By Carla Wintersgill
Editor-in-Chief
As editor-in-chief, I take pride in telling our readers all about our stories for the week. Our primary role as journalists is informing the public, and nothing makes me happier than a good scoop. Having the best campus news coverage is what we strive for every day.
So it seems counterintuitive when we talk about what stories won’t make the paper. This is an issue we deal with every week when we’re faced with articles that are potentially libelous, controversial, or just plain poorly reported. There are also stories that never see the light based on personal conscience.
On Saturday night, a Ryerson student took a fatal fall from the roof of Neill-Wycik. The police are calling his death a suicide.
Those are all the details you will read here. Our hearts go out to the student’s friends and family.
What else you won’t see in The Eyeopener this year: a glut of pages.
Unfortunately, the new year hasn’t brought us a respite from the economic chaos. Ad sales are still down, and with them go the size of our paper. Media outlets across the country are cutting back and shedding staffers.
Fortunately, The Eyeopener won’t be laying anyone off. Probably because our editors get paid in beer and Salad King. But with the lack of space available in the paper, we will continue to make greater use of our website. Make sure to check out theeyeopener.com every week for additional content.
Starting online this week in the Arts and Life section, Kiera Toffelmire tracks three Ryerson students as they attempt to fulfil their new year’s resolutions. Kiera checks in with the students during their first month of change and sees how well they’re holding up.
From resolutions to predictions, reporter Hilary Hagerman visits a fortune teller to find out what’s in store for 2009. Apparently October is going to be a big month. Read the whole story on page 10.
I don’t have many prized possessions. No priceless jewelry or family heirlooms. But the one thing that I do have that I treasure above all else is my degree from Ryerson.
I missed convocation and had to wait until August to pick it up when I was back in Toronto. I was so thrilled to finally have my degree after four years of hard work that I guarded the envelope fiercely. I had the degree professionally framed, and now it is safely glassed in, never to be touched by human hands again.
But if this week’s cover story by Chelsea Miya has taught me anything, it’s that I shouldn’t have bothered. Counterfeit degrees are on the rise and schools are stepping up their security measures as a response. Well, other schools are.
Ryerson’s degrees have no security features. They are so easy to fake that once we had a template, we made a bunch for ourselves. Chelsea became a doctor of philosophy. One of our photo editors got his “faux-taagraphy” degree.
All of this made me feel pretty silly about idolizing my degree. But at least I had official transcripts to confirm that I did actually graduate from Ryerson. Turns out you can fake those too. Flip to page 6 for the whole story.
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