In the Spotlight: Madeline Huerta, Founder & Overseer, College Problems

Madeline Huerta is a genius.  She has turned other people’s problems (and some of her own) into Internet gold.

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Huerta is the creator and overseer of College Problems, a Tumblr site that offers undergraduates a spot to vent about everything related to higher ed. that irks or annoys them.  The user-submitted entries typically run only a sentence or two, almost always with a set-up and a punchline and sometimes without proper capitalization and grammar.

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A quick sampling of students’ admitted college problems: “Paper-thin dorm walls. . . . So much homework that you don’t know where to start. . . . Laptop dies [so] forced to pay attention during class. . . . Open a bag of chips in the quiet part of the library [and] receive death stares. . . . Two water bottles left in the fridge [and] you don’t remember which one is vodka.”

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Madeline Huerta is a Boston University rising sophomore majoring in marine science.

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Below, Huerta talks about the secret to the success of College Problems and offers her 10 favorite posts.

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How did you come up with the idea for College Problems?

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I came up with the idea for College Problems one day when I was just on Tumblr and supposed to be writing a paper. There are a bunch of other blogs similar to mine– that make little blurbs about a certain topic.  I was feeling kind of frustrated with college at the time, so I figured I’d make a college-themed one.  ULTIMATE PROCRASTINATION.

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So I wrote out a bunch of different name ideas, like “Why College Sucks”, “College Sucks When…”  But then I came up with College Problems, and the name stuck.  So I came up with a design, wrote out a bunch of College Problems, and uploaded them to Tumblr.  I didn’t follow people or ask people to follow or promote me on their blogs. I uploaded the images, tagged them, and within a few days, a lot of people started taking interest.

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What is the secret to its success?

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I think the main reason people are drawn to the site is that they can relate to almost everything I post.  Some College Problems are funny things that everyone goes through, and some are more serious issues that students have to deal with.  It’s a site that people visit and go, “Wow, I thought I was the only person with this problem.”  Students read College Problems and submissions from other students and realize they’re not alone.

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Memorable CP moments.

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Two moments immediately come to mind: (1) At the beginning of May, a girl from my school’s student-run newspaper interviewed me and wrote a feature about College Problems. When the article came out, I was amazed at how many BU students came up to me and were really surprised and excited that I ran College Problems.  Up until the end of the year, I’d be walking to class and people I didn’t even know would compliment me on the blog.  It was pretty surreal.

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(2) The second is more of a series of moments– I think it’s wonderful when people send me messages on Tumblr telling me how much they love the blog and how much it’s changed their view of college, knowing that virtually all students share the same problems.  Knowing that the blog is so influential and reaches so many people is unbelievable.  I still can’t wrap my head around the fact that I make one post and it reaches 67,000+ people.

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Any advice for students interested in launching something similar to CP?

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Choose something relatable.  Choose a big group of people.  For example, college students all over the world relate to College Problems.  Another tip is to not force your blog/website on people.  It’s obnoxious when people send me messages asking to promote their new blog.  It’s good putting your website out there, but in my opinion, if people like your blog, they’ll follow it.

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What have been your favorite submissions so far?

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Biology 108 inspired this one. As soon as I finished reading a chapter or completing a lab write-up, there was more work.  This is one of the most liked/reblogged posts as well.

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So relevant.  I live in Chicago and almost all of my college friends live on the East coast.  I don’t get to see them all summer.  It’s rough.

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It couldn’t be more true.  This semester I didn’t get much sleep.

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This was me spring semester.  I didn’t have any classes before 11, and it still felt too early sometimes.

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Those girls you hear in the dining hall on Sunday mornings, going on and on about the night before.  Obnoxious.

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Judging by how fast this year went by, graduation seems right around the corner. :( Sad.

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No one to bring you soup, make you tea, wake you up when it’s time to take more Advil.  Laying in bed sick, all you can think is, “Why isn’t my mom here?!”

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It’s happened too many times.  I’m not awake until I’ve had some coffee.

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When I tell someone I’m a marine science major, the the most common response is, “So like . . . fish?”  Yes, fish.

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My mom and my friends’ moms do this all the time.  I put this one up during finals, and a few hours later my mom calls me and asks to talk for “just a few minutes.”  She thinks she’s funny.

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College Media Story Ideas: Campus Pets, Music, Activism, and Late Night Library Antics

—  A rundown of the top 10 pet friendly schools.  Apparently, students are enjoying evermore freedom at some schools to room with certain animals in campus housing and have their pets included in all parts of their college experience.  For example, according to Eckerd University’s dean of admissions and financial aid, “A couple of years ago, we had one young lady whose dog actually walked across stage with her at commencement.”

