The Editors’ Exchange

The Web edition of The Editors' Exchange offers a compendium of interesting and imitatable innovations from the world of daily newspapers. In posting it here, ASNE makes the ideas available to the general public for use in all sorts of publications, including newspapers. The printed version of The Editors’ Exchange includes the names of editors who are willing to share information with other editors. However, because the Web version is archival — and not current — Internet readers should not contact the contributing newspapers or ASNE for examples or illustrative material. Thanks... and enjoy!

Different coverage in the sports section

In order to address the great number of participatory athletes and fitness fanatics in San Diego, The San Diego Union-Tribune started the Spotlight on Fitness feature.

The Union-Tribune (circulation 375,500) created the feature when sports staffers saw that there was a large community of these athletes but no way to consistently cover them.

The Wednesday feature is anchored on page 2 of the section and usually includes a short personality profile, a photo, a training tip and a calendar of events for local walks, runs, bike rides, etc.

Athletes profiled have run the gamut of sports, including kayakers, triathletes, mountain bikers, surfers and plain old runners. Sometimes instead of a story about a person, the feature focuses on a fitness trend, like a recent story on the top five places in the county to run up steps.

The editor of the package says it also can be used for advances on important weekend competitions.

Occasionally, the feature is a celebrity workout, showing how the Chargers’ coach or a television news personality keeps in shape.

Tell readers your ethics policy
In the wake of the recent journalistic lapses, readers may wonder what your standards are. Editors at The Roanoke (Va.) Times (circulation 102,000) decided to tell them, making the policy available online and at its office. In a column about the policy, Managing Editor Rich Martin outlined why it is so vital: Readers “are the ultimate judge of how successful we are in our journalistic efforts. ... Every day we ask readers to believe and trust us. Our statement of standards spells out what our newsroom stands for and explains our methods and motives.”

Students in a positive light
Student news — a staple of the lifestyle section — has a different flavor in The Southern Illinoisan of Carbondale (circulation 26,000). Its Monday tabloid A+ section is made up of positive stories on students with prominent photos, a school profile, scholarship information and student news briefs. Over the summer, it runs honor rolls, summer music camps and the like. “We started the section to increase the public’s perception that there is indeed good news about kids,” writes Editor Carl Rexroad. “Some of the material was removed from ROP, where it didn’t have the same impact, but we also were able to expand our coverage of youth news. We chose Monday as a way to beef up that day’s paper.” Rexroad noted that the target audience isn’t really the students themselves, but their parents, relatives and teachers.

Crime graphics illuminate issue
Everyone runs crime news. And everyone probably thinks he or she knows where most crimes are occurring. But do you? The people of San Diego do because The San Diego Union-Tribune (circulation 375,500) runs detailed monthly, quarterly and bi-annual charts showing crime information at the neighborhood level. The police department “mapped the entire city and, with input from residents and city officials, put specific boundaries on neighborhoods that had long been ill-defined,” writes Tom Mallory, the paper’s public safety editor. This breakdown allows the paper to run neighborhood-by-neighborhood crime statistics. Smaller police departments generally can’t compile data like this, but it’s popular in San Diego, especially with people thinking about moving.

Tying paper to Web database
The Commercial Appeal in Memphis, Tenn., (circulation 175,000) took advantage of its Web site’s bottomless news hole and interactive abilities for a series on residential property reappraisals. The same day a series began on the subject, a database of all residential properties was placed on the paper’s Web site after the paper bought the database from the county and prepared it for the Web. Projects Editor Sonny Albarado writes that it was too popular: Overwhelming interest crashed the server on May 31, its first day. Once restored, the site got 47,000 visits in one day. Visits remained high through the July 31 deadline for appealing the valuations.

Readers help with serial fiction
Serial fiction, a form newspapers started with more than a century ago, has been reborn at the Daily Press of Newport News, Va., (circulation 97,000). The weekly New Point Comfort feature is written by columnist Felicia Mason, an experienced fiction writer, journalism professor and reporter. Each week, a different chapter in the story appears, focusing on a 30ish woman who returns to the Newport News area after years away. As one would expect, each chapter ends with a cliffhanger. Readers contribute to the story and help steer the narrative through calls, e-mails and voice messages.

