Corinne ParianteYear: freshmanMajor: CommunicationGPA: 2.66
1. Describe any academic, professional, and/or extracurricular experiences that qualify you to lead the University Press.
During my final two years of high school I worked as editor on the Stroudsburg High School newspaper The Mountaineer. I was in charge of a staff of around 40 people and we put out a paper every 2 months. I worked closely with the teacher/advisor, Mr. Matthew Sobrinski, and the business manager Brittany Hill, a fellow classmate. From working at The Mountaineer I received The Mountaineer Award for outstanding work in journalism.
Also in high school I was on the track team for three years. Other than being a runner my fellow hurdlers and I were in charge (during my last two years) of teaching up and coming hurdlers the ropes. I would demonstrate and help an average of five runners a week for roughly thirteen weeks out of the year.
For roughly 4 months I also worked at the New York State Theater with my father as a stagehand. This helped me with being a “team player” in that it takes far more than one person to lift an 800 pound piece of set and raise it to the ceiling. I also was often running errands for the other people I worked with such as getting carriage and machine bolts and doing any work that no one else could get to immediately.
While at college, I have joined the radio station where I have a one hour to two hour long show once a week at around 1am. This is the only time I am not busy with school and University Press work. While doing the show I must keep records of what I play and pay close attention to the two to five guests I have to make sure that things go smoothly and that they abide by the rules of the radio station.
I have worked at the University Press for 6 months. Beginning at the end of October I was appointed entertainment editor by Catherine McCormick. Before being appointed, I was always in the office helping Catherine with recruiting and paperwork. Aside from being entertainment editor, I also do design work. I began doing design work the first day I was in the office with Stefanie Resciniti . I was also placed in charge of the Spring Break 2004 issue by Vanessa Frost.
My first column that ran was about Self-Mutilation and that ran in the opinions section in issue 9. The first issue where I was entertainment editor was issue 13. In 17 issues I have had 19 articles or columns run. I am also in charge of the new back page called The Back Story, which I work on with Andy Orge.
2. Describe a major strength and a major weakness of the University Press this semester. Cite specific examples to support your claims.
One of our major strengths is definitely our Sports section, despite having almost no writers, Corey Zimmer has something consistently in every issue. And what goes in to the paper is consistently well-written and researched.
One of our major weaknesses is our lack of communication at the office. Often the entire staff is not sure what is going on with certain issues. An example of this can be seen in that only one or two if any of the section editors knows what is in to the other sections, even with it written on the board. As an example, repeatedly I am asked by over and over again what’s in the issue, though if they turn around its right on the board. Also, I feel that communication between the section editors and design team is sometimes lacking, from experience with news design, the news editor was often unreachable and would have things in the folder not on the board or missing things from the board without giving the design team a heads up.
3. Describe the most important goal you want to accomplish as editor, and detail exactly how you will do so.
As editor I would like to make the paper more timely. Currently there is a week to week and a half time delay in when deadlines are and when the paper comes out. I plan to remedy this by pushing deadlines up to 3 days before the paper goes to print. This will give copy editors and the design team 3 days to get the paper ready for printing. The paper is usually sent to press on Tuesday, so the deadline would be Friday night or Saturday morning for section editors. Often I find that the design team has waited until the last minute to start a design and will be in the office on a Sunday or a Monday finishing the issue. This is after some of the sections have been handed in for a week.
The copy editors and designers will be separated into sections. They will only do the section they are designated, unless the section is small that week and another is large or they want to design the cover and spread. To get more designers and copy editors I will go to classes with Andy Orge and Tehmina Mani and start recruiting as many as possible, though recruiting is part of the job already and is nothing extra. Once we have enough people, we will split them up and let them go to work.
4. As editor, what measures will you take to ensure the University Press covers every campus?
To ensure that the University Press is on every campus I will work closely with the other campus editors who at this time are Ghazal Yasdanparast and Marissa Grant. At least once a month I will try to make it to the other campuses for breezeway days and possibly recruiting at the classes on the other campuses. This is not only required by the Student Government constitution for UWC positions such as UP editor, but it is also an important way to maintain a high profile on all the campuses.
5. As editor, what measures will you take to improve the University Press in the following areas: recruiting, accuracy, and news of interest to students and faculty? Be specific.
When it comes to recruiting I would definitely keep with the section editors ads on the second page, why not have the people who actually take the time to read the paper write for us? I will also attend a journalism, design or photography class at least once a month. I’ve found that hanging flyers around campus actually work, as I received about ten e-mails after I put up around 90 flyers. To me those are some pretty good odds.
For accuracy I would always double proof the issue and have others go through their sections with a fine-toothed-comb. I would not like to see any further inaccuracies or plagiarisms go into the issue. If anyone would like to check facts before the paper comes out I would be more than happy to help them. Should an inaccuracy or plagiarized work reach the racks I will take every step to ensure that it does not happen again.
The only way to find out what is of interest to our readers is to talk to the students and faculty. The University Press can use the breezeway days and recruiting in classes to ask what they want to read about, maybe even have surveys in the issues or hand them out in random classes to try to test the pulse of the University.