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What are the pet policies on your campus?  Depending, what are the most popular animals legally or illegally being cared for by students?  More generally, while at school, how do students deal with the separation from their pets at home?  And what about faculty and staff pets?  Any pet-owner lookalikes?  Depending, a photo slideshow is a must.  (U.S. News & World Report, Huffington Post, and UPIU)

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—  A mini-ethnographic report on late-night antics at the Kent State University library.  The bottom-line question the reporter sought to answer: “What happens in the library after 2 a.m.?”  It is an interesting question, considering the bookish haunt is one of the few spots on most campuses open and well-lit 24/7. This piece told the library’s after-hours tale through a series of short observational bursts presented chronologically.  A more straightforward report with quotes from students and staff might also be interesting.

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Among the questions I’m curious to have answered: What do staff do on the library’s graveyard shift?  Are there similarities among the students hanging out at such odd hours (i.e. all bookish nerds, grad students, sexiled roommates, hung-over frat guys, townies)?  What spots in the library are most known for more, ahem, elicit activities?  What does the security system for the library entail?  (KentWired.com)

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—  “On The Dwnld” is a weekly listing of the most downloaded music tracks by college students nationwide.  What are the hottest singles among students on your campus?  What about the hottest viral videos or mobile apps?  (NextGen Journal)

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—  The wife of the University of Vermont president has been relieved of her “official volunteer role” after a mini-scandal involving an apparent relationship between her and a school administrator.  Yikes.  For story brainstorming’s sake, I’m less interested in the scandal than her status as an “official volunteer.”  What role does the president’s spouse serve at your college or university, if any?  What causes do he or she particularly champion?  Is he or she on the payroll or included in school brochures or websites in any capacity?  Or do he or she purposefully shun the spotlight?  (Inside Higher Ed)

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—  An interesting mini-profile of a student activist at New York University.  In this case, she is attempting to shed light on the “ugly side” of the cosmetics industry. Who are the faces of student activism on your campus?  Any profs or admins with an activist history willing to tell their tales?  What are the most popular student causes at the moment?  What are some stories of student activists’ efforts? Any classes on activism in the current curriculum?  Depending, talk to the instructor.  What are the latest activism trends?  (Washington Square News)

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Online Video Collection: ‘Important Lectures for Journalism Students’

Principles of Good Journalism. Why Newspapers Matter.  Media in Transition.  The Future of Publishing.  How Did the News Get So Dumb?

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These are the names of just a few of the lectures, seminars, and workshops included in an interesting list compiled and posted by OnlineClasses.org.

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The title of the list, which provides a slug, a brief description, and a link to a video of each talk: “40 Important Lectures for Journalism Students.”  (Suggested subtitle: “40 Lectures Possibly Worth Poaching by J-Profs”) :)

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The list offers a very scattered collection of journalism, media, and contemporary culture chats– some delivered by biggies with last names such as Rather, Kinsley, and Assange.  A quick sampling of the first dozen proved marginally entertaining and occasionally enlightening.  Enjoy.

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Former Editor: Colorado J-School Closure First Step Toward Building ‘World-Class Program’

Susan Deans wants the world to know: Journalism is not dead at the University of Colorado.  In a recent guest commentary for The Denver Post, the former editor of Boulder’s Daily Camera wrote that the university is actually moving “closer to the forefront of journalism education” and will soon be “a leader in the field of digital communication.”

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As many in the journalism community are aware, the Board of Regents at the University of Colorado-Boulder recently voted to close CU’s School of Journalism & Mass Communication based upon the recommendation of an advisory board that counted Deans as a member.  The vote officially ended a long discontinuance process that has been viewed by some as a harbinger of dark days ahead for journalism education nationwide.

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Deans argues the opposite.  As she wrote, “At present, the journalism school is no longer meeting the needs of its students. It is still teaching news journalism pretty much as it did 20 or 30 years ago, when most graduates went to work for newspapers and a few for TV stations. . . . The advisory board supported closure only because we believe it was a necessary step toward reconstructing a world-class journalism program on the CU campus.”

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My take: I am a firm believer in the brush fire mentality as it pertains to journalism’s current state– the notion that the flames burning down some traditional portions of the field will enable new innovative portions to rise from their ashes.  In this sense, the words Deans spouts such as leader, forefront, and world-class (not to mention digital) to describe the dreams of Journalism 2.0 at CU are obviously welcome.

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My problem is that they are still only dreams.  The school has been shuttered without a true detailed plan in place for what happens next.  Yes, the administration has been offering reassurances that it intends to keep its “three most important resources intact– our budget, our student body and our faculty/staff.”  But what will they be doing exactly?  What will they be teaching and learning?  How will they specifically be integrated into existing programs?

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The brush fire is a neat analogy.  But it requires more than burning down.

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‘Print-Hating Generation Still Reads the College Newspaper!’

As digital and online media conquer the world, college students are still most content to read their campus newspapers in print.

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It is not breaking news, confirmed over the past few years by a number of news outlets and marketing surveys– including a fall 2010 Poynter Online piece (screenshot below) and a Washington Post Magazine feature published in April.

