When you were a kid, did you ever play the game where you spun yourself around in circles as long as you could before falling down, just to see what it felt like to be dizzy? The game makes very little sense to me now, but I can remember doing it often in my childhood days.
I kind of feel like I’ve been doing that here at The Reflector the last several weeks, even months. But, unlike when I played that game as a child, the dizzy feeling I have right now is for a good cause. I hope many of you have already noticed some of the changes we’ve made to the newspaper recently. They’ve been subtle, not startling, I know. But, I’m excited to tell you that more changes are on the way and they will affect our readers and how you interact with us to get your information in the paper.
We’ve been going through a bit of an overhaul here at The Reflector. I’ve always been proud of our product and our readers have always been quick to heap us with praise. But, it was time for some changes. We always want to be better.
Over the past several weeks, our staff has worked collectively to improve the design and presentation of the newspaper. We’ve also been working on the preparation for more changes, which we will begin to implement in the June 4 issue of The Reflector.
Starting June 4, we will roll out more changes to both the structure and the design of the paper. As far as structure, The Reflector will continue on most weeks to be presented in three sections. However, those three sections will be structured differently than before.
The A section will now focus solely on general news, the opinion pages and obituaries. It’s the kind of A section that a true newspaper junkie will love – lots of meat and potatoes. It will be some of the best content we have to offer each week. It will also feature the (newly-designed) opinion page or pages, which includes my weekly editorial, the editorial question and your letters to the editor as well as occasional Op-ed columns from area elected officials and leaders.
If you want to submit a letter to the editor for publication, in order for it to be in consideration for the following week, it must reach us by Thursday at 3 p.m. Email those to me at letters@thereflector.com. If you have a Memorial or free obituary, it must reach us by 9:30 a.m. on Monday for that same week’s publication. There are a handful of holidays throughout the year when we are forced to change are deadlines and we will publish that information prior to each of those holidays. Feel free to email your obituaries to news@thereflector.com, call us at (360) 687-5151 or stop by our office at 20 NW 20th Ave., Battle Ground.
The B section will now feature an expanded sports section, that will include up to the first three pages of the section devoted to sports. The first of June isn’t the best time to launch an increased effort to cover area sports, because the high school sports teams and athletes head into the summer months. We will be creative over the summer months, covering youth sports as well as outdoor and recreational sports and activities. I will also provide a weekly sports column. We welcome your sports story ideas, so send them to me at news@thereflector.com. Once fall gets here and area high school athletes don the pads for football season and other sports begin, this new commitment to sports coverage is something I’m going to be very excited to present to our readers.
The B section will also include our legals and classified sections. Our deadline for all submissions for legals is 5 p.m. on Fridays for publication that following week and for classifieds is 9:30 a.m. on Mondays for publication that same week. Deadlines will change when there is a holiday that falls on a Monday. Feel free to email your items to either legals@thereflector.com or classifieds@thereflector.com or call us at (360) 687-5151.
The C section will be called our Lifestyle section. It will contain virtually everything else you’ve enjoyed in The Reflector. Nothing that you’re used to is going away. The Lifestyle section will include our regular rotation of the following themed sections – Horse Corral, Companion Pets, Home Scene, Outdoor Living, Food, Business Scene, Senior Living, Youth Focus and Health & Beauty.
The C section will also include our calendar listings and happenings around the area as well as announcements, including births, marriages, anniversaries and engagements. Here’s one of the most important bits of information we need you to know. Because of print deadlines out of our control, we need our readers to get us their information for this section by Wednesday at 3 p.m. for publication the following week. That’s right, I’m sorry to have to inform you of this, but if you want something in the calendar, happenings or announcements, we need that information a week in advance. All items run on a space-available basis, but we do everything we can to get all items in the newspaper.
Email those items to news@thereflector.com or call the news team at (360) 687-5151.
In addition to the structural changes of the newspaper, our design team has been working with our entire staff to improve the design and presentation of The Reflector. As I said, you should have already noticed several changes, but more are coming. I’m very excited about those changes and I hope you will be as well.
We realize that some of these changes have necessitated some movement in our deadlines for you to submit your information to us. That is out of our control. We don’t want to inconvenience you and we will do everything in our effort to make the transition as smooth as possible.
As you see the changes in your community newspaper, I hope you will be as happy as I am.
Ken Vance
Editor
