Jan. 13, 2009 • 7 p.m.
Board room, Talley Student Center, fourth floor

CALL TO ORDER

Present: Crystal Clark, Ryland Clark, Melissa Patzwaldt, Laura Lauren, Bob Ashley, Dean Phillips, Phil Zachary, Kishea Phillips, Saja Hindi, Joe Wright, Kyle Robb, David Mason, Bradley Wilson

Others Present: Jamie Lynn Gilbert, Fred Eaker, Xander Dale, Ty Johnson

Not Present: John Clark, Jay Dawkins, Scott Richardson

OLD BUSINESSS

1. Approval of minutes of Nov. 11, 2008. The minutes were approved with no objections
2. Budget update CLICK HERE for PDF file
3. Wolf TV Memo of Understanding • The memo of understanding was approved with no objections and recommend for administrative approval in Student Affairs and OIT
4. Time Out for Diversity CLICK HERE

NEW BUSINESSS

1. Recruitment and Retention update CLICK HERE
2. Grades and full-time status CLICK HERE
3. Amendment to strike section 3.2 of the Constitution.Joe Wright discussed how the old role of Americana has been assumed by the new vision for the Windhover site, a 365-day submission vehicle, as well as by WKNC and the Technician presences online. The Windhover revised site is scheduled to be developed later this spring and online this summer. Bob asked if there should be an easier way to create or dissolve a publication. In the short term, media tend to develop as part of an existing media outlet (as Wolf TV is doing primarily with the Technician). Because all of the media depend to some degree or another on student fees, Bradley said it probably should be difficult to dissolve an entire media. The motion to strike section 3.2 from the Constitution was approved unanimously. It will be included on the spring campus-wide election ballot.
4. Adoption of an election code CLICK HERE • After some discussion of wording, the election code was approved unanimously as amended.
5. Amendment of Compensation Policy to reflect current practice • The Compensation Policy was approved unanimously as amended.
6. Procedure for hiring of top student leaders
   • Board members approved, unanimously, a new procedure regarding the hiring process for new editors. “If, and only if, the candidate is unopposed, and if, and only if, there is no objection from any Board members that a candidate be hired by unanimous consent without having to spend 10 minutes giving a statement, spending 10 minutes answering questions and a deliberation time. Any Board member could object and then the candidate would still go through the process as we’ve done it in the past. I hope this will give us more time to spend on opposed candidates or candidates about which Board members have concerns.”
   • Board members also approved unanimously, a new procedure for top editors and managers to use when hiring other staff members. “All top editors/managers will hire their next tier editors/managers (i.e. section editors for the Technician/Agromeck/Nubian Message, WKNC Board of Directors members) through a process that includes posting the position, requiring such people to apply in writing by submitting at least a resume and a letter of interest, consulting with their media adviser before making job offers to discuss each position and informing the Board of Directors of the individuals in those positions.”
   • After lengthy discussion, Board members delayed approval of another item regarding terms for the Technician editor. Board members said their biggest concern was the impact this would have on the continuity. Bob Ashley said it seems that it’s a big challenge even in one year to get everything up and running. Everything is urgent. Plus, he said he doesn’t want to set the expectation that an editor can bail in four and one-half months. Saja said it took her six to eight weeks to feel comfortable. Board members seemed to agree that developing a review/evaluation system for the top editors would be a good thing to give Board members a chance to check on the progress of the people they’ve hired. “That the Board hire an editor of the Technician for the summer, independent of the editor for the fall and spring. That is, in the spring, the Board would hire a Technician editor for the summer and the fall/spring. We have been discussing this at length over the past two years, following the model of other student media operations. I have solicited input from all past Technician editors from the past seven years. Here are some notes and topics for discussion.”

