Has your paper made a switch in Content Management Systems?

How did it go?

What do you wish you knew before you started?

Show us your site. (Please)

New Year in the Newsroom

The coffee pot is actually a metaphor to say that College Newsroom and its very handsome development team are back in action for 2011.

A brief hiatus caused by a distracting shiny thing (probably an iPad) has been vitiated and we’re looking for you, the member, to help us make 2011 a great year for us. More importantly, we want you to help us make 2011 a great year for college newspapers across the country.

So, let’s hear what some of your Big Hairy Audacious Goals (BHAG) are for the year. We’ll work as a community to help you achieve them.

As always, we welcome your words of wisdom and support, but not photos of kittens hanging from a clothesline. Shoot us an e-mail at admin[at]collegenewsroom[dot]org

So, we want to see your best.

Post a link to what you think is a Touchdown of a football article or column and share briefly what makes it worth six points.

We’re not voting and you don’t win anything, save for the respect of other college journos and some extra hits on your site.

There’s no limit to your sharing. Checking back often is HIGHLY recommended. (as always)

Do some bragging, people!

A lot needs to be done this upcoming semester for my organization. We’re extremely understaffed right now but I hope that a heavy recruitment phase during the first couple of weeks will bring in some fresh talent who are eager in contributing to our site while building their electronic portfolio’s.

As this fall semester creeps closer, how is your newspaper (or online-only newspaper) preparing for the new school year? What roles need to be filled? How are you planning to recruit new writers, editors etc.? What are some obstacles, both new and old, that your organization faces? Will there be any changes that occur come fall?

Hope everyone is excited to return to their respective college!

I’ve considered blocking the site on each newsroom computer except one, where reporters/editors could log on to use the site legitimately. I really don’t want to have to do that though. I’d like to instead enforce a rule that would help curb erroneous or aimless use of the site, especially when other work could be done. There are always press releases to be rewritten and story idea sheets to be written up, etc.

Any suggestions? I’d like to encourage responsible use of the computers rather than acting like a mean babysitter. Just for reference, its the copyeditors/designers and editors themselves who are the biggest offenders.

Thanks.

So the problem is less financial dependence and more incompetence. I acknowledge that. At the same time, I was just elected EIC, and so I have to clean up this mess. I’m learning about contingency funding and deals we might make with our publisher. But I was hoping to benefit from your advice and expertise. I apologize for not being able to be more specific. Thanks for any and all help.

Thank you!

you can email me at kellis3@ucmerced.edu

As editors and staff move on to whatever is next and leadership roles are filled by new people there is a passing of information.

A lot of what you’ll be doing will stay the same. A lot of what you do will get better. A lot of what you do won’t be fully appreciated by your readers, but we the inky-fingered members of collegiate newspapers are a unique militia of information.

Older and Experiecned Staffers: this is a good time to put that last little tid-bit out there for the newbies to learn.

Younger Inexperienced Staffers: this is a good time to ask some questions.

And we’re not going anywhere.

So leave your thoughts as comments to this post.

(Also, tell your staff, all of them, to sign up for College Newsroom. We’d appreciate, seeing as we’re not much without our members!)