Welcome back Eagle Nation to another semester at Georgia Southern University. I’m excited about both this new semester for us at The George-Anne and the changes we have made during the break.

One major change you might have noticed right off the bat is that we didn’t have a print edition of The George-Anne on Tuesday. The reason is because the Student Media Executive Board made the decision to reduce production from twice-a-week to once-a-week. It was not an easy decision for us to make because we consider our print product valuable for us and for you, our readers and community.

This decision was made solely because of monetary restrictions and the realities of print advertising in journalism. Our print product continues to provide a large part of our budget, but no longer at levels that we have seen or experienced before. Businesses are no longer as interested as before in advertising with print newspapers anymore and we are not the only ones who have taken a hit because of that.

Another aspect that made the decision difficult is the fact that The George-Anne was the only college newspaper in Georgia that printed more than once-a-week and one of the few in the country who did so too. It was a source of great pride for our alumni and the current staff to be able to go on trips or conferences and say that we printed twice-a-week.

The emotional and financial support from the university has not changed and we are grateful for that. We appreciate all the support and understanding President Jaimie Hebert, Dean Patrice Jackson, our new Vice President for Student Affairs Georj Lewis and everyone who is part of the consolidation efforts for the new Georgia Southern, have shown as we made this decision. Our Student Activity Fee support remains unchanged and helps us a lot in our yearly operation at Student Media.

Moving in a new direction

Although there were some cons with the decision, there are a lot of positives that will come out from the reduced production. As you might have seen, our focus the past couple of semesters has shifted more towards our digital presence on our social media and our website. This is an aspect that we expect will continue to grow throughout this semester and the years to come.

We will be launching new projects to engage with you and be able to create a better, more informed Georgia Southern community. I can’t go into too much detail about all of our projects, but hopefully you like them as much as we do.

There will be a lot of changes in Student Media in the coming months and years, but we are grateful for your support of our organization. We hope you follow along for the ride as we continue to grow the history of The George-Anne every Thursday on the newsstands and everyday online.

Sincerely,

Jozsef Papp