Our names are Kristina Dergacheva and Joshua Skinner and we are running for the co-editorship of the prestigious student newspaper: Arthur. Both of us bring three years of experience at Trent University that qualify us for this job, and are excited to get started.

Kristina’s experience as president of Trent International Students Association (TISA), the second largest group on campus, demonstrates her administrative qualifications to handle a diverse group of students while improving interests and conflict in a professional manner.

During this time she was integral in organizing meetings, and putting on events such as the wildly successful TISA: Cultural Outreach. She is also a standing committee member of the Charter and Policy review.

Meanwhile, Josh has been an independent journalist with his successful news broadcast, Trent Variety. Over the past two years he has been covering news stories both at the Trent and Peterborough level.

He has honed his public outreach skills by reaching out to community members of all political persuasions in a fair and balanced manner. Josh has also worked for and with Trent Radio going out and covering events in the community, facilitating transfers of information to the broader public.

Josh and Kristina come together to create a perfect balance of administrative and journalistic expertise that Arthur deserves. We are both excited and passionate about creating a fair and balanced product for readers that is focused on creating an avenue for all voices at Trent University and the broader Peterborough community.

We will work tirelessly at establishing a professional work environment for the staff writers that holds ourselves and the writers accountable to journalistic and professional standards.

Both of us come from very different places, and have had different life experiences.

However, as stated above our differences are what make us the most sensible combination for running this school paper. Josh brings his two years of independently driven journalistic experience to the table.

He would be in charge of external administrative duties such as public outreach, social media and dealing with the printers.

Kristina would be much more oriented towards administrative duties of the internal nature through organizing story meetings, making sure deadlines are met and most importantly, ensuring that all staff members were communicating with each other and on the same page.

Josh and Kristina will bring together the perfect blend of internal administrative efficiency and committed public outreach to make Arthur the best it can be.

However, there are things that can be improved upon at Arthur. Editing is often a thankless task, and one that can swamp the copy editor. This is why we will partner staff writers with each other on a weekly basis to peer edit their partners’ article.

This will create an environment of accountability among staff writers as well as ensure that the copy editor is able to focus on the articles that need the most editing, non-staff submissions.

The second goal will be to get a levy increase of 50 cents for Arthur. This will involve mobilization of the staff we have on hand, however as co-editors we bring a wide network that we accrued during our time at TISA and Trent Radio.

Part of this levy will go to printing costs and toward funding a social media campaign. It may seem backwards for a newspaper to pay for advertising, but print media no longer has a monopoly on advertising and, as a result, we will have to explore new avenues to expand Arthur’s readership.

Part of this will also include Josh taking the time to revamp the website to create a greater online base of readership.

We will also work to build greater bridges with the journalism program at Trent by doing presentations for the classes and create a culture of collaboration between us.

Part of this will involve inviting students to observe how Arthur does story meetings and what Arthur looks like Monday nights when we’re getting ready to print.

Finally, in step with our commitment to creating a professional environment, we will be strict with deadlines at Arthur when elected co-editors.

Through the partnership program it will become easier to discern, which, if any of the writers are not able to keep up with their workload.

Trent University has a journalism program with students that should be given equal opportunity to practice their craft if someone shows a lack of ability to keep up with both school and work.

Thank you for reading our platform and don’t forget to vote for Kristina and Josh for the co-editorship of Arthur.