Alternative Media Showcase: The Easterner
I will spend this week focusing on the great reporting and editorial writing that is taking place on campuses throughout the United States. I have chosen a few student newspapers from Washington to the Northeast that span the gamut of collegiate writing on today’s issues. The first paper in this series on alternative media among America’s college campuses is The Easterner.
This weekly newspaper is the main student organ for Eastern Washington University in Cheney, Washington. This public university has a little over 9,200 undergraduate and graduate students as of 2007 with dozens of programs available for students in the Pacific Northwest. I found out that Eastern Washington is the only campus in the country with a state crime lab and forensics facility for use by state investigators.
A first glance at The Easterner revealed the usual fare of Bush and Cheney bashing, letters to the editor about recreation centers and articles on sexual issues. These articles are familiar parts of alternative newspapers and magazines so I cannot blame The Easterner for meeting the needs of its college readers. There are several aspects of The Easterner that set it apart from small-college newspapers throughout the United States.
Readers on the Eastern Washington University campus can bypass stale letters to the editor by responding on the “Cyber Soapbox.? Recent responses via this online tool include an impassioned response from a current student and former Marine for better understanding of the situation in Iraq. The “Eagle Life? section of the paper features interviews by student writers with writers, activists and other luminaries that surpass expectations for student newspapers. I think that The Easterner is an outstanding student newspaper and it will be difficult for other papers in this series to surpass their levels of organization and journalistic prowess.
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