please cover it.

now back into obscurity for a few more weeks. (it's so much easier to remain impartial if i just never talk )

Hi everyone,

For those who don't know, I'm the SRA member elected to sit on The Silhouette's Board of Publication. If you ever need someone to talk to about The Sil, and you don't feel comfortable approaching the staff directly, please feel free to contact me (preferably by email - [email protected] rnlink.mcmaster.ca).

VP Finance Andrew Caterine has informed me that the next Board of Publication meeting will be next week. I already have a stack of questions/thoughts/issues to raise that I've amassed since our last meeting, and this thread will certainly play into the discussion that we have.

Also, if you care about whether or not The Sil covers the election, please write in to Jeff Green (the Executive Editor) and let him know. I prepared a letter for him this evening and, like Alvand, I'll post it here for your perusal.

Hi Jeff,

As you can tell from the title of this email, I would like The Silhouette to cover the MSU Presidential elections.

To be honest, I'm a bit shocked that you would even consider not covering it. For better or for worse, the MSU Presidentials are an important campus event. It impacts all undergraduate students in some way, shape, or form regardless of whether or not they choose to cast a ballot. As the MSU's - and the students' - newspaper, it would be irresponsible of you to consciously decide not to cover the current election.

As you'll recall from our meeting in the fall, a growing number of students feel that The Silhouette is becoming irrelevant and out-of-touch with student life. This is truly a shame, as The Sil has incredible potential to connect with students and shed insight on important, meaningful issues. The perceived "we don't care whether people read our paper or not" tone of your Jan 21 editorial suggests a lack of willingness to do so and further alienates students from what can be a great newspaper.

I realize that only one person responded to your Jan 14 editorial. This can definitely be explained in part by a lack of student interest in MSU politics, but it also speaks in part to the limited readership of, and interest in, The Silhouette on campus. And by not covering important, timely issues such as the Presidential election, you'd be giving students another reason to walk past the newsstand rather than picking up a copy of their student newspaper and reading it.

I sincerely hope that The Sil puts in the necessary work and covers the Presidential election. If you'd like to discuss any aspect of this email further, you know how to reach me.

Thanks,

Matthew Tenenbaum

You can contact Jeff Green at [email protected]

Glad to see you have an opinion on the paper.

Whether or not you agreed with asking students if they really care, I think asking the students if they wanted to cover the election was relevant. The MSU elections have extremely low turnout – I’m not sure if this is a case of convenience or student apathy. What I was asking for was engagement. So many people tune out elections; the posters become a blur of wasted paper, and the pre-class speeches are all the same – so why would we run that on your student newspaper’s front page? Would you want them to tune out The Sil as well?

I don’t pretend to think that everyone reads / cares / hates / loves, or even has an opinion on the paper. MacInsiders is not loved by everyone, but it, like the Sil, has its niche in a campus of 23,000 students.

A letter to the editor is a step to a paper that YOU want. E-mail is the easiest way, but actually attending a sectional meeting is the best. All the meeting times are here and are in the basement of the Student Centre, room b110.

On the subject of a daily newspaper, like it was mentioned before, all of the Sil staff are full time students (besides myself). Other papers that have been mentioned above enjoy a full time news editor, business manager, managing editor, etc. If you want to explore that avenue, by all means, contact your SRA member.

As for the news meeting being a week before the “news”, the Sil has tried to tell you what’s about to happen at Mac – We printed the news of Patrick Deane before the Spec, we let you know Emerson Pardoe (Brandon Hall Arsonist) was going to plead guilty before it happened, we let you know a Mac student was going to be tried as one of the “Toronto 18”, and when he was sentenced. An editor was at both the Pardoe trial, and the Saad Gaya trial (in Brampton) – that requires planning, and balancing act with one’s school schedule. Last minute and breaking news is covered, when it happens (Patrick Deane’s Thursday morning hiring is an example).

For opinion articles being “picked”, every week we try and filter out obviously racist and incoherent articles sent into the opinions editor. For the ones that we do print, their argument is their own (even if we don't agree with them), and we try not to edit what students at Mac want to say.

As for the comment about funding, contrary to what was said before, the Sil is not the most well funded and equipped university newspaper – Joey Coleman should know that considering The Varsity has a two floor office in downtown Toronto. The Gateway at the University of Alberta collected $157,000 from students through their levy. The Imprint (University of Waterloo) collects about $7 a student, The Excalibur (York University) collects even more. The Sil has run under budget for the last five years, and is well under budget this year too. The Sil collects under those universities, plus others, as explained in its operating policy: 1.3.1.14.1 “$6.61 per student for operating expenses (as of 2004), indexed to CPI”.

However, that is not collected. It is roughly applied as an “operating loss” by the MSU. By running under budget year after year, the Sil saves money, and that money is not returned to the paper, rather it is put back into the MSU pot. Other independent newspapers would keep that money, and “survive” on their own.

As for independence, it is possible but would require a large amount of planning and cooperation from the Sil, the MSU and the SRA. For example, at the Fulcrum at the University of Ottawa, they traded advertising for a few years for the equipment that their student’s union had purchased for them when they had a similar arrangement the Sil has with the MSU.

@ Danielle – Perhaps you can remind me about your emails, the last one I have in my inbox dates back to last spring. You’ve seen me at events, including today’s presidential debates, yet this has never been a subject of conversation.

