THREE AND a half years ago, before I was a part of The Cavalier Daily, I would get annoyed when the paper was not in production after holidays and during exam periods. "Those lazy bums," I would think, "they should be producing a paper!" Needless to say, three and a half years has ever so slightly changed my perspective.
I would estimate that a significant majority of the University population simply has no idea the amount of hard work and dedication that goes into the creation of a single issue of this paper -- I know that I certainly didn't. Making a quick calculation, it is safe to say that well over 150 man hours go into the production of a single issue of The Cavalier Daily. The Managing Board alone each spends 40 to 50 hours a week in the basement of Newcomb, working (for no pay) so that the University community can have a first-rate news source at their disposal.
During my term as operations manager, I have been no less than amazed at the constant and tireless dedication of every member of our staff. Some of our page editors would arrive by 9 a.m. and not leave the office for good until the paper was rolled at 1 a.m. the following day. Almost everyone contributing to the paper was making some sort of sacrifice -- none of us get rich putting out a paper every day, yet we happily sacrificed our time for the greater good.
As operations manager, I was responsible for making sure that the paper went out the door every night, both to our printer and to the Web site. As such, my job sometimes became confused with the "nagging manager." Some staff members perfected a "look of death" specifically to combat me asking if their page was done yet. I do thank all the members of our staff who put up with my constant reminders of the 1 a.m. deadline -- we certainly met the deadline far more often than we exceeded it.
During its 116th year, we certainly have made a lot of changes to The Cavalier Daily -- some that are visible to you, the reader, and a lot that are not. On the visible side of things, we made changes to the look of the paper, hopefully making it easier for you to quickly find the information you need. We were one of the first college papers in the country to print our own line of Sudoku puzzles, thus providing endless hours of amusement to students trying to avoid paying attention during lectures. Behind the scenes, we worked hard to improve our computer systems used to the produce the paper, fixed a large number of ongoing technical problems and began to transition our accounting system into the 21st century, ensuring that we will continue to be able to provide this (free) paper for years to come.
Spending 50 hours a week in a windowless basement is not without its downfalls, and I must profusely thank my family and friends for understanding why I might want to give up nearly all my free time to do such a thing. These people put up with my crazy schedule, my late nights and homework-filled weekends, and I thank them.
To my co-members of the 116th Managing Board, there is little else I can say except that you are a fine group of individuals, and I was extremely honored to have worked with you. We challenged each others'opinions time and again, and I would venture to say that we all benefited from it. When a lead editorial topic had passed through the hands of the five of us, all from extremely different schools of political thought, the topic was strengthened far more than one of us could have written alone. We worked together well, through trying times and long hours, and we have a lot to show for it.
I could not feel more certain in saying that we have left the paper in the best of hands. The new managing board has already shown steadfast leadership during these past several weeks, hurdling all sorts of obstacles with relative ease. The transition to this job is stressful at best and traumatic at worse, and I have been extremely impressed with how trying events have been handled thus far. I truly hope that the new board, along with the entire new staff, continues some of the work that we have started, and leaves a legacy of their own as well.
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