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The most recent proof of students’ print-first campus newspaper reading habits comes from David Simpson, the coordinator of student publications at Georgia Perimeter College.  As he recently wrote in a message to college media advisers:

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“A nugget from our latest market research at Georgia Perimeter College made me very happy, so I’ll share it.  This is a pretty rigorous survey designed and analyzed for us by senior marketing students under a very savvy professor at nearby Georgia College and State University.

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“The first question on the survey was whether the respondent agreed that ‘reading the newspaper is a waste of time.’ Not a particular newspaper– just ‘the newspaper.’

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“A whopping 69 percent either ‘agreed’ or ‘strongly agreed’ that the newspaper is a waste of time– and that number jumps to 89 percent when you include ‘somewhat agreed.’

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“A little later in the survey, the respondent was asked if he/she had read The Collegian, our campus newspaper, in the last month. (We only published every three weeks this year.)  The ‘yes’ on that question was 62 percent.

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“So this print-hating generation still reads the college newspaper!”

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Duke Chanticleer: ‘Portrait of a Yearbook’ as an Old Man

At nearly a century old, The Chanticleer, Duke University’s yearbook, is dying— at least in its current form.

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A profile of the yearbook published in The Chronicle, the school’s student newspaper, during spring semester paints a grim picture.  The staff is having trouble giving free copies away.  Its top editor admits many students do not even know Duke still has a yearbook.  The publication’s budget is being slowly slashed.  And more questions than ever are being raised about its relevance in the Internet era.

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As Chronicle staff writer Ryan Brown writes, “In an era of Facebook photos and digital cameras, when every student group has a website and every basketball game can be Tivo-ed into permanence, one of Duke’s oldest student organizations is staring down a life-or-death question: does anyone care about the yearbook anymore?“

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In a separate Chronicle report on the yearbook’s recent budget battle, a Duke senior is similarly quoted saying, “There is no reason why we should be giving $80,000 to the yearbook when we have things like Facebook.”

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Will Duke join Mississippi State University, Mount Holyoke College, Purdue University, Towson University, and the University of Virginia “on the growing list of schools that no longer print a student yearbook”?  (In fall 2008, the University of Texas student media director told ABC News that there are roughly 750 yearbooks still publishing at U.S. colleges and universities, “far fewer than there were 10 years ago or 40 years ago.”)

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Even a free price tag is apparently not enough enticement.  I see the same sad reality at the University of Tampa, where an overwhelming majority of students are either uninterested in owning a quality yearbook offered without any charge or entirely ignorant of its existence.

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Why should these books retain a place on campuses, in print form?  A Duke publications adviser: “Of course people have their Facebook pictures and everything, but it’s so impermanent.  You’re not going to pick that up years from now and say, ‘Here’s what was happening at Duke while I was there.’  There’s something to be said still for having a book.”

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College Media Story Ideas: Shot Girls, Fake IDs, and Freshmen Going Greek

• An interesting glimpse at one night in the life of a shooter, or shot girl, a side job for many female students.  How popular is this nighttime/weekend profession among undergrads at your school?  What are the perks/downsides?  How do their parents/friends/sig others feel about their work?  (UPIU)

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• A profile of four siblings— ages 10 to 16– enrolled at the University of Iowa at the same time.  What family holds the record for most legacy enrollees at your school?  How many young geniuses are seeking degrees at your school, and what are their stories?  How do admissions handle off-beat applicants such as these? (Daily Iowan)

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• A pair of stories on the debate over whether freshmen at Princeton University should join Greek organizations— story one and story two.  What are the rules at your school?  What do Greek student leaders, administrators and freshmen think? (Daily Princetonian)  Update: Here’s my USA Today College column on it.

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• A write-up on a busting of a fake ID ring run by a student at the University of Maryland.  A separate piece on a fake ID website popular among students, apparently based in China.  What are the latest trends/controversies within your school’s fake ID culture?  Especially memorable student stories related to their use? Does your school consider fake IDs a major issue?  (Diamondback and UPIU)

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• A piece outlining the latest skirmish in the textbook sales war being waged between college bookstores and Amazon.com.  Portion of piece: “For years Amazon and other Internet retailers have been moving into a college textbook market that was virtually oligopolistic 15 years ago. Most college towns had only the college-run bookstore and one or two independent shops. Internet booksellers and the ease with which students can compare textbook prices have now made the market ‘exceptionally competitive.'”  How has your school bookstore fared in the past 15 years?  What are textbook-buying trends among students?  What do the profs assigning these textbooks think?  (Inside Higher Ed)  Update: Separate piece by Heather Regen at NextGen Journal on textbook renting and downloading trend.

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SPLC: Two Student Newspaper Advisers Fired . . . for No Good Reason

Late last month, a pair of student newspaper advisers were separately told their employment contracts were being terminated . . . for apparently no good reason at all.

