UW-Madison is about to get some political diversity in its student newspapers.
`Right-on' gets new take at UW-Madison
Conservative paper to bow on campus
chicagotribune.com
By Robert Gutsche Jr
Special to the Tribune
Published February 7, 2005
MADISON, Wis. -- The University of Wisconsin-Madison is one of the few public universities with two competing independent student newspapers. And soon the historically liberal hotbed will have a third paper, this one with a conservative twist.
"There was a lot of hostility towards conservatives on campus that happened even before the [2004 presidential] election, and that has a lot of pent-up demand that gives us something to capitalize on," said Tim Shea, a 20-year-old economics major at the university, who is starting the paper and will be its managing editor.
Shea also started a conservative newspaper when he was a high school junior in Wallingford, Conn.
The first issue of The Mendota Beacon, named after a Madison lake, is scheduled to hit campus newsstands on Saturday, Abraham Lincoln's birthday. It will focus on business, politics and the activities of conservatives from Washington, D.C., to the steps of university lecture halls.
The paper's arrival is being seen as a reflection of a movement among conservative college students fueled during the 2000 presidential election and stoked again by President Bush's re-election.
About 21 million people under the age of 30 voted in the November election, up about 4.6 percent for that age group compared with 2000, according to a study by Declare Yourself, a national group that urges young people to vote.
Though many were Democrats, the high turnout for that age group is likely to give college students a bigger presence on the political landscape. It also may give conservative students at campuses without right-leaning papers enough energy to start papers to combat what they consider a liberal university student press.
"You would think it's an old story now--liberal orthodoxy on campus--but we don't see that. With Bush winning, students are stirred up," said Stephen Klugewicz, executive director of the Collegiate Network.
The Collegiate Network, based in Wilmington, Del., helps support conservative student newspapers across the country, including the Chicago Criterion at the University of Chicago and the Michigan Review at the University of Michigan.
It also may help fund Madison's new paper, Klugewicz said.
"The papers we see are fighting against political correctness and the liberal orthodoxy on campuses," he said. Beyond giving money--about $180,000 last year to these papers--his group helps student journalists with professional development.
In Madison, the Beacon will come out twice a month initially and move to publishing weekly next fall, said managing editor Shea.
Dozens of students have applied for newspaper positions, Shea said. The Leadership Institute, a national conservative group based in Arlington, Va., gave the Beacon $500 to cover the first printing. And the staff of about 50 students will write for free and use their own laptops to produce the paper.
The Beacon will be up against two daily independent student newspapers, The Daily Cardinal, which has published since 1892, and The Badger Herald, which started in 1969.
The Herald used to be the school's conservative newspaper, but when it went from a weekly to a daily in the 1980s, its executive board calmed the editorial page's conservative voice. Since then, the two papers have moved closer politically and in how they cover news.
Any new paper's success will hinge on attracting its core demographic and maybe creating controversy to get people to pick it up, said James Baughman, a journalism professor at UW-Madison.
"The news racks around the campus are already full," he said, "but there's no question that we have more conservative students who are more assertive about their politics than we did 15 years ago. We always had conservative students on campus. What has happened is that they are less passive."
Cristina Daglas, The Badger Herald's editor in chief, said she's not worried about the added competition.
"Any other form of publication will help us keep on our toes," she said. "However, I'm skeptical of a newspaper that openly comes out and says, `We are going to lean to the right.' I'm going to be a little leery about what kind of news that will come from that."
Steven Schwerbel, a UW-Madison international studies senior from Menasha, Wis., who took off last semester to work for the Wisconsin Republican Party, has signed up as a graphic designer for the Beacon.
"I think we are being more honest about where we are coming from," said Schwerbel, 22. "We do have a bias and we are acknowledging that. Everyone has a bias and I don't think that you can get around that." |
