KUDOs April 7 issue

This 8-page issue had much potential. It had a very nice teaser, some good inside stories, and a couple of good lead items that should have attracted much student readership.

Unfortunately, the reproduction was just terrible. It was so terrible in fact that it was embarrassing. This was especially true for our layout and design on the Legacy Ball. The reproduction was horrible and left many who attend the event wondering what the hell we were doing. Well, it was not our fault. It is the printing company's fault. It's very poor reproduction. We have stayed with the current printing company as long as we could. We were not allowed by Student Development to change printers, unless there was a breach of contract. Poor quality and the inability to heed our cries for a better print job led to my decision to change - immediately. Next week we will print elsewhere and we will see where that ends up.

As for this issue, there were some good and bad things. Good things first.

Good: It was nice to see the staff scramble to come up with clear and well-written articles on the AMK and A&I vote both for the student vote and the South Texan poll. It was also nice to see the summer school schedule on the front page, but I was disappointed we didn't write it...WE WRITE ALL OUR STORIES!

The "Relay for Life" story on page 3 was excellent. The history of the university was a nice touch on page 4. Ed-Ops was super. Sports decent. The Legacy Ball feature on page 8 was a lot of hard work and we had some good photos but, because of the poor print job, we missed the mark. Katrina, good job on this assignment.

Angela's teaser was beautiful. Too bad no one could see it on the print job. Are you kidding me?

We had several good columns and editorials throuhout. Good job Erika, JC and Jaime and others who contributed.

Bad: Our photography was poor, at best, overall. The best pictures were of the Legacy Ball and sports. Other than that, a 3rd grader could have snapped the shots with a auto focus camera. We can do better. Also, the summer school schedule story which was assigned three weeks ago turned out to be staff reports. Why?

Jav-A-Style is one of the fresh new features on our paper. This Jav-A-Style was very weak. It was just a guy with t-shirts and jeans. He has no style. JC has more style. Perhaps we should feature JC or, as several of you have suggested, some professors in town. This feature must single out what is "different" about the subject we are interviewing. It can't be some one's friend or acquaintance. It must be a student with a singular dressing style.

The layout on page 3 was too horizontal modular. We can do better if we plan ahead.

KUDOS: Well, who gets KUDOs. My vote is for Staff Reports, who had three front-page stories. What do you think? Any suggestions? Of course not. Few of you will read this blog. If you do, please post a suggestion on the comments section of this blog or see me personally.