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Patriot Talon adviser Vanessa Curry at the University of Texas at Tyler told the Student Press Law Center she was let go due to “complaints.”  She said the nature of the complaints or the individuals making the complaints were not revealed to her.

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SPLC attorney advocate Adam Goldstein: “When you fire someone because you say there’s been complaints, but you won’t say from who and you won’t say about what, it doesn’t really have the hallmark of sincerity, does it?“

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Curry is convinced school officials began targeting her after a Patriot Talon editorial this past semester criticized the school for its lack of communication and maddening “cyclical bureaucracy” surrounding a sudden order for the paper to abandon its newsroom for a new out-of-the-way spot.  (Screenshot of a portion of the editorial below.)

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Meanwhile, Chart adviser T.R. Hanrahan at Missouri Southern State University was fired because administrators “wanted to make a change.”  Hanrahan earned the 2010 Missouri College Media Association Adviser of the Year honor.  In his words, “How did I get so bad at my job in 12 months?”  He was not given any answers.

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Of course, if a College Press Freedom Index existed, MSSU would be near the bottom.  For years, the school has operated with little to no respect for its student newspaper.  Among its transgressions: Last spring, MSSU suddenly forced the Chart to gather all information on campus through one official, the director of university relations.

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Hanrahan: “This school is very important to me, and I will always love this school, but the climate that they have here with regard to the First Amendment is not healthy and I hope it will change.”

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Separately, in a recent AP piece, SPLC executive director Frank LoMonte offered the most powerful quote about the precariousness of student publication advisers’ positions…

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“There are two occupations in America that are more dangerous the better you are at them: journalism adviser and suicide bomber.”

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College Problems: ‘Everyone’s Got Them. Tell Me Yours’

The only thing lower than your GPA is your bank account balance. Mistaking Nyquil for Dayquil.  Paper-thin dorm walls.  So much homework that you don’t know where to start.  Laptop dies [so] forced to pay attention during class. Open a bag of chips in the quiet part of the library [and] receive death stares.  Two water bottles left in the fridge [and] you don’t remember which one is vodka.

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The many, varied, and often hilarious difficulties associated with the undergraduate experience now have an online home: College Problems.  Its tagline: “Everyone’s got them.  Tell me yours.”

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The Tumblr site collects and projects brief user-submitted complaints and confessions about the complications of collegiate life.  They typically run only a sentence or two, almost always with a set-up and a punchline and sometimes without proper capitalization and grammar.

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The inventor and purveyor of CP is a female Boston University freshman majoring in marine science who chooses to remain anonymous.

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The site’s user-generated success is what most intrigues me.  The key seems to be simplicity– the concept, the site design, and the submission process are all geared toward making it easy to look at, ‘get,’ and feel compelled to contribute.

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The idea seems ripe for localization by student newspapers, centering the problems talk on their home campuses, possibly with an editor/approver to keep more vulgar or personal attack posts from appearing.  Is this also possibly a model for future man-on-the-street queries?  (Let’s be honest, the random mugshot/quote combo for that feature is far overdue for a makeover.)

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A small sampling of students’ recent submissions:

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Guest Post: Jackie Spinner Reflects on Efforts to Launch Independent Student Newspaper in Oman

Former Washington Post staff writer Jackie Spinner has become a force within student journalism circles in the Middle East.  Over the past two years, she has helped launch pioneering independent student newspapers in both Iraq and Oman.

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Her most recent efforts in the Oman capital city of Muscat centered on Al Mir’ah. The student news outlet recently premiered at Sultan Qaboos University, where Spinner also taught digital journalism as a Fulbright Scholar.  In the fall, she begins work as an assistant professor of journalism at Columbia College Chicago.

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Jackie Spinner, teacher, adviser, Fulbright scholar and journalist extraordinaire

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Below is a piece by Spinner reflecting on Al Mir’ah and the Omani media culture it operates within.  Enjoy.

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By Jackie Spinner

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MUSCAT, Oman— Within hours after the new student newspaper at Oman’s flagship public university went live, the new editor-in-chief frantically called me. A bus had crashed carrying students from the College of Agriculture and Marine Science. Three students and a technician from Sultan Qaboos University had been killed.

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Abdulrahman Elhadi, a journalism student from Libya, wanted to break the story on the newspaper’s website but had no idea how to report or write about the crash. Would I take a look at what he had cobbled together, Elhadi wanted to know. How fast could I get edited and back to him?

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A screenshot of the top portion of the Al Mir’ah homepage in late April.

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I immediately logged on to my computer to read the draft. He had reached one witness, and although the story had spelling and punctuation errors and was poorly organized, the basics of a news story were there, in a run-on paragraph, asking for Allah’s blessings for the departed at the end.

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His enthusiasm to break news that he had verified with reporting, with facts was exactly why I had started this student newspaper in Oman as part of my Fulbright. My students were studying journalism in a country that too often relied on rumor and second-hand information sent by text message or shared in passing.