@ SRA members – Besides 2 or 3 SRA members, your disagreements / complaints / concerns are never voiced to the Sil. How can you expect change if you don’t ask for it?

The door is always open. Cheers.

Jeff Green
Executive Editor, The Silhouette

I just want to reiterate Jeff's point that his door is always open. I try to drop by the Sil office approximately every week and Jeff has been extremely approachable, welcoming and willing to speak. I personally don't appreciate the sarcastic and negative tone that some SRA members have been voicing about The Silhouette - especially when Jeff is open to discussion.

The Services Committee is currently undergoing a review of The Silhouette and it's structure, which I am SURE will be quite the hot-button topic this term. I'll keep the SRA and MSU Members posted on when it is being discussed and hope those members that are being extremely critical at least use that as an avenue to discuss their constructive opinions.

Originally Posted by jeffgreen

@ Danielle – Perhaps you can remind me about your emails, the last one I have in my inbox dates back to last spring. You’ve seen me at events, including today’s presidential debates, yet this has never been a subject of conversation.

Yes, I emailed you in I think around June of last year, correct. My displeasure was aimed more at the editors that came previous to you (because they had received more than one email per year, and if I am not mistaken all went unanswered. One piece was printed though (response to WADS in 2007ish)) each, however.

I am horrible/terrible at approaching people I don't know; I am often incredibly introverted. Case in point not talking to you, ever.

Originally Posted by jeffgreen

The door is always open.

LOL ..

The Sil already covered the election in their last issue. They printed a dumb-ass article profiling the candidates' favourite colours and dream cars. If this is the quality of coverage that we can expect, then no, the Sil should not cover the election. MacInsiders is already covering it better than the Sil ever could. Thanks Chad.

Sam Dick

I'm pretty sure they censored my comment. Actually, 100% certain. I really didn't say anything bad, just mentioned how that elections need to be more visible and accessible to the mcmaster community. I didn't write anything negative about the sil or the university.

Jeff (or someone else), could you please post the room number for your office? I wouldn't mind stopping by to ask some questions in person.

Originally Posted by A.Marlowe

Jeff (or someone else), could you please post the room number for your office? I wouldn't mind stopping by to ask some questions in person.

Its in the basement next to the Socs/Maroons office If I recall correctly; or it was there last year?.

Originally Posted by samd

The Sil already covered the election in their last issue. They printed a dumb-ass article profiling the candidates' favourite colours and dream cars. If this is the quality of coverage that we can expect, then no, the Sil should not cover the election. MacInsiders is already covering it better than the Sil ever could. Thanks Chad.

Sam Dick

Just a quick point of clarification: Chad, Temara.Brown and myself contribute to the site more or less equally, although we have different roles. There wouldn't be info on the Presidentials with out me (at least in part, our Insiders Agents and other students have been contributing too), since I'm the only one who goes to Mac! Temara has been updating the site as well (just as much as me, if not more), adding the recent debate slideshow and other updates. We've been planning for the election since at the very latest right before exams ended. Chad and I covered them twice previously (one of those times on a campaign team), and Temara helped us last year as well.

Also, a lot (some?) of the Sil's coverage for the election is based on what the candidate teams submit themselves (each had the opportunity to submit some sort of article thing for this week's issue).

Originally Posted by huzaifa47

Its in the basement next to the Socs/Maroons office If I recall correctly; or it was there last year?.

It's MUSC B109-ish.

Originally Posted by aaront

I'm pretty sure they censored my comment. Actually, 100% certain. I really didn't say anything bad, just mentioned how that elections need to be more visible and accessible to the mcmaster community. I didn't write anything negative about the sil or the university.

I would not jump to conclusions. I used to moderate comments for the online Maclean's education section. If someone new commented, it was held for moderation. On a night like tonight (when I'm busy working), comments could wait for hours for approval.

The system is designed to prevent spam; it's not a perfect system.

Originally Posted by samd

The Sil already covered the election in their last issue. They printed a dumb-ass article profiling the candidates' favourite colours and dream cars. If this is the quality of coverage that we can expect, then no, the Sil should not cover the election. MacInsiders is already covering it better than the Sil ever could. Thanks Chad.

Sam Dick

I agree with this. MacInsiders covers the election far better than The Sil - and they're not even officially associated with Mac (since they're not part of the MSU or a club).

Maybe next year The Sil could have student Q&A with candidates like MacInsiders does and links to their websites/Facebook/Twitter, etc (if it doesn't already do so).

Originally Posted by lorend

Just a quick point of clarification: Chad, Temara.Brown and myself contribute to the site more or less equally, although we have different roles.

Sorry about that, didn't mean to sell anyone short. I only mentioned Chad specifically because his profile says he's the founder. The reason why MacInsiders has the best coverage is because of the large and diverse pool of contributors, and of course it's core community of admins and the like.

Sam

Hey everyone!

The new issue of The Silhouette is now available at newsstands around campus, and online via thesil.ca. They did cover the election, and in particular focused on Tuesday's debate. Additionally, there are some opinion pieces regarding the election, as well as a "What to Look For" guide on the President's page. Definitely take a look!

To anyone out there who's generally not impressed with The Sil, I encourage you to pick up a copy this week. I haven't read it front-to-back yet, but from what I've read so far it strikes me as a particularly good issue.