Beginning in fall 2012, The New York Times and USA Today will be more widely available on campus. The newspapers will be in more locations, and students can now access their news from the Internet through the university.
Previously on campus, the number of copies of both newspapers available was concentrated mainly to Coates University Center. Also, fewer copies were available overall.
“In Coates there were 45 copies of USA Today per day and 120 copies of The New York Times available, and in Mabee Dining Hall there were 15 USA Todays and 20 New York Times,” said Sean Solis, vice president of the Association of Student Representatives.
Solis pushed for a change in distribution after realizing that students were not utilizing many of the copies available in Coates.
“I met with the USA Today representative. Her name is Karen Shafer, and she works with our school. She gave me the data from last year of how many papers were being picked up per day. I also merged that with a student survey that said it would be helpful if there were more papers in the library. Primarily the survey made the change. Seeing that only 63 copies on average were being picked up from Coates, we could more easily distribute those papers,” Solis said.
Now there will be a news station in Java City, where 40 copies of The New York Times and 15 copies of USA Today will be available daily. The number of papers in Mabee Dining Hall has also increased overall, with 40 copies of The New York Times now available””an increase from the previous 20″”and 15 copies of USA Today. The number of copies of The New York Times has been decreased in Coates to 80 from a previous 120. With these changes also comes student access to The New York Times online.
“The biggest thing is the availability of the online component. I think a number of students will be primarily accessing The New York Times through the Internet. It will help in two ways: having an overall more-informed campus and helping in classes such as political science that require students to be exposed to the news,” said Solis.
Online access for The New York Times will be available for Trinity students starting Aug. 20, and delivery begins on Wednesday, Aug. 22.