REPORTS

1. Agromeck CLICK HERE
2. Americana CLICK HERE
3. The Nubian Message CLICK HERE • Kishea added that they sold an ad yesterday. And she said they are still recruiting people, yet they had no attrition from last semester. They had a full house at their first staff meeting.
4. Technician CLICK HERE • Saja said four section editors from last semester are no longer section editors this semester. The news editor resigned from staff as did an assistant news editor. She said they have hired two assistant news editors, a new Viewpoint editor and a new photography editor. She said the first training, with team building exercises by Adam Culley, photo training by Austin Dowd and editing training by Heath Gardner, went really well. She emphasized that they are working on their Web presence a lot and that moving the budget meeting to 3:30 p.m. has helped to bring the stress level down.
5. Windhover CLICK HERE • Joe said they received 148 poems, 87 prose submissions, one that was more than 150 pages long. He wasn’t sure how many visual submissions they received. Through negotiations with Theo Davis, they have written specs for this year’s book and will stay within budget. Open Mic Night was successful and has begun airing on WKNC. He said they got good feedback and interest calls from that.
6. WKNC 88.1fm CLICK HERE • Kyle said his Afterhours music director resigned as did his Webmaster, but he will be looking to fill those positions. He said the new blog has been working great and has received more than 3,000 page views since Jan. 1.
7. Society for Collegiate Journalists CLICK HERE
8. Budget update CLICK HERE
9. Technology update CLICK HERE

EXECUTIVE SESSION

The Student Media Advisory Board may adjourn into executive session to discuss matters of litigation, potential litigation or personnel.

ADJOURN

REPORTS

Due by Jan. 8 at noon

AGROMECK

(submitted by John Cooper Elias, editor)

Revenue — The January budget numbers show us at 63 percent of non-fee income. However, as of Jan. 8, we received checks for ad sales and book sales that will bring us to 82 percent of non-fee income. The remaining money owed to us from ad sales will bring us to 93 percent of non-fee income once they have paid us in full, leaving 7 percent needing to be made up from remaining book sales. Seeing as how we had a strong push at the end of last year for book sales, I would anticipate that we will have no problem meeting our non-fee income projections.

As of Jan. 8, we have sold 74 books out of a budgeted 100 (up from 17 at this point last year). Despite looking better than last year, the staff plans to push books sales even harder during the final months of production that we did last year.

Personnel — Our assignments editor position continues to be in a state of flux after one of the co-editors took the Viewpoint editor position for Technician for this semester. However, she plans to continue to copyedit and help especially around deadlines. We also added one new staff member at the end of last semester who will help with marketing and writing.

Training — We are going to do some preliminary training for the semester at our first two staff meetings so the designers will be comfortable using the new software. We are also planning to do a larger training day during January since we will no longer receive proofs for pages. We want the staff to be trained to be catching the small mistakes that we have been catching on proofs.

Coverage — We identified the large events of the semester and we are working to develop angles and coverage strategies so we will have strong packages towards the end of the book. We are also planning the content to be included in the senior portraits section of the book.

Deadlines — After missing our November deadline, the staff did a good job of putting in extra time to exceed the December deadline and send 40 pages to the plant to make up for what was missed in November. We are prioritizing pages for the January deadline so we will have completed signatures in the plant so pages can start being printed at this point.

Progress toward goals

• I was happy with how the staff bounced back from the November deadline to work hard in December, even with the end of the semester approaching.
• We have set our final page count at 320 for this book and as of last deadline we have 208 in the plant.

AMERICANA

NO REPORT

NUBIAN MESSAGE

(Submitted by Kishea Phillips, editor)

Revenue — For the Nov. 12 issue, we sold one half-page ad and one full-page ad. The full-page ad ran in color.

Expenditures — There are no expenditures that are out of the ordinary or out of line with the budget.

Personnel — There have been no significant staff changes. We have maintained the same 27 students on staff.

Training — I led a training session for the writers on staff on November 14. The training served to evaluate articles published throughout the semester and brainstorm ways to improve the content, style and structure of articles. I addressed some basic AP style as well as N.C. State Student Media style, editing techniques and ways to make articles more interesting. I also emphasized the importance of continuing to use student quotes. 10 out of 15 writers attended the training.

The training was effective to all writers who were able to attend because students had a better understanding of how to write more effectively for newspapers in terms of structure. Writers began to order their articles so that the most important and interesting information appears earlier in issues 10 and 11.

Technology — We recently received a new computer for design, equipped with a new version of Adobe InDesign, which will make it much easier for the layout designers to construct the paper.