Leveraging Newspaper Assets
Have we changed our papers to cater to our readers’ needs? This detailed 76-page report examines what content we are good at delivering and where we fall short (and how other media do, as well).

Coverage of race sought
An editor will win an all-expenses paid trip to New York City and take home a $500 award if his or her newspaper’s coverage of race and ethnicity is judged among the best in the nation by Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism. Send copies of your newspaper’s work and a cover letter on why the stories are exemplary by Nov. 15. The work must have been published during the last two years.

Resumes of top j-school grads
Penn State University’s journalism school offers a free “diversity resume book” that lists its top graduating minority journalism students. The wire-bound book is published twice a year.

1998-99 ASNE regional minority job fair schedule
Seven of this season’s job fairs are co-sponsored with the Newspaper Association of America and will be open to candidates and interviewers for all newspaper departments, business as well as newsroom. San Antonio’s job fair will focus entirely on news and editorial issues. Here are the locations, dates, co-sponsors and contacts for the 1998-99 job fairs:
Raleigh, N.C., Oct. 15-17, The News & Observer. Contact William W. Sutton Jr., e-mail: sutton@nando.com, phone: 919/829-4530.
Lincoln, Neb., Nov. 5-7, Lincoln Journal Star. Contact David Stoeffler, e-mail: dstoeffler@nebweb.com, phone: 402/473-7224.
Detroit, Nov. 19-21, Detroit Free Press, The Detroit News and Detroit Newspapers. Contact Joe Grimm, e-mail: grimm@det-freepress.com, phone: 313/222-6400.
Jackson, Miss., Feb. 5-6, The Clarion-Ledger. Contact David Petty, e-mail: dpetty@ jackson.gannett.com, phone: 601/961-7176.
Boston, Feb. 12-13, The Boston Globe. Contact Daisey Harris, e-mail: d_harris@globe.com, phone: 617/929-3120.
San Antonio, Feb. 18-20, San Antonio Express-News. Contact Dino Chiecchi, e-mail: dinoc@express-news.net, phone: 210/250-3235.
Richmond, Va., Feb. 25-26, Virginia Press Association. Contact Katherine Lewis, e-mail: prodev@ vpa.net, phone: 804/550-2361.
Reno, Nev., March 4-6, University of Nevada, Reno and The Sacramento (Calif.) Bee. Contact Paul Mitchell, University of Nevada-Reno, e-mail: pmitchel@scs.unr.edu, phone 702/784-4563.

Some non-ASNE minority job fairs to note:

Washington, Oct. 22-23, Howard University. Contact Carol Dudley, e-mail: carrol_dudley@ igw.howard.edu, phone: 202/806-5806.
Los Angeles, Oct. 22-24, California Chicano News Media Association with the Society of Professional Journalists. Contact Julio Moran, University of Southern California, e-mail: info@ccnma.org, phone: 213/743-2440.
Chicago, Nov. 1, Inland Press Association. Contact Kathy Koerlin, e-mail: inland@ fortwayne.infi.net, phone: 847/795-0380.
New York, Jan. 21-23, Newsday. Contact Walter Middlebrook, e-mail: walter.middlebrook@ newsday.com, phone: 516/843-3648.
Seattle, July 7-11, Unity: Journalists of Color conference. Contact Walt Swanston, e-mail: Unity1999@aol.com, phone: 703/841-9099.

Fellowship nominees needed
Fellowships are great tools for newsroom staff retention and career development. The Newspaper Association of America offers 32 fellowships for minority journalists in early 1999. The deadline is Oct. 30.

Sports souvenirs
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch sold hundreds of thousands of copies of the special Mark McGwire edition, demonstrating the potential of sports souvenirs. Even relatively small newspapers have found how hot they are. Take the Times Record News of Wichita Falls, Texas, (circulation 38,000) for example. The town hosted the Dallas Cowboys Training Camp this year. While the team was in town, wrote Editor Carroll Wilson, “we published a four-page section on training camp activities every day, but enthusiasm was so high after they left town that we decided to publish” a pictorial book commemorating the camp. “After all, we already had plenty of photos,” Wilson wrote. Of the 7,000 copies of the coffee table book that the paper printed, 3,300 were pre-sold.