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When I had first arrived at SQU in October, students told me about another bus accident that had killed 12 girls. No, seven. Actually it was 15. No, it was 20. No, someone else insisted. Only four died. How can you not know the number, I implored my students. And then I’d go on to describe how we’d often arrive at a body count when covering a suicide bombing in Iraq, where I had been a reporter for the Washington Post in 2004 and 2005. “You check with the U.S. military because they often send soldiers to secure the scene,” I explained. “And then you call the health ministry in Baghdad because they coordinate with the hospitals. Of course you talk to witnesses, but they’re often emotional and not always objective. You can go to the hospitals yourselves, although if it’s a large bombing, you may have to go to four or five, and the streets might be barricaded. But if you really want to know, you go to the morgue and you count the bodies.”

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Few reporters metaphorically count the bodies in Oman. They too often rely on press releases, official statements, anonymous sources. Witnesses, if they have them, are rarely identified, making the credibility of the report suspect. During a riot in the northern Omani port city of Sohar on Feb. 27, where I had gone to report and take pictures, I was the only reporter in the street, cowering behind a bush, choking on tear gas but trying desperately to remain an observer, a reliable source, a witness. “That how I know what happened,” I told my graduate students in class that night after I had returned to Muscat. “You have to go to the story. You have to see for yourselves. You have to count the bodies.”

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SQU was the first university in Oman when it opened in 1986. Since then it has grown to a thriving institution of 12,000 students. And yet it never has had a student newspaper. When I initially asked my students to help start one, they were reluctant. They weren’t interested for many of the same reasons they aren’t eager to go into the field of journalism after they graduate.

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They sense that the government will control what they write, which has been partially true. Oman’s Ministry of Information certainly influences what issues are covered in Oman, although the press has exploded with “real news” since civil unrest broke out in the sultanate this spring. It wasn’t until the students started to write about topics they chose for a newspaper that they had named, with editors whom they had selected that they realized I meant what I had promised. I was setting up a student newspaper with no prior review from the administration, with no censorship.

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Although it would be officially based in the school’s mass communication department, Al Mir’ah, which means “mirror” in Arabic, would be editorially independent. As long as student followed the policies I had established for ensuring accuracy and credibility, as long as they followed a basic code of ethics and promised to be fair, they could write whatever they wanted. And they have. The lead story in the first issue, which is published weekly on-line, was about student protests at SQU.

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The newspaper’s launch on April 16 was months behind schedule and yet paradoxically right on time. In the old Oman, in the Oman before Arab Spring, in the Oman before the press spoke of anything out of the ordinary because every day in Oman was supposed to be ordinary, this venture might not have succeeded. But after the people of Oman rose up to ask for jobs, for political reform, for rights denied to Omani women with children born to foreign husbands, the new Oman emerged, an Oman with a vibrant press.

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In the new Oman, Al Mir’ah was able to set sail with news by students and for students at SQU, Al Mir’ah‘s motto. I had started a similar student newspaper last year at The American University of Iraq—Sulaimani. Like Al Mir’ah, the AUI-S Voice was Iraq’s first independent student newspaper. And yet the experiences in establishing the two newspapers were quite different. It was one thing to start a newspaper at a university where the concepts of an independent student press were not unique to my American administrators.

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My colleagues in Oman were supportive, and no one stood in my way, but the newspaper wasn’t a priority. It was baffling to me, a product of American journalism schools, that you would teach students about journalism and not offer them a way to practice it. Most of the journalism classes at SQU are in Arabic, and students don’t get practical training, even in the classroom, until their last year in school. And yet, in the end, Al Mir’ah, which is published in both Arabic and English, came into being. The people responsible for that happening are seven students who walked into my office and accepted the challenge to be founders of a unique media project in Oman, a newspaper that aims to deliver accountability and the truth without interference from the authorities.

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As Abdulrahman told me, “I think it will require a lot of work in order to get out there and earn readers and followers and actually reflect student opinions and voices. But we’re young, we’re excited and we’ve already got the ball rolling.”

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USA Today Campus Beat: Rise of the ‘Speedy Senior’

I am excited to introduce the first entry of a new column I will be writing for USA Today College.  Campus Beat aims to spotlight different facets of the university scene via its most significant primary source– the student press.  The post below outlines a possible new enrollment trend, linking to stories in The Eagle at American University, The Cornell Daily Sun, and The Oracle at the University of South Florida.

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This commencement season– among the caps, gowns, diplomas, and distinguished invited speakers such as Snooki — a question looms: How many fresh graduates were on the three-year college plan?

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According to a new report in American University’s Eagle, there are an “increasing number of students that graduate early from universities across the nation.”

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While the super senior — an undergraduate who takes five years or more to earn a degree — has long been a part of university lore, the so-called “speedy senior” is a relatively new breed of student.

