New year, new look, new paper. Help us tell your story
In the past couple of years, Central Michigan Life, Central Michigan University’s premier news source and your student voice since 1919, has begun to stray from its primary audience: CMU students.
Between faculty and administration tensions, questionable spending of university funds and numerous instances of faculty confusion, the paper has started to become bogged down in covering the bureaucracy of the university and at times lost focus of what it is: a paper run by students, for students.
Don’t get me wrong – those issues needed to be covered, and were covered well, but the student voice got lost in many of those stories.
I’m here to tell you this is the year that will change.
This year, my staff and I are giving the paper back to YOU.
We want to hear what you have to say. We want to cover what interests you. We want to know what you love about this place, along with what you love to hate about this place. We want your face, your story and your voice in the paper.
Though, that’s not to say we won’t be the same CM Life you’ve come to rely on to report hard-hitting news stories. We’ll still be examining every budget that comes our way, delving into Board of Trustees meetings, and holding the faculty and administration of this university accountable.
We’ll just be doing that with you in mind.
With a new attitude on news coverage, I thought CM Life could use a facelift, too. Something to show we’re serious about these changes and starting fresh with the student body.
That’s why we’re launching a brand-new website on Monday, revealing a new in-print design today, will have a new phone app coming soon, and have begun using multimedia and social more than ever before.
We’ll be looking for your opinion on Twitter, asking you to send us photos on Instagram, and sharing important articles with you on Facebook.
We’ll be hitting campus to feature you and your organizations in videos and photo galleries.
And all of that is going on in addition to changes on the advertising side of CM Life.
We have ad representatives hard at work to bring attention to some of Mount Pleasant’s best businesses. Take advantage of the deals you find in the paper and online. Let them know you heard about them from CM Life. Show them that this paper means something to you.
That being said, we’ll do our best to make your voice heard, but you have to help us.
Tell us what’s happening on campus. We spend a majority of our time in the office, making the paper. That means we miss some things happening on campus. It doesn’t mean we don’t want to cover them, though.
Here’s my promise to you: We’ll be the watchdogs of this campus, but we need you to be our eyes and ears.
Hear something suspicious? Want an event covered? Wish you could get involved? Have a story that needs to be told?
Let us know! We’re here for you.
I know life gets busy and classes start to consume your days, but don’t forget about us. Come on up to Moore 436. My door’s always open and I’d love to hear your story.
