KUDOS for 1st 3 weeks

One of the traditions at The South Texan is to name a "Staffer or Staffers of the Week." This honor is called "KUDOS." Each KUDOS recipient becomes eligible for the drawing of $100 scholarship at the end of the semester during The South Texan and Javelina Press Club annual "-30- Party" or end-of-the-year gathering. The KUDOS winner will have displayed dedication to their fellow staffers and the newspaper and should have gone above and beyond their required duties.

Managing Editor Roberta Flores exemplified the KUDOS spirit for this year's first issue of The South Texan. She covered one page one story, one campus news story and designed a page. her leadership is a critical part of The South Texan newsroom. KUDOS to you, Bobbie!

Graphic designer Cat Myers is the recipient of the KUDOS award for week two of The South Texan. Cat took on the story of alumna Carmen Lomas Garza's visit to the campus. The art work with this blog is one of Lomas Garza's most recognizable cultural works. A mother is trying to cure her child's earache with an old-fashioned home remedy. Cat also took the initiative of helping to add some "flair" to the page one package. Cat has also been a reliable leader in the newsroom this semester. Her efforts in all areas have not gone unnoticed. KUDOS to you, Cat!

The third week of The South Texan saw the ushering in of a new look to our Sports page. As the new sports editor, Jaime's vision for the sports page included a very professional look, including Jav-a-Stats. Jaime has taken possession of the sports page and made it his own. KUDOS to you, Jaime.

The staff has started off well this semester. This week the paper was mostly finished by Monday morning. This was a great effort by all. Keep up the good work, all and remember-- work hard enough and you could be $100 bucks richer at the end of the year!

Student Journalists Cover Hillary Clinton's visit to S. Texas

The South Texan staff was busy covering the visit of Sen. Hillary Clinton to South Texas as she tried to drum support for the Texas primary. South Texan staffers Ellie Tamez and Rubi Reyes left early in the morning Feb. 13 to cover Clinton's speech and press conference in McAllen, where she was courting Rio Grande Valley voters. Meanwhile, South Texan editor Dominique Garcia and reporters Catherine Myers and Edwin Vasquez  travelled to Robstown later that day to cover Clinton's visit to Nueces County. The reports will be published in the Feb. 19 issue of The South Texan but may be on-line sooner.  Reporting on events like this from a student interest viewpoint is part of The South Texan's mission. Let us know what you think of this effort.

Spring Semester Issues

The first three issues of The South Texan have been produced and are now history. Editor Dominique Garcia and her staff have done an admirable job with limited resources and with much volunteer effort. The last two issues, in particular, have been outstanding. The new page 2 design has brought a new level of interaction with the student body with a new feature that includes questions and answers on a variety of topics. The Jav-a-Bit section includes news TAMUK students would not usually read in a student newspaper - like the premier of alumna Eva Longoria Parker's new movie. Eva's picture is featured with this posting. It's hard to imagine that not too long ago she was taking a Structure of the Arts class here at TAMUK, was elected Miss TAMUK and was a cheerleader for the Javelinas. The "briefly" section and "police blotter" are also designed very well and have interesting information for out students. The staff continues to do a good job with its news coverage, features, layouts and design. Our new associate editor - Juan Carlos Reyes - is revamping the ed-ops page so that it includes more poignant controversial issues. Our new sports editor - Jaime Gonzalez - is revamping the sports section to include Jav-A-Stats so that the student body has a vehicle to see Lone Star Conference standings and other reports which normally do not appear in media in South Texas. Overall, it's a good start for the semester and more is in store.

Conflict of Interest Lesson

In a recent edition of The South Texan, we ran a review on the university's drama production of "Sleeping Beauty." While the critical review was well presented and written well, it did not completely meet ethical standards for journalism. The review was done by a student who had tried out for the production and was not chosen as one of the cast members. That presents an automatic bias and the staff (and adviser) should have prevented that student from doing the review. While this was not a serious breach of ethics, it could have been. The review was critical and to the point, but it should have been written by another student journalist.

South Texan now on KTAI radio

The South Texan staff has joined forces with KTAI 91.1 FM, the university's radio station, to provide news updates on a daily basis. South Texan reporters record daily updates every afternoon for a session called "91 Seconds of News with the South Texan."  The reports run every 91 minutes from 8 a.m. until 9 p.m. and contain news and information about university and community activities. The reports can also be heard daily on The South Texan's website - tamuk.edu/southtexan. Keep up with  news of Texas A&M University-Kingsville through our weekly print edition, our daily radio broadcasts or popular website.

Javelina Journalism

UIL Journalism Workshop a Big Success
Thanks to the 12 high school that attended the second annual Javelina Press Club UIL High School Journalism Workshop on the campus of Texas A&M University-Kingsville. More than 125 high school students attended the day-long workshop which had all the attending students attend every session on UIL events such as headline writing, feature writing, newswriting and editorial writing. We hope that those students learned some of the basics and that they will do well in their contests later this Spring. The 12 high schools attending were: Corpus Christi Moody, Corpus Christi Carroll, Corpus Christi Tuloso-Midway, Corpus Christi Calallen, Hebbronville, Hidalgo, Orange Grove, Edinburg North, San Isidro, Banquete, Falfurrias and Freer. Also, a big thanks to TAMUK Students Services Staff led by Nino and Crispin. Thanks for helping us make this a success.

First issue TAMUK Communicator is out
The first issue of the TAMUK Communicator, the magazine produced by the Communications/Theatre Arts Department of Texas A&M University-Kingsville has been published and has been distributed to alumni, high school journalism programs in South Texas and selected media outlets. The magazine features the latest news from TAMUK's Comm-TA Department, focuses on the activities of the different programs and highlights what some of the students are doing, including internships and research. Also, it features five Comm-TA Alumni and where they are now in their careers and also announces the creation of the Friends of Javelina Journalism account to raise funds for scholarships and other activities of the department. If you would like to receive a copy of this first issue, please contact the Comm-TA Department at 361-593-3401 and talk to our Office Administrator Ilda. Also, you can email a request either to kair000@tamuk.edu or kfmcf00@tamuk.edu. Thos 000 are zeroes. Okay? Bueno, good luck!
Dr. Manuel Flores
Associate Professor of Journalism/Communications
Texas A&M University-Kingsville