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The speedy senior graduates a semester or full year early — taking advantage of AP credits, course overloads, and summer and winter break sessions. Sometimes, the speedsters are spurred by academic ambitions or a general impatience to enter the job market. But mostly, they are motivated by the opportunity to stave off debt.

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As the Eagle found, “Though many students acknowledged that they would be giving up opportunities like studying abroad, interning or taking more electives by graduating early, they explained that saving money is more important.”

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While it is better for students’ bank accounts, it is troublesome for schools’ bottom lines. As The Cornell Daily Sun reported in February, “The upswing in early graduations has begun to put a financial burden on the colleges, which do not receive expected tuition dollars when students graduate early.”

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To read the rest of the post, check out Campus Beat.

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NextGen Journal Gives College Students’ Spin on Global Events

Connor Toohill is attempting to break the college bubble.

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Last fall, with the help of friends, Toohill launched NextGen Journal, a student-run news and commentary site, writ large. Its roughly 90 contributors are currently enrolled at colleges and universities across the U.S. and Canada.

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In terms of sheer geography, Toohill has arguably filled college media’s biggest niche. At the moment, NextGen may be the only true national college news outlet by students for students.

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It covers matters of interest and importance to students outside the bubble of their own campuses — “from dorm life to Darfur, and from climate change to Kid Cudi.” Recent topics under investigation and discussion on the NextGen home page ranged from Libya, Net neutrality, and campus break-dancing clubs to college graduation rates, the deficit, and Rebecca Black.

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“Up until now, campus media, especially in the opinion sense, has just been localized,” said Toohill, 19, a rising sophomore at the University of Notre Dame. “There’s nothing from our generation that is influential in the national sphere. We wanted to do something that can have influence nationally, that can bring our generation into the conversation.”

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The “Osama Circus”

Amid the conversations — and celebrations — that have erupted in the wake of Osama Bin Laden’s killing, NextGen has published more stories on more angles than any other student media outlet.

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The site featured dispatches on student reactions at roughly two dozen schools — from West Point cadets running around in “crazy patriotic costumes and underwear” to Stanford University students who “roasted s’mores, drank beer (mostly the American variety), and chanted ‘U-S-A U-S-A!'”

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It debated the merits of the country’s celebratory mood, including a Michigan State University student who decried the “Osama circus” atmosphere and a Tulane University student who separately described the national party as “perhaps the only time that I’ve felt proud to call myself a young college student.”

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NextGen also reflected on the meaning of the terror kingpin’s death for current students who were in grade school when 9/11 occurred. It gauged the impact of the military strike on the 2012 presidential election. It ran a reminder op-ed that “terrorism does not die with Osama Bin Laden.” And it discussed the growing skepticism surrounding Pakistan’s alleged ignorance of Bin Laden’s whereabouts.

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Similar stories have been run throughout the professional press — but hardly any from the student perspective.

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As Toohill said, “Our best pieces, our most popular pieces — whether it’s Egypt or the State of the Union or health care reform or the Super Bowl — really look at, what is the impact here for students? What is the significance for our generation? We’ve seen there is really a demand for that. Huffington Post College is sort of established as a section to cover what’s going on at college. Basically, what we’re saying is that college students deserve their own Huffington Post.”

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To Read the Rest of the Piece, Check Out PBS MediaShift

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Daily Lobo Editor at University of New Mexico Apologizes for Cartoon Depicting President Obama as a Monkey

The editor of The Daily Lobo at the University of New Mexico has apologized for the recent publication of an editorial cartoon of President Barack Obama and Osama Bin Laden criticized by some as racially insensitive.

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Local television news in Albuquerque, UNM’s hometown, reported African American students were fed-up and furious about the cartoon, which depicts Obama as a monkey-like creature holding up Bin Laden’s head.  The image was intended as a satire of the famous baby-holding scenes at the beginning and end of Disney’s “The Lion King.”  It also was meant to reference Obama’s own recent use of the scene in a video he showed during the White House Correspondents’ Dinner poking fun at the birther controversy.

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The image of the president with facial features resembling those of a monkey are what most infuriated students.  The Daily Lobo reported roughly 30 students met on campus last week to protest the image and the larger racial intolerance on campus they feel it represents.  One UNM senior said she felt “immediately upset and angry because of the history of these types of injuries.  President Obama is drawn as a monkey which portrays him as less than human which is how black people have been portrayed throughout history. Yet, Osama Bin Laden’s face is normal.”

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Daily Lobo editor in chief Chris Quintana apologized to readers and said the staff would receive sensitivity training: “It was not published with the intent to perpetuate stereotypes, or infer African-American students are in any way inferior. . . . We saw the cartoon as an interpretation of Osama Bin Laden’s death and the American celebration along with it.  We saw the cartoon as a symbol of the twisted nature of American pride and thought it would provoke interesting, not racist, discussion.”

