SO MANY GREAT IDEAS ALL IN A ROW

Room full of small newspapers' best work is something other editors could take home and apply immediately

A seminar on the Internet, a debate on public journalism and a project on journalism values were important aspects of this year's convention. To many editors of smaller newspapers, however, their value was marginal.

Good ideas from newspapers the same size as their own are much easier to take home.

Editors from around the country reinforced the basic values of newspapering when the Small Newspapers Committee asked them for their best ideas for linking with their communities. More than 50 responded to the appeal, and most of the examples they sent were displayed at the convention.

The idea of the exhibit was to display ideas editors could take home. The most portable ranged from comprehensive coverage of Little League to reader-involvement features to regular columns recognizing personal achievement. Players, students and volunteers of the week are now staples in many newspapers. Without infringing on editors' (and readers') preference for deviant behavior, these features are good answers to the age-old complaint that newspapers care only about what goes wrong. In certain features, papers have even turned news judgment over to readers. In its "your sports" section, the Times-News of Twin Falls, Idaho, publishes anything relevant that readers submit, including the results of the fifth-grade rope climb.

Several papers used their readers as a resource for historical anniversary stories and other features. Readers' snapshots from D-Day, V-E Day, V-J Day and the Korean War brought home in local human terms the magnitude of those events. During the Christmas season, the Journal-Record in Meriden, Conn., asked readers to share memories of playing roles in "The Nutcracker."

The Telegraph-Herald of Dubuque, Iowa, warmed up a winter's day by sharing readers' best snapshots of Florida vacations. When Cal Ripken streaked to the baseball consecutive-games record, many papers found people in their communities with comparable work records.

Some papers submitted major reporting efforts that had got them closer to their communities. The Telegraph of Nashua, N.H., published a superb series on battered women. The Morning Journal of Lorain, Ohio, reported in depth and in human terms on the widespread use of Ritalin and other prescription drugs by schoolchildren. A version of Lorain's "Generation Rx" would raise eyebrows in any community in the country. Some examples in the display qualified under the current buzzword "public journalism." The best example was the Bradenton (Fla.) Herald's impressive effort to involve readers in the selection of a school superintendent. The paper brought about far greater public participation in the hiring than would otherwise have occurred. It also gave parents and taxpayers a chance to shape the agenda for local schools.

The Daily Messenger in Canandaigua, N.Y., submitted its effort to monitor presidential performance. Was the Clinton administration living up to its promises? In a series called "From the White House to Your House," the paper asked and published readers' answers.

For some papers, getting closer to their communities meant reaching new communities. The Santa Fe New Mexican bridges cultural gaps with its Global Village section. The Post-Bulletin in Rochester, Minn., ran a series on new immigrants, with pages on the background and customs of their readers' new neighbors.

Finding a common denominator among the ideas in the Small Newspapers Committee's display was difficult, but this is close: Nearly every submission was an example of an editor who had identified an interest, a need or a problem in his or her community and sought to meet that need. The project reinforced the premise that community editing is proactive editing.

Pride, 1995-96 chair of the Small Newspapers Committee, is editor of the Concord (N.H.) Monitor.