Board Agenda

EXECUTIVE SESSION
The Student Media Advisory Board may adjourn into executive session to discuss matters of litigation, potential litigation or personnel.

Our preparations for the 2006-2007 Agromeck reflect important changes that we expect for the coming year. Because the future of the university's yearbook will depend on our improvement on sales, and because Taylor publishing will no longer advertise for us, the Agromeck staff will need to focus more money on funding promotion of the book. These new expenses including a website redesign, hiring of a marketing manager, and increased frequency of current modes of advertisement, and new methods of advertisement will be new expenses added on top of the typical annual costs of the Agromeck.

We have recruited a staff member to fill each leadership position, and each of these students has submitted a position paper.

This staff will choose one person (from the two qualified candidates that we currently have) to be the new promotions manager. This manager will be responsible for recruiting and leading a marketing team next focused on increasing sales and popularity of the Agromeck.

Although this new staff will not officially take office until June 1, 2006, we have begun preparations for next year. We are writing job descriptions, creating the freshman directory, training with the outgoing editors, choosing a theme, and selling this year's book to help increase sales of future years. We will not finalize the deadline dates for spread submissions until this summer. We already prepared the following marketing plan.

Senior portraits: (late Aug, early Sept) - William Alligood
Underclass portraits (Mid/late Sept) - William Alligood
Freshman Directory portraits (orientations) - William, Brandon, maybe Austin

Aug. 24
Email Parent and Family Services about having portrait dates included in newletter (Cynthia)
Email deans about portrait dates sent out using college distribution lists (Cynthia)
Email Student Senate president about having portrait dates send out using SG distribution list (Cynthia)
Email Senior Class president aboutsenior portrait dates using senior distribution lists (Cynthia)
Email Housing about having portrait dates included in the e-newsletter (Cynthia)
Announce at All Park meeting (Mary Beth)

Aug. 29
Technician paper Ad
Wolf Web ad

Sept. 5 - Senior Portraits Start
Tech paper Ad
E-mail seniors (Staff)
SPIFFY 07 post (Mary Beth)

All Week
Chalk blackboards in classes all week (Staff)
Table tents in dining halls
Sandwich boards outside
Online ads
Technician ads
Agromeck Web site
Wolf Web ad
Facebook ad

Sept. 12 - Underclass Portrait sign up sheet (William)

Sept. 26 - Underclass portraits start
Ads in Technician
PSA on WKNC (Mary Beth)

Oct. 7 - Email seniors (Staff)

Americana has continued to publish without trouble since the new site went live, and May 1 marks the publication of the seventh and final issue of the semester. Typically, Americana publishes seven issues each semester, so this is a welcome change from fall’s zero issues for the semester. In addition to this, the Open Mic Nights have had strong support from talented students and moderate support from those wishing there for entertainment. The final Open Mic Night of the semester was Friday, April 21 at 7 p.m. in the Caldwell Lounge.

Michael McAuley, Web developer, has come a long way in his coding. Content is no longer hard-coded into the site. User accounts can be created by anyone, and using these accounts stories can be submitted to an approval queue. All editors logging in can see the queue, edit the stories, and then flag them for publication. This takes much of the hassle out of the old way of publishing stories.

Two major issues that have come up are staff retention and lack of content. As noted in previous reports, a few staff members have left the publication with more expressing a desire to leave or an inability to contribute 100 percent. Furthermore, this problem will only be complicated with so many of this semester’s staff being graduating seniors. Currently, this staff set up is:
Editor: Emmanuel Lipscomb (graduating)
General Manager: Jeff Horn (leaving)
News and Opinion Editor: Jode Willingham (graduating)
News and Opinion Editor: Holly Harris (one semester left)
Features Editor: unoccupied
Humor Editor: Amos Baynes
Creativity Editor: Cari Corbett
Arts Editor: Christopher “Critter” Wentworth
Graphics: Travis Stearns
Publicity Coordinator: Matt O’Bryant
Publicity Coordinator: Liesl Clous
Web Developer: Michael McAuley
Web Developer: unoccupied

Compounding the troubles these departures will bring is the fact that Americana already has trouble finding content for its issues. Being unproductive for so long severely hurt the number of dedicated writers the magazine had. Plus, this was the first semester that many of the editors have ever had to produce content for their sections. With writers now supporting other publications and the new editors lacking the resources of the old, the variety of names once seen in Americana is has slimmed to a small group of regular contributors.

During weekly meetings with Bradley Wilson, coordinator for student media advising, the question of Americana’s future has come up frequently. It can be argued that much of Americana’s content is already being covered by the Technician, the Nubian Message and Windhover. Between these three publications, news, opinion, features, creative writing, and arts are covered extensively. In lieu of this and other issues, it has been decided that Americana should halt the search for a new editor until its purpose and structure can be evaluated. Cari Corbett, creativity editor, had expressed interest in applying for the editor-in-chief job, but this was after the announcement of the new student media leaders. It is hoped that in the fall a student media task force will be created to investigate Americana’s plight.

At mention of the proposed task force, Jeff Horn expressed interest in working with the group despite limited availability next semester and a desire to leave the publication. He went on to say, "Though I was heavily discouraged by our lack of productivity this semster, this could be the kind of self-evaluation an experienced staff member could and should aid. With Jode leaving and many of our rookie staff disheartened, I feel it incumbent upon me to change that attitude and improve our image on campus."

