here is a real newsflash for our readers: we are not perfect. We’re human, and we make mistakes.

We work hard at the paper to cover interesting, relevant stories that will be fun for students to read about in the paper or discuss online. But this is not always the case. We rely on underpaid freelancers to write stories for us and further we rely on advertisers to buy space in the paper to keep us afloat financially and give the paper its length. The University of Northern Iowa is a great campus with many smart and interesting people and we are grateful that some of them have chose to spend their time writing for the Northern Iowan.

But that isn’t good enough for everybody. The expression goes that you can’t please everyone and we at the paper have certainly learned this lesson over the past school year. We receive all kinds of complaints and we try our best to cover what we can with the staff and resources we have.

The Northern Iowan has not been immune from state-wide and campus-wide budgetary crises. We have lost staff and suffered pay cuts. The paper gets smaller when we don’t have enough advertisers to buy space, and economic conditions have forced companies everywhere to cut down on their advertising budgets and this affects us directly with shorter papers and less cash flow.

Without a journalism major or large department at UNI there is a lack of volunteers to write stories, and with a lack of financial incentive we sometimes get stuck as writer’s last priority in their already busy college life.

We are proud of the work we put in to making an exciting, interesting student-run newspaper.  Maybe you don’t see what you want covered and you’re too busy to come down to our meetings and become a writer yourself but does that give you license to complain without merit about the paper? Giving us more than just “The paper sucks” can give us direction, things to improve and places where we can work harder.

Contrary to how it may appear, we actually welcome constructive, relevant criticism. But it is just mindless paper-bashing which is intolerable to working student-run publication.

The Northern Iowan receives dozens of interesting press releases in a given week, but it is impossible to give all of the on-campus events their appropriate attention. If no writer or photographer signs up or volunteers to cover a story or event, we don’t have the staff, resources or mandate to force them to comply with our wishes of what should be covered.

Next year, things are taking a different turn at the paper, and we hope the campus population will be involved and excited about it. Our Web site will be expanding to include photo slide shows and video.

If you feel passionately about change you want to see in the paper, we are always looking for skilled writers and encourage you to contact us. We are still looking to fill positions over the summer, please contact 2009-2010 Executive Editor Nikki Davidson at ndavidso@uni.edu.

6 comments

Hilary H.

Fri May 1 2009 00:33

I would urge everyone to check out the most recent edition of the Northern Iowan, specifically the Summer 2009 Student Guide, the fifth paragraph on page 31 under "Our plans for next year."

"Finally, the paper will be taking extra steps to ensure our content is accurate and error-free by processing all content through an extra set of eyes through new Assistant to Copy Editor positions. The NI strives for the respect of its student body, and we understand the need for accuracy and CREDIBLY in order to be the student newspaper the community can trust."

I capitalized the good part. Even the Northern Iowan staff has to think this is a little funny. Good luck to you all in fall/summer 2009.

None

Thu Apr 30 2009 18:44

The Northern Iowan does not effectively meet the needs of the student population here at UNI. Very few times will I actually read the stories, as opposed to just flipping through for something to do.

While I'm glad to see you're working to get beat reporters, there's so much more you can do. Have a health/sex page, or relationship columns, some student profiles for fun, product or business reviews (relevant to students).

While I support the paper and realize it's not easy, the right staff with the right mindset to report for the student body can make a difference. That is what seems to be lacking. And the paper, for the most part, does not have interesting stories that students want to read, and the front page is rarely gripping enough to make me want to read it. Try hiring a new layout person too.

Nikki Davidson

Thu Apr 30 2009 00:25

Prefer not to be Named,
I think you will be happy to know that I did send out a lengthy e-mail to the list of writers I currently have on my computer as active, responsible writers to let them know about the changes I am considering making next year and asked for their feedback. I wish I could have gone more in-depth about the changes, but, as no one attended the meetings during the last couple of weeks, that was obviously a bit of a challenge.
I wish you would have e-mailed me or another editor to address your problems with being blown-off, as I have written more then 20 stories myself and only been blown off once about a extremely controversial story to a source. Much of how you are treated depends on who you are seeking as a source, how you contact them (phone or email), and how you address your needs.
I've never had a writer request for a in-person consultation in the entire year I've spent working as an editor. As far as "brow beating sessions" in private rooms, I've been at the office for every paper this year and have never seen as writer subjected to this type of treatment. If you have never been a subject of one of these "sessions," how do you know they exist/what happened in them? Next year, we are working to get the writers more involved by having writers' meetings twice a week and beat reporters. I hope this helps to improve any areas you may have concerns about. I encourage you to contact me privately, if you would like to converse further about this matter. I am a little confused and wondering if we work at the same paper.

Prefer not to be Named

Tue Apr 28 2009 20:00

As someone who's written quite a bit for the NI, I would like to throw in my two cents. The problem is cyclical. This paper is regarded with little respect on this campus, and because of that, story sources tend to blow off reporters. I cannot tell you how many times I was stood up for an interview. I simply do not have the time to persistently chase after people who regard my publication with disdain anyway. Because of that, I write fewer articles. When fewer articles appearing, readers continue to consider the paper substandard, and potential sources continue to blow off reporters.

Another thing that might help is if the editors made more of an effort to include writers. Did you consult any of your writers before you decided to make these "big changes" at the paper? Did you ask them why they stopped writing? It also doesn't help that editors don't pay attention to their writers (i.e., not responding to emails or requests for in-person consultation) unless there's a problem for the editors. Often, these problems are solved by pulling the writer into one of the private rooms in the NI office. What follows is a sort of browbeating session in which the writer often feels gained up on by two or more editors. Ill-defined phrases such as "your writing lacks passion" are then thrown out. Passion? My god, if a writer doesn't have it before, there's no way bothering them like this will remedy it.

So, ignoring and then haranguing your writers doesn't make them want to continue writing for you. Although I myself was never subject to such a browbeating session, several of my fellow writers complained bitterly to me about it. One of them was a person I considered to be a phenomenal and talented journalist. After experiencing everything I described above, this person eventually dropped the journalism career path. That's saying something about how you behave towards your writers.

Treat your writers with a little more dignity and respect. And maybe then you will see more people volunteering for stories.

Duh

Sat Apr 18 2009 01:14

"Contrary to how it may appear, we actually welcome constructive, relevant criticism."
-Paragraph 8, sentence 1 ... of this article

Tired of this

Fri Apr 17 2009 14:12

What an understatement.

When will this paper actually take some responsibility for themselves? All I ever hear is complaining about the big bad student body being mean to them. Grow some thicker skin and deal with it. This isn't middle school anymore and Suzy isn't calling you names behind your back. Grow up.

Maybe when people complain, there's a reason behind it. This is the second article that says stop criticizing us; learn to handle it. This paper has criticized people, you can take it too.

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