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Crimson White Continues Coverage of Tuscaloosa’s Tornado Recovery Efforts

The Crimson White, the University of Alabama’s daily student newspaper, is continuing its coverage of the clean-up in UA’s hometown after late April’s deadly tornado.  The paper is providing hyperlocal updates on physical and emotional recovery efforts in various Tuscaloosa neighborhoods.  It is reporting on the debate over credentialing volunteers to work in the recovery zones; the economic rebuilding already underway; and larger efforts “to restore normalcy.”   It is also presenting obituaries of students and others lost in the disaster.

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Below is a photo of the tornado as it tore past the UA campus, emailed to me by Mark Mayfield, the editorial adviser to student publications at the school.  In his words, “The UA Office of Student Media is located in the building in the lower center of the photo, near Bryant-Denny Stadium and between those two columns in the foreground.  This photo was taken by former UA Student Government Association President James Fowler.”

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Interview with ‘Documenting Disaster’ Student Filmmakers at Christopher Newport University

As I confirmed in my previous post, “Documenting Disaster” is a must-see film for student journalists and their supporters.  The documentary gives us a glimpse into the newsroom of The Collegiate Times, the student newspaper at Virginia Tech, in the immediate aftermath of the April 2007 shootings.

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“Disaster” is the triumphant work of four student filmmakers.  They are graduating seniors at Christopher Newport University who are also finishing up stints as staffers at CNU’s student newspaper, The Captain’s Log— Victoria Shirley (Captain’s Log editor in chief), Samantha Thrift (news editor), Andrew Deitrick (online editor), and Cassandra Vinch (sports editor).

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The film premiered with a pair of shows in mid-April at CNU– the second showing held on the four-year anniversary of the shootings central to the story.  According to Deitrick, roughly 100 people turned up at each show, including some family members of the student victims.  The full film was placed online soon after.

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Last week, three of the student filmmakers– Shirley, Thrift, and Deitrick– were gracious enough to chat with me via Skype video about creating the film, including their monthlong sleepless stay in post-production purgatory (AKA the living room of Shirley’s apartment).

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The filmmakers watch a "final run through on DVD" in Shirley's apartment.

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In Thrift’s words, “It was the most stressful month of my entire life.  I hope I never ever get faced with that amount of pressure.  We just felt this heavy weight that we wanted to make it perfect, give it justice not only for the Collegiate Times but the family members [of students killed in the shootings], especially after we met them.  My biggest concern was that it was just flawless for them.  The whole way through we were such perfectionists that any type of glitch was just like a stab to the heart.  We sacrificed sleep.” Deitrick confirmed, “We also all sacrificed class time, homework time, study time, friend time, social time, all that stuff. . . . But it was worth it.”

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A screenshot of my video chat with filmmakers (left to right) Victoria Shirley, Samantha Thrift, and Andrew Deitrick.

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During the interview, the trio also touched on what surprised, angered, and saddened them during the filmmaking process, which took them from Manhattan, Kan., to downtown Washington D.C.

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How did the idea for the film come about?

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Samantha: The Captain’s Log went to Louisville for the ACP/CMA National College Media Convention [last October].  I went to a session where Kelly Furnas [the former faculty adviser for the Collegiate Times] was speaking about how the newsroom handled April 16.  After I saw it, it just hit me that it was a story that needed to be told. . . . Two of the victims [of the shootings] went to my high school and my sister was a good friend with one of the victims and my best friend was a friend with the other victim.  And the shooter went to my high school too. . . . Before that session, I hadn’t even thought about [the CT’s role during the tragedy].  It was a completely new perspective and that’s one of the reasons I was so taken aback by it.  I literally ran to my friends immediately after and told them everything about it.  It hit me, and I thought it might touch other people to hear the story too.

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Andrew: We’re blessed by having a very awesome adviser [Dr. Terry Lee] who hooked us up with some of his own research money.  It was an initial concern [money] but he said, ‘Don’t worry about it.  Whatever you’ve got to do, do it.’  And he also does documentaries, so equipment-wise and financially we were pretty good to go.

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How did you divide the workload?

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Victoria: At the beginning, the four of us sat down and decided what each of our roles would be.  I am a wedding videographer, so I’m very familiar with film and editing and all that stuff, so we decided technology would be my specialty.  Sam is super-organized and she’s our news editor [at Captain’s Log], so she’s very good at investigating information and getting names from everywhere– so her first main task was gathering information of the different contacts who were at the Collegiate Times and who the important people would be to talk to.  Andrew is our online editor and is very good at building websites, so his main job was building a platform for the documentary to eventually be online.  Cassie is also very organized, so she was in charge of planning our trips everywhere we went and making sure we got reimbursed. . . . Then we just started shooting the interviews.  The hardest part was definitely the post-production, just deciding what would go into the documentary. We had such good interviews.  Everyone had so many good stories to tell and to fit it all into a 45-minute documentary was one of the hardest parts.

