IDS, Arbutus name future publication leaders

Friday the student media board announced new editors for the Indiana Daily Student and the Arbutus yearbook. The board named junior Eamonn Brennan the summer editor in chief for the IDS, junior Michael Zennie as fall editor of the IDS and junior Lauren Cooper as the editor in chief of Arbutus.\n"We felt like we had five exceptional candidates and had to make some tough choices," said Director of Student Media Dave Adams. "I'm excited about working with all three of the new editors in different capacities. I'm a very lucky person to have the job I have."\nThis year, Adams combined the Arbutus selection committee with the IDS committee to select the candidates. There were 11 members on the selection board, five of whom are representatives of the IDS and the Arbutus.\n"We were looking for the passion for the person to do the job and we wanted to select a person that could take the paper to the next level," Adams said. \nApplicants were asked to comment on a number of issues. In a response, Zennie referred to "shoe leather journalism" -- getting out of the IDS office and walking around to talk to people. Zennie said he believes this will increase the quality of the articles of the IDS as well as improve the relationship between the IDS and its readers. Zennie beat current IDS Campus Editor Sam Nissen for the fall position.\nAmong the main focuses of the applicants was the IDS Web site, www.idsnews.com.\n"I think getting people to read online is very important because we're a community newspaper and we touch on issues that nobody else covers," Zennie said. "It's not as important as The New York Times or The Washington Post, but it's going to be really important for blogs and video."\nAs fall editor next semester, Zennie also has other initiatives he would like to accomplish.\n"I really want to encourage the reporters and editors to get out into the public to sit down with people and see what issues we're covering well, what issues we need to be covering better and which issues we're not covering at all," he said.\nAs Zennie wishes to improve the IDS Web site, he will be working with the changes that Brennan will have made as the summer editor in chief. The future summer editor also said he sees the Web site as an important issue.\n"We really want to focus on continuing the progress that we've made on the Web over the past couple of semesters," Brennan, who beat current Arts Editor Kacie Foster for the position, said. "We want to increase the interactivity between our readers and the Web site."\nHe said the summer IDS staff typically has some different concerns than its fall and spring counterparts.\n"It's tough that there's not as many people here, but on the Web we can still get many people to come and our current product is quality to the point where we know people will read it -- it's about expanding on that."\nBrennan, the current sports editor of the IDS, also said he sees the summer as a time to train writers and get them involved in writing workshops to get them ready for the fall. He said he sees this as important so that writers can gain experience and be more prepared when new writers apply to the IDS at the beginning of the fall semester.\nCooper, the new Arbutus editor, ran unopposed and is charged with the job of improving the popularity of the yearbook, as sales declined in 2006.\n"Lauren's been grooming for this job for quite some time for the Arbutus," Adams said. "She's been working side-by-side with the current Editor in Chief Katie Farrer."\nIn order to improve the financial constraints of the Arbutus, Cooper said in her application that students and greek organizations need to be more informed on the yearbook.\n"Greeks are a huge, untapped market," Cooper said in her application. "We allowed them to be in the groups and organizations section in the current book, yet we had a poor turnout. I want to work with the advertising staff to come up with a plan to get greeks excited about being featured, especially since sororities put pictures of their pledges in the IDS."\nEven though there are areas which each of the editors believe will need to focus and improve upon, Adams said he is pleased with the new editors of the two publications.\n"Both the Arbutus and the IDS have very strong immediate futures with the leaders that we chose," Adams said. "I look forward to seeing them put their respective staffs \ntogether"