By Melissa Boyd (Whetstone editor)
Melissa Boyd
People always ask me what the hardest thing about being the editor of the school paper is – is it writing the articles by the deadline, is it managing people, is it scheduling interviews?
The list goes on.
The secret is… it’s none of those things.
Writing articles and meeting the deadline is simply time management and scheduling interviews is fun because I get to meet so many different types of people and hear their stories.
I imagine managing people could be difficult… if we had any people.
Recruiting and retaining members seems to be our biggest problem.
If it weren’t for the Media Arts department and the Journalism course, taught by our adviser, I’m not sure we’d have much of a paper.
Currently, it’s myself and one other reporter, not including the students in the Journalism course.
I’ve gone to several “leadership†conferences – how to make your members motivated, how to help them write their articles, and how to take awesome pictures.
But it’s not much use when only one other person shows up.
So the big question people ask me when I say that recruiting and retaining members is the hardest part is: why is it so hard?
The Whetstone is a very unique organization on campus.
Not only can you join for hobby or extracurricular, but you can also take the course for a credit, receiving a grade to boost your GPA if you do the work.
Ahh… the work. That’s the key thing, isn’t it?
People assume The Whetstone requires tons of time and effort, so nobody even wants to talk about joining because they “don’t have the time,†as so many people tell me week after week, person after person of quitting.
I get it. I do. I’ve got 18 credits, a job on the weekends, placement with my education courses and a life.
Still, I manage to set aside the time to not only write for the paper, but edit the stories, find the pictures needed if we don’t have any, lay it out in InDesign and distribute 1000 copies across campus.
“I don’t have the time†just isn’t the answer. If you want to do something, you make the time.
Time isn’t the answer, but rather work. Writing a 350-word article (which approximates to about 1 page of writing, single-spaced) is just too much work, even though 75% of the article is formed based on a minimum of 3 sources.
The first couple of articles do take time because you’re learning.
But after a couple weeks of learning the style with our adviser Victor Greto and myself, and getting the hang of interviewing people, it’s a really rewarding job.
I’m the one who gets to drive to the Dover Post, collect all of these newspapers, and have people literally flock to me to take them, opening them rapidly and watching their eyes glow with excitement over the articles I wrote or helped others write.
I’m the one who gets asked a million times a day by patiently-waiting students and professors, “when’s the paper coming out?â€
I’m the one who gets to have a voice that 1,000 people hear when they read my words about topics that matter to me.
So, yes. It can be work.
But it’s the most rewarding work you’ll ever do, and it really builds your interviewing skills for when you’re the interviewee rather than the interviewer and it builds your social skills.
Don’t be afraid to try out for something because of the work.
Be afraid that you won’t try out for something because you’re too lazy.
