What’s next?

Well, last week, if you read along, I let you know that I’d be leaving the Tribune-Phonograph.

I reminisced on my last two and a half years at the company and all the memories I made throughout my time here. It might have left you with more questions than answers.

One concern we’ve heard from subscribers and members of the public who pick up the paper is, who will be taking my spot? The answer is a multitude of people. Journalists aren’t growing on trees anymore. I don’t want to speak for our publisher, Kris O’Leary, when I say that hiring a newspaper editor is next to impossible today, but I think she would agree with that sentiment. Just five years ago, I was in school at UW-Oshkosh and I was sitting with 30 other prospective journalists learning about how to properly abbreviate states in AP Style.

Today, that journalism school has been gutted as professors teaching journalism basics and ethics have been let go.

Couple that with shrinking newsrooms all across the country and you have a field that is in dire need of a revival. Coverage of local events will largely remain the same. Kevin O’Brien will be riding his trusty steed back into town to save the day as he will be taking over a portion of the news coverage. Nathaniel will still be covering sports and various news events. Sami, our wonderful photo editor, will be more present at events as she helps take pictures of concerts, festivals, sports and anything else that moves.

If you ask me, I think this paper will be in a better place than it was when it was just Nathaniel and I running the show. We entered as two people who didn’t really know what we were doing and we didn’t have a ton of help getting started as everyone else was working on their own end of the content-creation business.

Now, there will be more eyes on the paper than ever before and more input into what should go into it. It’ll be a true team effort and I think the primary people that will benefit from a paper with more hands involved in making it are the readers.

I’m excited to subscribe to the paper and read what everyone in the areas we cover are up to. I’m also excited to keep up with the folks that appear in this spot every week.

There are plenty of reasons to subscribe to local papers and that is something I learned throughout my time at the Tribune-Phonograph.

What we do here is important. I know as a teacher, I will make every effort possible to have students go through and find a local paper to read.

The importance of having a community watchdog like the Tribune-Phonograph which simultaneously keeps people informed and calls out malfeasance in government cannot be stated enough. Support the cause and (stay) subscribe(d) to your local paper.

SPEEDING

THROUGH

L

IFE

BY

NEAL H OGDEN EDITOR