KALAMAZOO, Mich. (WOOD) — Founded in 1916, the Western Herald is the oldest registered student organization at Western Michigan University. But like many other student newspapers at universities nationwide, it's facing challenges.
“Many papers all across the country are experiencing lower readership, not as many ad sales as usual for college papers, and so they decided to start the Save Student Newsrooms movement,” Western Herald News Editor Zoe Jackson told 24 Hour News 8.
The Save Student Newsrooms movement describes itself as “a campaign to educate people about the challenges facing student-run newsrooms.” Those challenges include maintaining editorial independence and the financial stability of student media, especially print media, according to the website.
“It kind of came at a good time for us, too, because we’re going to be running into some financial changes in the future, so this would really help the Western Herald,” Jackson said.
The Herald printed an editorial Monday announcing it is joining the Save Student Newsrooms movement. The editorial talks about the Herald’s own budget woes, saying it’s looking for “new ways to innovate and keep afloat.”