The most positive outcome of this semester’s work was a long overdue collaboration with Windhover. Through funding and the passing along of a name or two, Americana helped to produce the CD portion of this year’s installment. In return, Windhover added Americana’s name and URL to each CD produced providing the publication with a bit of publicity. Windhover also supported every one of Americana’s Open Mic Night events for which Americana is definitely thankful. Next year, Americana hopes for more
collaboration of this kind.

Editor-Keitris Weathersbe
Managing editor-Niccoya Dobson
Business manager-Ryan Daniels

Budget
There were two deviations from this year's budget for next year in the areas of training and staff development. The Nubian Message staff will hosts training sessions once a month. We will invite one or two persons from the profession to conduct an half day or all day session. The instructors will be paid for their help ($50-$100 per session). As for staff development, an incentive will be given to the staff member of the month or to those who consistently make deadline ($50 per month, along with certificate). A portion of the budget is also being used to hire an additional copy editor, to identify any errors the section editors may overlook prior to submitting articles for publication.

Staff Manual
The next big project for the summer is creating a staff manual. This document would include the mission of the Nubian Message, job description, calendar, style guide, hierarchy chart, instructions for submitting for publication, etc.

Staff Recruitment/Retention
We have had excellent staff recruitment and retention rates this year. Out of the approximately 50 students who attended fall open house, 36 students joined the staff, and the same students wish to remain on staff for the upcoming year. Since the new term, five students have expressed interest in joining staff; three as writers and two as photographers. I have contacted all five students, but have only met with two of the them.

Staff retreat the first week of class (August)
Nubian Message Open House (August)

Addition:
The Nubian Message will be available beginning Aug. 30, 2006. We will not produce on Wednesdays following major holidays or breaks.

After the completion of 10 issues at the time of this report, I can say with confidence that this is the most excited I have ever been about Technician. From breaking national news to in-depth coverage, this staff has already experienced a wide range of issues that have worked well to get their feet wet.

I have hired 16 new people onto the editorial board, some of them brand new editors, and I have continued to be impressed by their performance.

Writers are starting to drop off a bit because it's getting to be the time of the year when they get busy, but we still have a dedicated core who are able to produce consistent content.

We held a very successful training session in March with the new editors to go over copy editing, leadership development and goals for this year. All but three editors attended the meeting and it was a good opportunity to come together for the first time as a staff.

Since April 1, Bradley has critiqued almost every issue with us at our daily editorial board meetings, which has helped us make improvements and get a professional observation about what we have done right and wrong.

We are also planning another training session for April 23. Adrienne Johnson-Martin, lifestyles editor for the News & Observer, will lead the session, discussing how to find, cultivate and write features stories for the paper as a whole.

Staff recruitment will begin on a large scale in the summer/early fall. Two students have committed thusfar to being readers for the literary portion of the magazine. Team of two designers will be hired by Sept. 15.

We are working on a Web site that will provide information on the history and vision of Windhover, house available archives of past Windhovers, catalogue information on the awards Windhover has won, and
provide a space for current updates (i.e. submission guidelines, contact information, calendar of events).

WKNC has been busy these past several weeks during the change over of positions. The new WKNC Board of Directors and other positions have slightly changed but many positions have been retained by the same people who held those positions prior to April 1.

There have been no significant deviations from the budget and work on the budget for the next fiscal year has been nearly completed. The budget for the next fiscal year is awaiting approval.

This past semester saw the second training class to go through the new training program consisting of classroom meetings to review FCC and station policy supplemented by live in studio training with a DJ for a period of four weeks to prepare the trainees for their own shows. The training class was quite large seeing a total of 18 new trainees pass through it. For the summer there have been three students that have expressed interest in starting the training program. We are waiting to see if there will be more people to express interest before setting a date for a summer training class.

The current concentration of WKNC is getting the newly hired board of directors used to their new jobs here at the station. The daytime music department has seen the addition of two more assistants and a revamp of the current music reviewing system to make the station sound much more refreshed on a more consistent basis. The production department will begin work shortly on several production pieces that will be entered into the CBI 2006 National Student Production Awards contest. Finally, the training DJs from this past semester are in the process of taking their board tests to determine if they are ready to take on a shift of their own.

The new adviser for WKNC, Jamie Lynn Gilbert, will be starting in her new position on May 15. The staff of WKNC is preparing for her arrival and her office is being remodeled. We are eager to being work with her immediately and cannot wait to hear her ideas for making the station increase its potential.

To produce an annual (school year) calendar of deadlines and publication dates for all media while (1) educating students about the importance of meeting deadlines; (2) establishing consequences for failure to meet those deadline; and (3) learning how to plan so that major deadlines are broken into manageable pieces that can be delegated among staff members.

PLAN: The Technician staff will deliver the paper to the News & Observer by FTP on or before 1 a.m. 80 percent of the time in the fall and spring semesters as determined by the times logged by the N&O staff. If the staff exceeds this goal in any given month, the editor and managing editor will receive a 'bonus' which they can distribute as they see fit. If the staff falls below 80 percent of on time delivery in any given month, the editor and managing editor will receive a penalty equal to $50 for every five percent below goal. Editors may also choose to hold other staff members accountable for missing deadlines.

PLAN: If the staff meets or exceeds this goal for any given deadline, the editor, managing editor and photo editor may receive a 'bonus' of no more than $75/each which they can distribute as they see fit. If the staff fails to meet its deadline, the editor, managing editor and photo editor will only be paid a percentage of their monthly salary equal to the percentage of the deadline met. The editors may also choose to hold other staff members accountable for missing deadlines.