Editorial - Join our award-winning team

Do you enjoy writing?

Are you looking for a challenging, rewarding opportunity to expand your horizons?

Do you want to have your work published in an award-winning newspaper with one of the largest circulations in the state of West Virginia?

If you answered any of these questions with "yes," we would like to invite you to submit an application for a position on our news or opinion staff.

We are currently accepting applications for opinion columnists and news reporters for the 2012-2013 school year. Writing for The Daily Athenaeum is a great opportunity, regardless of your professional goals. If you are interested, please read the following descriptions and get in touch with us as soon as possible. We will be holding a recruitment event tonight in the Honors College media room at 7 p.m and all prospective applicants are strongly encouraged to attend.

The Daily Athenaeum

The Daily Athenaeum began in 1887 as a literary magazine, then simply called "The Athenaeum." This name was a reference to the ancient Greek forum in Athens, which was commonly a venue for public debate. 125 years later, the DA is published five days a week, serving the West Virginia University community as the school’s official student newspaper. The DA is entirely run by students. Over the years, we have built a tradition of excellence in providing the latest in news, sports and entertainment.

Additionally, the DA has lived up to its name by facilitating the public discourse within its opinion pages. In 2010, we were named the third best student newspaper in the country by the Society of Professional Journalists. This year, we accepted 19 awards from the West Virginia Press Association. If you would like to become a part of this winning tradition, we encourage you to send us your application.

Columnists

Columnists are tasked with writing one 600-800 word column a week for the DA’s opinion section. Traditionally, the opinion staff has been very diverse, and many of our alumni have gone on to professional schools in a variety of fields, including law, medicine, political science and biology. If you enjoy writing, have strong opinions and want your writing to reach thousands of readers, this position is for you.

Reporters

As a reporter, you will be thrust into exciting, unpredictable situations to gather information. You will be assigned a specific topic to cover throughout the year. After conducting interviews and researching your story, you will compile it into a coherent narrative to educate your readers about the latest on-campus occurrences.

Both the columnist and reporter positions are paid positions.

If either of these opportunities sound interesting to you, we strongly encourage you to attend tonight’s recruitment event in the Honors College. Distinguished political commentator and former DA staff member Michael Tomasky, who currently writes for Newsweek, will be on hand to discuss the impact his time at the DA made on his career.

Refreshments will be served, and several of our editors will be available to answer your questions.

We look forward to meeting you there!