Coverage — We are continuing to stay in contact with staff, faculty and students to get ideas about how to improve our coverage and keep it campus centered. For issue 9 we did a feature that went into detail about how students felt about the results of the 2008 election that ran throughout the paper. For issue 10 we covered African Awareness Week, and in issue 11 we rounded out Native-American Heritage Month to continue with our coverage of culturally diverse events. We are simply continuing to make sure that students can relate to the articles we publish and making sure to ask for feedback and input from readers so that we remain aware.

Deadlines — The staff is doing better with deadlines. For first draft deadlines, for issue 9, eight out of 12 articles were turned in on time. The same is true for issue 10. For issue 11, seven out of 10 student articles were submitted by deadline.

Ethics, Legal Issues — We have not had any ethical issues or corrections since the last Board meeting.

Progress Toward Goals — We are continuing to include at least two student quotes in each news article with the exception of one article in issue 9. We’re still working on publishing even more student quotes from students we haven’t interviewed previously. We have continued to publish on time.

TECHNICIAN

(submitted by Saja Hindi, editor)

Revenue — The end of last semester was a little rough, but as the new semester is starting, we’ve seen an increase in ads starting off.

Expenditures — There are no expenditures out of the ordinary.

Personnel— Since the new semester has started, we opened up applications for new editors and the new people have started their first few days of production. Everyone’s been working really hard to plan bigger packages for the semester and meet deadlines.

Training — We had our first training of the spring semester from 8:30 a.m. – 5 p.m. the last day before production started again for the semester. We went over everything from editing to the new production schedule. Guests from the Center for Student Leadership, Ethics and Public Service and the Women’s Center came to present for some of the training, in addition to Bradley and Heath’s editing exercises, and the new production schedule Derek and I have been pushing.

Technology — Our new photo editor has been pushing hard to increase online content, especially for the bigger events coming up like the Krispy Kreme Challenge and Ag Awareness Week. He’s also working with Wolf TV to make sure they are available to assist us in these bigger projects.

Coverage — In terms of coverage, especially since the new semester has started and the results from Time Out for Diversity came out, the staff is making an extra effort to reach out to the different groups on campus that may not necessarily have seen enough coverage this year or have important upcoming projects and events for the spring semester. We are also making sure to have different angles for national stories that have an N.C. State connection wether it’s the economic struggles people are facing or Coach Yow’s break from coaching for the rest of the season.

Deadlines — We’ve developed a new production schedule, which has pushed budget meetings back to 3:30 p.m. Everyone is really excited about trying to get pages sent earlier and meet earlier deadlines.

Ethics/Legal issues — We haven’t had any legal or ethical issues this past month. We’ve had seven corrections since the last board meeting, which is definitely a decrease from the last report. This was one of the big things we stressed in the spring training/retreat. The better the editing and reporting is, the less problems we will have.

Progress toward goals — We’ve established a recruitment sub-committee with one person at least from each section that will be working on recruiting in classes second semester and around campus. One of our deputy sports editors is heading the effort. We’re also placing a big emphasis, again, on online content, which seems to be easier to produce in the spring semester, as well as training, so new people are ready to take on these jobs next semester.

WINDHOVER

(submitted by Joe Wright, editor)

Things are finally beginning to become busy in the Windhover camp. Submissions were sufficient in every category and right now we are generating numbers for records. This way we can see the rise and fall in submissions based on different techniques.

At the time of this submittal, I have a meeting tomorrow with Fred over some of the IT things that Windhover is doing now. We are hoping to generate a new online interactive submission system for the future as well as an interactive podcast to be implemented immediately.

At this time, we have no personnel or expenditure items to report. All seems to be on schedule.

WKNC

(submitted by Kyle Robb, general manager)

Personnel – Mike Alston has been hired for the position of local music director. Mike will be responsible for updating rotation for the 8 hours of programming which is devoted to local music each week in addition to managing WKNC’s relationship with local artists and the triangle music community.

Kieran Moreira has been hired as promotions director. Kieran is replacing the departed Nicole Griffin, who graduated.

Jenna St. Pierre has become head music director, replacing Kelly Reid who graduated. Jenna served as co-daytime music director this past semester.

Training – WKNC 101 for the spring semester will begin on Jan. 26 and will be taught by Jamie Gilbert, Adam Kincaid, and Kyle Robb. Enrollment for the spring class is set at 21, enrollment is more selective this semester as a result of an already large staff.

