Allow me to break away from my silly-sometimes-sappy column this week.
Notice anything different about this week’s paper? Me either.
Try holding it up to an issue from last year. Or the year before. Or any other college paper in the state of Oregon.
Now do you see the difference?
Editor Eder Campuzano and I have made it our personal mission to give you the best damn (community college) newspaper in the state.
By our own standards: We’re succeeding.
We’ve revamped the look and feel of the paper – with hopes that it better reflects the personality of our readers.
Nobody wants to read something dry and lacking color. Which brings me to my next point: We’ve brought you every single issue in color this year. It’s a first for this campus.
We write a weekly editorial with the hopes of steering campus movers and shakers in the direction we find most effective. You didn’t see that last year.
Here’s one thing you probably didn’t know (and could never tell by reading the paper):
Every Wednesday night, you can find our staff working hard to put out Thursday’s paper. In the past, The Torch staff sometimes worked all day Wednesday and stayed until the early Thursday morning to finish the paper.
This year’s staff has never stayed past 10 p.m. on a Wednesday. Usually, we’re done by 8.
It’s all evidence of the dedication of this group.
We have 11 issues remaining this year. I’m here to tell you that it will only continue to get better.
Web Editor Victoria Stephens is working to improve our website and we’ll be launching an entirely new site in March.
With that will come more videos, podcasts, slideshows, blogs and other content you can only get online.
Campuzano, News Editor Brett Stanley, Sports Editor Alan K. Fox and I will be at the national college journalism conference in Los Angeles by the time this column is printed.
We’ll swap ideas with other journalists, attend classes and enter The Torch in a national contest.
By next week, we may even be able to say it’s one of the best damn (community college) newspapers in the nation.
Managing Editor Andy Rossback is at 541-463-5109 or a.rossback@gmail.com
