WE’RE A few weeks into the Free Newspaper Project’s trial run, and a couple observations should be made. First off, I am happy to say I’ve seen no deluge of wasted papers blowing across Grounds and wreaking havoc with the beautiful aesthetics of our fair University. This point should make Student Council’s Environmental Sustainability Committee breathe a sigh of relief. The second point is that the initiative seems to be quite popular; by mid afternoon, I’m hard pressed to find a newspaper stand that hasn’t been cleared out by students. Well, actually that’s only half true. It’s a struggle to find any more copies of The New York Times, but an abundance of USA Todays are still piled up. When the pilot run for this program ends Nov. 7, Student Council should look into decreasing its stock of USA Today and instead offer a greater number of other publications, including The Washington Post.
This might seem an odd topic to be up in arms about, but it’s not a trivial issue. The project costs $14,000, with half of funding coming from Student Council and half from the Arts and Sciences Council. That’s not a staggering sum of money, but it’s nothing to be scoffed at either, particularly with budget cuts looming. If we’re going to spend some cash on such a program, we might as well do it right and get the most out of it for students.
USA Today simply offers less in the way of educational value. It’s not a bad newspaper, and in fact it’s one of only two papers left with increasing circulation. Still, I can’t help but feel as if it targets more casual readers with less interest in policy-oriented issues. With its colorful layout and penchant for large graphs and diagrams, it looks more like a big advertisement than a serious publication. More importantly, however, it offers less meaningful content than other papers do, including The New York Times. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with any of this, but Student Council must ask themselves what the goal of the newspaper initiative is. Is it to entertain or to enlighten? It could be both, but certainly not the first at the expense of the second.
With this in mind, we first should look into tweaking the balance of USA Todays and New York Times offered to students. According to Student Council president Matt Schrimper, the program used for the Free Newspaper Project is provided through USA Today. This program allows Council to purchase newspapers in bulk at a steeply discounted price. While we must purchase a certain number of USA Todays with the subscription, we are not close to hitting that minimum. “After the trial run ends Nov. 7, Council will reconvene, look at the data that’s been collected, and decide what quantity of each paper should be bought,” said Schrimper in a phone interview. He also noted that when considering how much of each publication students read, the issue of recirculation must be taken into account. Many people will put papers back into the stands once finished reading, resulting in multiple views for individual papers.
In addition to playing with these numbers, Council should also add The Washington Post as a third publication in this initiative. In addition to its high standards of journalism and insightful reporting, it could lend a more local perspective than the other papers do. It frequently covers Virginia issues, particularly from the northern part of our state, which roughly a third of the student body calls home. The Washington Post would not participate in the pilot run for the Free Newspaper Project, but is an option should the program be continued in its current form, said Schrimper. “If we were to add a third paper, the level of funding would not change. We would simply reduce the number of other papers and keep the overall number constant.” So from a financial standpoint, this choice would make sense. More USA Todays could be sacrificed, up to a point, than the more popular New York Times. Students then would have three options from which to get their news. In this case, there’s no question that more freedom of choice is better.
It is also true that students could benefit from a paper being offered that is ideologically distinct from The New York Times (USA Today is generally less polarizing in this sense, but some consider it too to be left-of-center). Unfortunately, one of the most reputable conservative-leaning newspapers, the Wall Street Journal, does not participate in the USA Today program. Another right-of-center paper of comparable merit to The New York Times or Washington Post is somewhat difficult to find.
Student Council’s original justification of the program was right on. Many of our peer institutions already have such a project in place, and a school as politically active as the University shouldn’t miss out on keeping its students well-informed. The USA Today should be praised for having a bulk subscription program in place for us to use. Still, buying a few less copies of their paper for the sake of diversity would be a wise move. It is quite clear that the Free Newspaper Project has been a resounding success by most measures. By implementing these minor changes, the initiative could be a home run.
Ross Lawrence is a Cavalier Daily associate editor. He can be reached at r.lawrence@cavalierdaily.com.
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