Editor in Chief

The Daily Collegian's semi-annual week of popularity is coming to a close -- and I am going to miss it.

For one week each semester, freshmen, sophomores, juniors and seniors with an interest in print journalism come to our basement headquarters to vie for a spot on one of our five very different staffs.

It's the one week a year that we can expect a slight ego boost, even if some of the compliments are a little off-base -- thanks, but I haven't lost weight and no, the Collegian did not get your tuition lowered.

Although I wanted to ask the hopefuls to jump through rings of fire, eat some kind of animal testicle and take a naked photo with Bob Woodard's Pulitzer, we asked for a demonstration of writing skills and knowledge of current events. Something, we think is fair, personable and definitely not as scarring as animal testicles or hoops of fire.

The Collegian news adviser, John Harvey, concocts a set of facts and asks the students to construct a news story. We can judge a lot from the product, like whether someone reads newspapers and can follow directions.

Some of the answers to the current events portion leave us puzzled. "The Cuban prison of death" is not generally accepted as a substitute for "Guantanamo Bay" and George Bush did not resign from the presidency to replace Penn State President Graham Spanier. But the caliber and enthusiasm of the students usually makes our job of narrowing down the large applicant pool very difficult.

To all the aspiring reporters out there who overslept, went to class or just didn't want to venture down to Burrowes Street:
You've got another shot in January. This is your chance to see your name in print (and not for making the high school honor roll or getting named in the police blotter). Your chance to hear different opinions and voice your own. Your chance to document Penn State history from the front lines while watching the homecoming parade with President Spanier or interviewing Four Diamonds families on the Thon dance floor or talking game strategy with JoePa.

To all the aspiring reporters who actually came on time to take a test that didn't count for graduation and still didn't make the cut:
Don't write us off. Prove that we were morons not to take your talented self. Come back in January and try again. If it's any consolation, a lot of our staff consists of people who refused to give up.

To those of you that read, care and just aren't the commitment type:
Sound off on our articles and editorials by submitting your own opinion letter to collegianletters@psu.edu.

Personally, I'm a little sad that wannabe reporters won't be telling me how cute my shoes are or how witty my blog is, but I'll survive -- it's only a couple months until January.

I can count on one hand the number of times being a journalist has made me feel "bad to the bone."

Long hours, a basement office, and writing and editing on a 10-year-old PC isn't really a gig that inspires a theme song. Plus, when you find yourself getting excited over a really catchy lede, some attorney's comments about his client's upcoming trial or a photo that will look really sharp in color, it's clear you aren't destined for a life of international glitz and glamor.

Not that the press pass doesn't get you access to all sorts of high-profile functions: I've hung out with Thon kids on the dance floor, I covered the Ohio State celebratory macing, I witnessed a fashion shoot on Chelsea Piers and once as an 18-year-old, I sailed by the Bar Bleu bouncer to meet former Dante's Inc. owner Dave Wells for an interview. (I know that doesn't sound cool, but this bouncer thought I was trying to sneak in underage and the satisfaction I got from saying, "Sorry, buddy, I've got a meeting with your boss, so 'move out the way' " ranks pretty high.)

But theme-song cool I can count on one hand.

Last Tuesday, five other editors and I attended a Pennsylvania student editors conference in Harrisburg (check Travis' Travels for visual documentation). We weren't sure what to expect -- we were told to be prepared to share our "best practices" in journalism and we drove up feeling unprepared. But it took barely minutes to realize we were by far the most prepared group in the room.

From the moment we arrived, the other news advisers and student editors asked us again and again what it was like to publish daily. Most of the papers in the room were weeklies, some were bi-weeklies and others were monthlies. They said they couldn't imagine the amount of work it took each daily to publish a newspaper.

But we have a lot of staff members, we replied, and we have systems and procedures in place that turn the basics into a mere daily routine. We have issues and problems and questions that arise each day, the same as you.

But then we started talking about specific issues and questions and we realized we weren't as similar as we thought.

A common complaint in the room was that each paper had a core of dedicated individuals but no consistent staff. Our Venues editor (shameless plug to the new Venues Web site) gushed to the editors from St. Joseph's University that with the Philadelphia arts scene to cover, they must have to beat away arts reporters with a stick.

They looked confused for a moment, shook their heads and said they wish they could find someone that would want to.

In another session we talked about ethical dilemmas and one panelist brought up an incident he experienced as a freshman photographer. He said he was on a ride-along with the local police when a student fell from a balcony. He said he initially hung back, unsure of what would be invasive or allowed until the police prodded him into action. He said he took some photos and he and the editors decided to use a small, black-and-white one on an inside page.

We sat there incredulous. If a student fell from the balcony practically into our laps, we wouldn't intend to be callous or cruel, but that's news -- big news. And I know our photographers and our reporters would be writing, shooting and asking questions non-stop. Furthermore, big news belongs on the front page in color where everyone can see it. Sure, we'd have a lot of discussions about which photos to run, but at least we'd have options.

But the biggest difference between The Collegian and most of the other state-affiliated university and community college newspapers in attendance was the relationship with the university.

We're independent. Penn State can't tell us what to print or what not to print. They can't censor us, they can't punish, they can't control our content. We rent a university building for our operations and Penn State has a contract with us to buy a certain number of newspapers each day to supply to its students.

Our independence makes us credible. If we were a university-sponsored experiment, then what student could trust our content wasn't influenced or previewed by the administration? We're entirely responsible each night for what you read each morning, and that's terrifying and weighty.

So while other student editors were lamenting the fact their university wouldn't increase funding or allow them to publish controversial content, we couldn't relate.

So as we left that day (early, of course, because hey, we had a paper to publish), I felt theme-song cool, because we're daily, independent and totally "bad to the bone."