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BY MELISSA CRUZ

In print | October 4, 2007

The college’s yearbook, The Halcyon, has been experiencing financial and publishing problems that interfered with the production of the 2006 edition of the yearbook. The Halcyon, first established in 1884, is a student-run organization and is funded through the Student Budget Committee. About five years ago, the SBC decided to make this annual collaboration of photos, shout-outs and memorable events free to all students enrolled in the College during the year of publication. Prior to that, it was free only to the graduating seniors.

“The budget for The Halcyon comes from the student activities fund, a few commercial advertisements, as well as student personalizations. However, as last year was the first year students were able to do personalizations, it wasn’t received as well as was anticipated,” said Sung Choi ’08, Editor-in-Chief and Administrative Editor for this year. “The senior boosters were what funded the coloration of the 2007 edition.”

As for the actual publication process, The Halcyon typically undergoes a long process of “proofing,” which is essentially editing and proof-reading by both The Halcyon staff and the publishing company, Jostens. “Ideally, we try to get [yearbooks] out by the end of the October following graduation. However, it is not uncommon for the process to be upheld for various reasons, and delayed by up to one or two months,” Choi said.

However, the 2006 edition of The Halcyon experienced complications, which have pushed back its finalized publication by over a year. Due to severe understaffing and a resulting lack of structure in the organization, the creation and editing processes of the yearbook suffered. In addition, technical difficulties arose when the uploaded files were found to be corrupt or missing and had to be resent to Jostens for re-proofing.

After troubleshooting several more proofing problems, the 2006 Halcyon was ready for the press by January of 2007.

As is customary, the allotted budget for The Halcyon allows for the books to be sent individually to each of the graduating seniors. However, by the time the 2006 edition was sent to the press last April, it was too late to campus-mail the books to the Class of 2007. This led to a budgeting dilemma that called for the action of the SBC.

Choi said that mailing a yearbook to each student would cost four dollars per person. “The 2006 yearbooks were mailed to the class of 2006 in June. As for the class of 2007, we have the funds for the projected cost of mailing the books to them, but it might turn out being more than we expected. In that case, The Halcyon editors would need to go to SBC to request the supplementary funds,” SBC manager Giannina Esquivel ’08 said.

“Our biggest problem with the yearbook was a lack of supervision. The SBC manager usually has no training or knowledge as a yearbook editor and so has difficulty knowing what needs to be done on a weekly basis to get the yearbook out in a timely manner,” Esquivel said.

Fortunately, the new Administrative Editor position has been created to solve just that. Choi has been assigned this role for the 2008 edition of The Halcyon. Choi’s tasks will involve acting as a liaison between the SBC and The Halcyon.

“It is a position which will be filled by a previous editor, so knowledge of how a yearbook functions will already be available to SBC,” Esquivel said. The Administrative Editor will supervise the editorial board, advise them on what deadlines need to be met and how best to meet them and report all progress to SBC.

“We try to oversee that things are running as they should without overstepping our boundaries. Sometimes, it is best to have fewer members involved, each with their own say in the process[es], and actually, we never really had a say to begin with,” Assistant Coordinator of Student Activities Paury Flowers said on the topic of administration interaction with student-run organizations

In the past, the heavy workload of being editor of The Halcyon also figured into the difficulty of its publication.

“Another problem was the vast amount of work that was expected of the editor,” Esquivel

said. “The editor normally worked 20 hours per week, but towards the end of the year, when the book was being compiled, it became more than that.”

A solution has been found in hiring an editorial board consisting of four editors, each working for five hours per week rather than giving the workload to one sole editor.

“We are confident that this will solve the past problems we have had,” Esquivel said of the changes made in the coordination and inter-departmental communication of The Halcyon.

“From my understanding, the 2007 edition of The Halcyon is progressing well and has not had any major complications with its progress,” Flowers said.

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