ESSAY 5 FINAL PROJECT/PAPER

John Petropoulos
English 101
Dr. Smith
12/10/09
Final Paper

Every Thursday my brother, Timothy Petropoulos, sneaks quietly into our bedroom in an attempt not to wake me. Always unsuccessful in his attempt, I glance at the time and see exactly what I am accustomed to seeing every Thursday night; it is five o’clock in the morning and my brother just got home from school. The reason why he gets home at all hours of the night is that he is the Sports editor of “The Ticker,” the Baruch College newspaper. Wide-awake, helplessly alert and frustrated I stare at my ceiling in deep thought and ask myself ‘what it is he is doing all night?’ Trying to answer my own question, I set out to discover what really lies behind this job that disturbs my peaceful night’s sleep. I chose to take full advantage of this assignment the was given to me and embark on a journey to answer the question that has puzzled me for years. Through this journey, I realized that the true question is not what keeps my brother up this late, but what really goes into being a student journalist. I went behind the scenes of the only current weekly newspaper in CUNY to get a taste of what it’s like for the people who work for a college newspaper.
"The Ticker" is a twenty-four hour, seven day a week responsibility. In order to work on “The Ticker,” an editor, or the person who is in charge on a specific section, must be willing to make personal sacrifices in order to put in the amount of time needed to produce the paper. An editor’s job description goes beyond just editing. Each individual section editor is responsible for coming up with stories, recruiting writers, editing, layout (or style), photo requests, and in most cases, writing stories of their own. In order to get the week’s most important student news out to the readers on time, everyone must be on the same page.
“The Ticker” has eight different sections featured in its paper. A section is a part of the paper that is dedicated to only one subject, or a range of subjects all in one field. The eight sections include News, Opinions, Business, Features, Science, Arts, Lifestyles, and Sports. In order for each section to thrive, the editors must find new and interesting topics to write about. The News section is the usually considered the most important section of any newspaper, and is consistently the section with the most pages in “The Ticker.” News is responsible for covering the most important actions and events around the school and bring stories that are important to Baruch students to their attention. The News editor, senior Lillian Rizzo, is responsible for finding the most compelling and important stories, making sure that, on a weekly basis, she successfully gets all the information to the student body.
The Opinion section is a section in which the student get a chance to speak freely about the issues they feel are most important to themselves and their peers. It is the only section in the paper in which political, personal and professional biases can be published, Articles like "Being Friendly goes a long way" by Daniella Bondar, gives advice and friendly tips on how to make new friends as well as how to become more active in schools events.
The Business section covers everything from the economic crisis we are currently in, to the everyday news at Baruch, which is a business school (a vast majority of the students enrolled have a major that involves business) . This section is one of the most popular in he paper because of all he student interest in the subject as well as the professional style of writing.
The Features section is where investigatory journalism shows in full force. The stories address topics from problems in the community and gives way to try to fix the problems and prevent them from happening to a friend or loved one to mental health concerns rising for college students to even pointers on how to fight bed bugs.
The Science section focuses on science-related topics. "Cutting edge assistive technology" is a remarkable article in which Hsi Chan explains how hard the Baruch front office has worked in order to make a easier and less challenging environment for the mentally disabled to be able to learn and communicate. Topics like this and advice on the latest gadgets are what make the section a must read for a student living in the 21st century
The Arts section is a section in which the paper informs you about art galleries going on in the vicinity of the school as well as plays, CD reviews and musicals and that are being held in Baruch as well as reviews of Broadway and off-Broadway shows.
The Lifestyles section is a section were the health fanatics of Baruch turn to first, and the ones who want a better life style begin. The section gives the student body tips on how to eat, where to work out and what to eat as an alternitive when you are craving a McDonald’s Big Mac. With articles like "Between the buns - a burger review" and "Getting fit after class," this section guarantees a healthier you when you put down the paper. Talking about health, who is the more physically fit then a sports athlete?
The Sports section of the Ticker is found on the back of the paper, maybe saving the best for last. The sports section covers every sports team in Baruch, gives you updated standing severy week and the inside scoop on the Baruch “Bearcats’” (the teams’ nickname) rising stars. Not only is the sports section a great read but writing makes you feel as if you were in the actual game.
In order for the ticker to come out with its weekly printing there must be funding, Dmitri Kutcher is the business manager of the Ticker and he handles the money spent as well as the income of the paper. In order to generate an income, the Ticker relies on the advertisments that appears in the Ticker newspaper or on the Ticker online newspaper edition which vary from national, local as well as clubs in the school. In order for the ticker to generate a steady income, the burden falls heavily on the shoulders of the advertising editor. The revenue the ticker brings in is mostly put in a separate account in which the student body, as well as the business manager can not touch that gets allocated to paying certain bills. Since the Ticker is a school based newspaper there are many funds that play a huge role in the Tickers week to week printing.
"If i had to pick a number from the top of my head i would have to say 70 to 80 percent of the total budget, which is a large number in the tens of thousands, to be general is for printing, The other aspects of the budget relate to administration costs such as office supplies[...] There are about fourteen to fifteen budget lines[...], it is a dynamic system but like i said most of the costs are fixed." said Kutcher.
As for the Ticker making its income, Kutcher says, "We are a pretty big bureaucracy, so simply for corporations you just take a corporate credit card and pay for it, in this situation we had to go threw justifying how much we are going to spend, getting invoice from the Chinese restaurant and then they will be paid in a matter of two to three weeks, so its a bureaucracy but its officiant to the extent that everything works out." The Ticker is a very well organized with its funds and expenses but is also very coservitive in the money spent.