Technology – WKNC launched the wknc.org blog on New Year’s Eve. The blog was designed by student media systems admin Fred Eaker and WKNC webmaster David Campbell. The blog includes news and info about each of WKNC’s four major formats, as well as local music information, promotions info, specialty show info, and podcasts. All blog posts are published by WKNC staff members and the blog has already received publicity and praise from several local music sites and blogs.

Austin Page, our student engineer, has installed a direct two-way communication line between the on-air studio and our mobile Comrex unit. This will allow WKNC to coordinate air breaks with increased ease when broadcasting live from local events.

Recent inclement weather caused signal problems on the evening of Jan. 7. Our engineers have boosted the power of the studio transmitter link in the interim to remedy the poor signal, and are investigating potential causes for the problem.

Coverage – WKNC has partnered twice with national record labels to present concerts in the past 45 days. On Dec. 8, WKNC and Green Label Sound presented The Cool Kids and Matt & Kim at Cat’s Cradle in Carrboro. On January 5th WKNC partnered with Domino to present a listening party for a new album from Animal Collective at the Pour House Music Hall in Raleigh.

Double Barrel Benefit 6- Lineup, dates, location, T-shirt design, and flier design have all been finalized. The official press release for the event was issued Jan. 6.

Society for Collegiate Journalists

(submitted by Saja Hindi, president)

Personnel — We will be holding inductions this month for new members, as well as elections for any vacant officer positions. We’ve reduced the requirement to allow students who have been a part of Student Media for one semester to also apply so we can get more involvement in the organization (the old requirement was at least two semesters).

Progress toward goals — We are working on planning several projects for the spring semester to create more awareness in the campus community of the issues as well as the organization.

The bigger project we are working on is hosting a panel discussion on the new president’s election and the race issues it has aroused, including at N.C. State. We want to invite people who are appalled by what happened at the Free Expression Tunnel to speak as well as people who claim it was free speech. But this would not only be about this incident so we don’t overplay it. We also want to invite Civil Rights Movement activists to come talk, and have this event take place in February during Black History Month.

For Sunshine Week, we plan to pass out information in the Brickyard about open government — similar to what we did last year.

BUSINESS OFFICE

(submitted by David Mason, manager)

Revenue — The business office sales team finished the fall semester on a positive note, with our total revenue for Technician between July 1, 2008, and December 31, 2008, coming to $234,003.80. This number is equivalent to 59 percent of our goal of $400,000 for the year. WKNC revenue for the same period is 38 percent of our $25,000 goal, while Nubian Message revenue is 36 percent of our $2,000 goal for the year.

Personnel — Our advertising territory changes were showing signs of being successful and we plan on building on the foundation that was built the last couple months of 2008. Some employees had to leave us after 2008, but we moved quickly to place promising individuals with high potential in positions where we think they can be successful. We also have some employees returning to our staff from 2007 that should bring a welcomed veteran presence to the office. A couple things the business office looks to be working on this semester include improved collaboration within the business office and working closely with all media to market and manage the N.C. State Student Media brand.

Training — Our first training session of the semester will be held Saturday, Jan. 10. Business Office alumni have been invited to participate in our training activities, as we look forward to stressing real-world situations and emphasizing proper selling and communication techniques when working with advertising clients. This important training session will be complemented by one-on-one meetings with each advertising representative at least one per month.

Goals — The business office looks forward to a great spring 2009 semester. A major goal for our team is to greatly improve local sales for all media. One way we’re going about achieving this goal is by setting a goal of two solid new prospects per week for each advertising representative. In addition, we will begin charting and analyzing contacts for each advertising representative and including those results in future board reports.

BUDGET UPDATE

• Technician advertising billed as of Dec. 8: $174,808.03
• Technician projections for collections: $162,571.47
• Technician budgeted income to date: $190,026.82
• Technician actual expenditures to date: $165,766.73
• Nubian Message local advertising sold to date: $720
• Agromeck local advertising sold to date: $0
• Agromeck book sales to date: 74
• WKNC non-fee income to date: $18,702.34

CLICK HERE for PDF of monthly report

TECHNOLOGY

Technicianonline and nubian.ncsu.edu experience a large drop in pageviews due to winter break. However, creation and promotion of slideshows for fall 2008 Graduation and the NCSU vs Rutgers game generated 284 visits (up 215 percent) and some traffic to the reprints Web site.

