Enjoy Spring Break, but prepare for an onslaught

In the 37-year history of Craven Community College, Student Council has never met on a Monday.

On April 4, however, CCC's Student Council will do just that in a special meeting called for the sole purpose of discussing and voting upon the college administration's proposed editorial policy for the Campus Communicator, an odious and insulting document foisted upon us in an administrative effort to establish dominion over an independent student newspaper and install an advisory committee imbued with the power to steamroll student editors.

Don't spend your Spring Break seething. Go to the beach. Sleep in 'til noon. Take a breather from this relentless and taxing controversy.

But the day you return to school, be ready to respectfully yet vociferously object to this draconian document and the de facto censorship committee it would create. The meeting will be held at noon April 4 in Orringer Auditorium, and I encourage all Commies to attend and speak out against CCC's illegal move, which has been condemned by the American Civil Liberties Union, Student Press Law Center, Foundation for Individual Rights in Education and Raleigh media law firm Everett, Gaskins, Hancock & Stevens, LLP.

Mitzi and I are drafting an alternate editorial policy, which we plan to deliver to Student Council bright and early April 4. If anyone is interested in assisting, please send me an e-mail or call my cell phone.

You still have a few hours to make deadline.....

I'm beginning to feel like the embittered editor of the New York Sun in the 1994 movie "The Paper," a sharp-tongued codger who is largely ignored by his reporters and editors when he crows "Doesn't anyone around here respect a deadline anymore?"

Commies, today is (or, if you're reading this after the 12th, was) the deadline for opinion and feature articles. No excuses; I know today is a Saturday and school is not in session. Articles are submitted via e-mail anyway, so why should the day of the week make a difference? I know the sex column controversy has sidetracked everyone. We're on a tighter leash and under more scrutiny, so that should motivate us to meet our deadlines, put out an earth-shatteringly good newspaper and silence our critics.

Deadline day doesn't officially end 'til midnight, so if you're reading this before then and you have a feature article or column due, you know what's expected of you.

I'll accept opinions and features Monday with no penalty. Any later than that, and you and I will need to have a serious talk.

No More Late Nights

Effective Immediately, well after toinite...neither we or student council are allowed in the office past 10 p.m.

By word of Steve...from higher up.

So does this mean no more late night orgies???????

The birds, the bees and the Craven trees

Think a tame, harmless sex column would create nary a ripple on a college campus - the breeding ground for the free exchange of ideas and the cutting edge of academic thought?

Think again.

After the publication of what was meant to be the first installment of "Between the Sheets," a sex advice column authored by a female student, we have been inundated with ire from readers, college officials and advertisers. As I write these words, the letters to the editor are just beginning to pour in.

Several area parents have harassed Craven Community College administrators and threatened not to send their students to school here if publication of the column continues. A few deeply concerned students have talked of not returning to Craven, and the institution's standing in the community has taken a hit because one student shared a controversial opinion in the student newspaper.

First, we never intended to hurt the college. We career Cravenites, or Commies, love the campus, its people and the institution itself. That being said, the purpose of a student newspaper is to be an objective monitor of campus happenings - not a public relations gladrag that runs warmed-over press releases and nothing more controversial than ribbon cutting art.

What's the balance between being true to your school and sticking to your First Amendment guns? Loyal Commies out there in Bloggerdom, did I make the wrong decision when I green-lighted "Between the Sheets?"
Comment away.

NEW RECORD

Not only did I land a 1 yr contract with Mt Olive College...Corey and I, who have absolutely no lives whatsoever....are about to break our "Commie Office Hours" record.

Even though I currently hold the solo record for last year when I pulled the PBL all-nighter, Corey and I hold the record for more than one person.

The current group record is 12:35 and it is currently....according to my cell phone 12:32. According to the computer it is 12:33...correction, 12:34. By the time it would take us to shut the computers down, we would have already broken the record...which we are about to do.

It is now 12:35 and I could sign off now and it would satisfy the record-breaking criteria.

OK...not it's 12:36 and we have officially broken the record. Not that that is something to brag about.

Sex column creates a stir

If initial college staff reactions to the first installment of student columnist Amanda Worley's "Between the Sheets" sex column are to be believed, the Campus Communicator has devolved into pornography, and yours truly is a smut peddler on par with Penthouse magnate Larry Flynt.

The point I'm trying to make, of course, is that those who took offense at the column are vastly overreacting.

College officials say the column is in bad taste, but the standard-bearers for collegiate and professional journalism disagree. Dozens of college and university newspapers carry regular sex columns, all much more provocative than the relatively tame coyness of "Between the Sheets."

The Poynter Institute for Media Studies acknowledges the legitimate journalistic purpose of sex writing and commentary. The headline of a 2003 entry in the Poynter Ethics Journal proclaims boldly, Journalists need more sex.

Our readership is comprised of college students, and correct me if I'm wrong here, but I'm fairly certain that college students have sex. Offering helpful pointers on how to heat things up in the bedroom would arguably be out of place in a newspaper whose target audience was celibate Gregorian monks. But a college? Give me a break.

Blog this

I finally figured out how to post a new message. Yay me!

These late nights in the office are gettin' kinda old. But, it's better than going home. It can just get a little boring sometimes. Like now. But I just got out of class so...

Hey Corey...your donkey just walked by, but you weren't here. Sorry. ;)

(inside joke)

btw-Plan C may be taking effect within the next few weeks....maybe.

I'm not feeling overly creative tonight so...I think I'll stop.








Or not......

At long last, paper transmitted successfully

Cursing Adobe Distiller, we finally .PDFed the March issue and e-mailed it to our Tarboro printers. Not to jinx future efforts, but I think this time we finally figured it out.

The latest and greatest edition of the Communicator will be distributed Thursday afternoon....we hope.