"With a student paper, a lot more work goes into it then a lot of people realize, it’s a seven day process [...] a lot of the time it is hard to schedule it into our classes, our work schedules, our internships but we all make it a point to be here so that the paper can run smoothly." said Kerri Jarema, long time Ticker staff member and current Arts editor.
Because the newspaper runs on a weekly schedule, the new issue comes out every Monday. On Tuesday, the editorial meeting is held where the Ticker staff discusses the issue coming out that week, this is one of the most important days of the week for the staff because not only do they work on new and catchy ideas, but also work to correct any mistakes that were made. During Editorial meetings, the staff discusses what they felt they liked and disliked about last-weeks article. They also discuss what they would like to do differently, and what ideas they would like to keep intact for the upcoming article. The staff then focuses their attention on the staff group as a whole and tries to fix any problems that have risen and give tips and pointers to one another to make a better issue for the next week. Most importantly, the editorial meetings allow the staff to discuss upcoming stories that will run in the newspaper.
After the meetings on Tuesday, the staff devotes their time on Wednesday nights to their own specific sections. Editors in charge receive articles and start making changes on these articles. This allows the editors ample time to edit the writers work in order for the article to be worthy enough to make it into the paper. While time at Wednesday night meetings are allocated to editing, Thursday is production day, the longest and most arduous day by far. Production is the day where every editor, copy editor, and production assistant sits down and goes over every article they receive and proceed to edit and copy-edit each article. Once that is done, every editor must make a layout of his/her section in the newspaper. A layout requires making headlines for each article, finding the pictures that are most appropriate for the articles and laying out the section in a program called Adobe InDesign (R) which is what is sent to the printers so that they know what print.
Friday is the unofficial last day of production. Friday is the day where the paper is complete, where the editors finish correcting the paper, tie any loose ends, and send it to the printing press. The production process is finally complete and the newspaper will now be available for the student body on the upcoming Monday.
However, in order for this process to continue, the editors must send out there Story ideas for the following Monday on Friday in order to secure a smooth production. During the weekend, “The Ticker” office is filled with reporters starting there articles so that come Wednesday, they will be able to submit a well written article to there commanding editors. The process that is required to produce this weekly newspaper is a huge task for any college student. Even though most of the students time is spent hovering over a computer typing in order to produce a worth-while finished product, it is an accomplishment in the end to view the finished piece.
"In the end, if there is a good paper with quality work that is being printed, and the students likes what we do, it’s all worth it" said Timothy Petropoulos, the editor of the sports section.
Hard work, commitment and the love for writing is what every journalist needs in order to become successful. The hard work of slaving over a computer key board for hours at end, the commitment of every single article being a extension of the writers heart and soul,the love for writing, when the day is over and all your energy was put into writing that one article you wake up the next morning see the readers enjoying one of your articles and are ready to go back to work.
As of today, massive cuts have plagued the journalism industry. The demand of print journalism diminishing with the invention of the internet and personal news outlets like blogs, twitter and other media. Yet, the staff at the ticker stay dedicated to this profession because of the love and passion they have for writing and delivering the news.
"Alot of people say journalism is a dyeing profession,but when you are a journalist, what you really get into journalism for is not to be rich, not to be famous; its for love, getting the news out there, letting people know what you want to know, what they need to know, there will always be a demand for journalism, people love hearing stories and I love telling them so as long as there is [newspapers], as long as there journalism, it doesn't matter how much you make in a year whether it be ten thousand or one hundred thousand dollars a year its not about the money its about the love and I love it" said Petropoulos.
Others disagree that journalism is a dying profession at all, "I actually disagree that journalism is a dying profession, there is always going to be a demand for news and good writers, and people who are pushing to get the truth out, i like to write and i like to let people know what is going on I just love journalism" stated Jhaneel Lockhart, Editor in Chief of the Ticker.