WKNC’s Web site traffic remained steady throughout the break. Two DJ profiles have risen to be the most viewed: D-Cutta and May Day & Spaceman Spiff (The Awkward Hour).

WKNC also launched a blog on Jan. 1, which has generated more than 2,500 pageviews (13 percent of total) during the first week of January.
Many of the incoming links are from other music blogs. There are also 45 subscribers to the RSS feed.

• CLICK HERE for PDF of full report
• CLICK HERE for link to Technology Plan updates

GRADES AND FULL-TIME STATUS CHECK

The Student Media has a policy regarding grades and full-time status of its employees. The policy, approved by the Board in September 2006 and amended in October 2008, is less strict than the previous policy. All students are advised of this policy when they complete their job/volunteer agreement.

We analyzed the grades and status of the current students on payroll and working as volunteers. As we continue to watch the potential impact of a grade policy, here is how Student Media came out for the fall of 2008:

• We had 232 students in our records, including volunteers. It took Jamie about six hours to check grades using the online Student Information System and another three hours to analyze the data. Only 158 students were included in the September 2008 report, representing the addition of 74 students throughout the semester.
• There were 76 people (32%) with greater than a 3.500 GPA for the semester. Although fewer than the 81 people (29%) from the previous fall, it represents a higher percentage of the staff.
• There were 17 (7%) people with a 4.000 GPA for the semester and 7 (3%) with an overall GPA of 4.000. This is a decrease of 22 (8%) semester and 13 (5%) cumulative 4.0 GPA students in fall 2007.
• There were 142 people (61%) with greater than a 3.000 GPA, fulfilling one of the requirements for the Society for Collegiate Journalists. This was 62% in fall 2007 and 61% in 2006.
• There were 7 students with below a 2.000 cumulative (consistent with 7 from fall 2007). These students will be dismissed from the staff in accordance with the Student Media policy.

Of the student leaders who are specifically targeted by the campus-wide policy:

• Four had below a 2.500 for the semester
• No student leaders had below a 2.500 cumulative

According to the campus-wide plan, only four students would have been affected. Four student leaders had a 4.000 for the semester and one had a 4.000 cumulative.

	Cumulative	Semester	Number people
Average	3.094	3.030	232
Low	0.000	0.000	232
High	4.000	4.000	232
Agromeck	3.242	3.383	13
Business Office	2.931	3.081	16
Nubian Message	2.772	2.629	15
Technician	3.131	2.990	87
WKNC	3.100	3.048	98

Hours being taken in spring 2009

	Average	High	Low	# not full-time
Agromeck	13	17	0	1
Business Office	14	18	0	1
Nubian Message	13	18	0	3
Technician	14	19	0	10
WKNC	14	19	0	10
Overall	14	19	0	25

Most recent semester Grade Point Average

	Average	High	Low	#<2.500
Agromeck	3.383	4.000	2.529	0
Business Office	3.081	3.905	1.511	2
Nubian Message	2.629	4.000	0.666	6
Technician	2.990	4.000	0.000	20
WKNC	3.048	4.000	0.000	18
Overall	3.030	4.000	0.000	46

Cumulative Grade Point Average

	Average	High	Low	#<2.500
Agromeck	3.242	3.854	2.604	0
Business Office	2.931	3.571	1.511	4
Nubian Message	2.772	3.829	1.621	5
Technician	3.131	4.000	1.200	11
WKNC	3.100	4.000	0.000	16
Overall	3.094	4.000	0.000	36

STUDENT LEADERS (all appointed positions)

	Average GPA	#<2.500	<#2.500 semester	# not full-time
Overall	3.201	0	4	6

(Average GPA was 3.22 in fall 2007 and 3.336 in fall 2006)

Require Work Plan: 6

STUDENT LEADERS (only leaders appointed by the Board)

	Average GPA	#<2.500	<#2.500 semester	# not full-time
Overall	3.190	0	0	1

Require Work Plan: 1

Total number of work plans required: 6

Notes:

• Students who represent more than one media are only counted once, in the medium where they have the most involvement.
• Three students in general administration are not counted in individual averages, but are included in the overall averages.

A graduating senior is considered full-time regardless of the number of hours taken. We will visit with each individual to determine if this is the case.