DTH editor candidate: Tori Stilwell's ideas

The Daily Tar Heel is an organization unlike any other.

It is a thriving news outlet at the forefront of college media. It is a campus organization. It is a family. It is a tradition lasting 118 years.

In order to maintain and surpass the expectations our audience — the University and surrounding communities — expects us to uphold, we must have a strong sense of direction combined with flexibility and the audacity to experiment.

Our Product

Our two content mediums — print and online — look too much alike. In order to adjust to an increasingly digital world, we must make it easier for our readers to both access and interact with the news we put on dailytarheel.com.

With this in mind, our print product is still our strongest, and it must not be neglected but pushed toward greater excellence.

• I would merge the online and multimedia desks and shift the job of posting online stories to the copy desk. This would allow us to provide readers with different online information interfaces.

• I would continue a renewed effort in blogging, including a revival of the newsroom blog. A daily featured post on the front page of the website would draw more attention to all of the blogs.

• I would maintain the visual managing editor position created this year. The position is critical for creating coherent visual themes in each issue and online.

• I would make the mix of stories on the front page just that. With some exceptions, the front page should represent the top news from most desks, not just one or two.

Staff and news-making

Happier, more invested and better trained journalists, designers, photographers and editors will produce higher quality content.

• The training process for new staffers must be improved. That starts with conducting a more effective and efficient orientation.

I would also meet with each desk’s staff to talk about how their work effects the paper as a whole.

• The DTH traditionally hires everyone who applies.

It’s important to continue this approach because our job is to teach (I started out with zero experience myself).

However, staffer performance must be strictly measured through required meetings between editors and individual staffers.

• Desk editors will take a day off each week. Editors will not only be healthier and happier, but the paper will also be better because editors will be fresher and more creative.

• I would encourage our staff to be more involved in other UNC and community organizations.

• Deadlines must be more strictly enforced, maintained and measured.

Our Audience

• I would increase the DTH’s on-campus presence so students can put faces with our product.

This interaction is especially important since our office has moved off campus.

• When speakers are brought in to the newsroom, I would extend the invitation to outsiders who could also gain from these resources.

• The DTH’s social media presence has flourished this year, and I would like to see sustained growth in this field through the community manager position.

• I would commit to re-inventing the public editor position.

The public editor would host public feedback forums twice a semester to gain public input and write columns explaining certain actions the DTH has taken, if needed.