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How did you decide how to tell story?

Victoria: I would say our overall theme changed very quickly after we talked to Kelly Furnas.  Our initial perception was, “Wow, how were they able to separate themselves from students and journalists to cover the story?  They must have been such professionals to be able to do that.”  But once we mentioned that to Kelly Furnas, he said, “No, I encouraged them not to split themselves into two pieces and [instead] to be a member of the community and report on this and that’s what made their coverage ultimately different.”

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Did anything particularly surprise you during filmmaking?

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Samantha: I know the first time I heard Kelly speak, when he said their photographer got arrested, that really threw me for a spin.  I didn’t even realize their communication went down or the fact that the media played a large role in identifying some of the victims.  We were able to speak to a public relations officer from Virginia Tech.  We were fortunate enough to speak to him and hearing his story too and just what they were going through, just how ridiculous and crazy and chaotic of a day it was and how they were able to do something that I already find completely stressful is bewildering to me.

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Victoria: I agree.  I talked to Larry Hincker, who was the PR guy at the time.  I think as student journalists we always think it’s us and them, us and the administration.  We never stop to think about what the administration goes through.  And he was going through as much stress as the Collegiate Times staff members.  He wasn’t sleeping.  He was so caught up in the day as it was happening it didn’t even occur to him to email his family to get in touch with them until that night. . . . Something I hadn’t really realized was just how cruel the national media was. . . . We’re all student journalists who aspire to have jobs in this industry later in life.  There were times I was watching just how insensitive the national media was and asking myself, ‘Could I do this?  Is this what I will turn into if I make it to the network level?’  It just disgusted me.  I think through all of it, it taught us, as journalists, what type of journalists, we want to become and we’re not going to ever dehumanize.  I do think a big part of the media is to heal communities and it’s just disappointing to see the national media, instead of healing, focused on tearing it apart for ratings, to get as many tears, as many people in pain, as they could, just for ratings, because people want to watch that.  It’s disappointing, I think.

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What were the emotional high and low points?

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Samantha: My largest concern throughout the process was not being so involved in it that we became numb to the story.  That’s why I’m glad when we watch it, every time I see Nikki Giovanni’s speech [the famous “We Are Virginia Tech” poem reading, still shot below], I still get chills.  That’s what was so important to me.  Even at the very end, we had a couple of victims’ family members come to the shows and some friends and when I saw them being emotional my emotions came flooding back.

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Andrew: When we out to Kansas to meet Kelly [who left Virginia Tech for Kansas State University last spring], we had a really casual dinner with him and then he pulled us into his office at night.  And here we are in the middle of nowhere, Manhattan, Kansas, and he pulls from the bottom of his bookshelf a stack of papers from the week [of the shootings].  And that’s when it became for me, real.  Later on, Sam and I went to see “Living for 32,” a documentary by one of the victims of the shooting who survived.  It’s about gun control. . . . At one point, it had a showing a few minutes from our school [CNU] and we went there and several of the victims’ parents were there.  We were there promoting our own documentary, but we had time to speak to them and that was another one of those ‘wow’ moments where we’ve been looking at this on a computer screen and in our heads for most of the semester but here’s someone who’s really been through it and really knows the emotional toll from the whole thing.  Those kinds of things helped bring it to life for me personally.

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Victoria: One of my main responsibilities was to find all the B-roll, all the national coverage, all of that.  Emotionally, it was tough, especially this one clip where we showed this student was obviously having a hard time keeping it together on camera and this CBS reporter kept poking him and poking him, trying to get tears for ratings and I just got so angry.  I think throughout the process we felt a lot of emotions.  It was an emotional topic.   I know, I myself while editing, cried watching the footage.  I’m the editor in chief of the newspaper here and just putting myself in Amie Steele’s shoes, it really hits home.  That’s what made it real for me.

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Talk to me about post production.

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Victoria: We turned my living room, to my roommate’s dismay, into an editing hub.  We had two monitors and we lived in my living room for the month that was dedicated to post-production. Usually post production takes the longest amount of time, but we weren’t blessed with the abundance of time because we wanted to premiere on April 16, so I would say most of us were editing eight to 10 hours a day for three weeks.  I personally can say that I definitely suffered in my academics because of it.  But this was my number-one priority. Luckily we had already selected another editor in chief so she stepped up and we had awesome assistants to make sure the paper was still going out.  I guess that’s how we survived. . . . We didn’t sleep at all.  The documentary team members basically slept on the couch of my living room the whole month.  I would sleep on the table by the computer.  [Laughs] We took breaks to make sure the paper got out every week and to go to classes we absolutely had to go to but other than that it was documentary time, around the clock.

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Samantha: People would get tired of us using the excuse of the documentary for not hanging out.  [Laughs]

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Victoria: In retrospect, it was all worth it.  I would do it again.

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