Guest Blog: Working at the YDN

Editor's note: This blog is by Harrison Korn, a sophomore in Saybrook and one of the science tour guides.

Working for the Yale Daily News, the oldest (and according to the Princeton Review, best!) college daily, has been an incredibly rewarding experience for me.

As a freshman, I started at the YDN (what most people on campus call the Yale Daily News) as a production and design (P&D) assistant. Two days a week I went to the YDN building (yes, we have our own building) and worked a two hour shift (usually from 8-10 pm or 10 pm-12 am) designing the next day's paper. My amazing editors and other P&D staffers taught me so much about design (for instance, what is a pica?) and about life.

Most of the amazing YDN P&D staff and editors at the annual YDN banquet

Working at the YDN has a lot of perks, one of which is lots of food. Every night the YDN has sushi, Thai food, pizza, etc. I picked which days of the week I went in based on the food that night (I usually chose sushi nights).

One of the highlights of my YDN experience was working on the redesign of the paper last summer. Mario Garcia (who has designed over 500 papers, including the latest redesign of the Wall Street Journal) and Pegie Stark Adam were hired to redesign the YDN. On Memorial Day weekend, I went to New York City along with most of the YDN design staff (paid for by the YDN) to meet with Garcia and see the initial prototypes of the redesign.

Over the next three months we went through prototype after prototype to get the design just r ight. Every little thing (should sports headlines be centered or left justified?) was thought about. Over those three months I learned more about fonts than I thought I would ever know.

In case you were curious, which I am sure you are, the YDN now uses three fonts: Moderno (for headlines), Quiosco (for body copy), and Benton Sans (for captions).

The best part about working on the redesign was for one week before the dorms opened in August the entire design team came back to campus to be trained in the redesign. The YDN put us up in the New Haven Hotel (and paid for all our meals so we obviously went to eat at nice restaurants) while we worked with Peggy and Mario to make the final redesign decisions and learn how to work with the new design.

This year, in addition to design work, I became more involved with reporting. The great thing about reporting for the YDN is that you can get involved as little or as much as you want. As a freshman, you typically start out as a general assignment reporter. You can write three times a week, once a month, or anywhere in between. After spending the afternoon writing your story, you come into the building and sit down with an editor. Together, you go over the story and work to polish it up. I am constantly amazed at how my editors' small changes always make my writing so much better!

Sophomore year, many reporters choose to get a specific "beat," or area of the University that you specialize in covering. Beats range from covering the University President (my suitemate Paul has this beat so he talks to President Levin frequently, usually at 9 pm) to covering Admissions to covering New Haven City Hall politics.

Being a YDN reporter also has some nice perks. For the elections, the YDN sent Paul to Arizona to report on John McCain's concession speech. We sent three other reporters to Chicago, another reporter to Virginia, and another to Nebraska (where a Yalie was running for Congress). One reporter even went to Wasilla, Alaska (Sarah Palin's hometown).

A picture Paul took while in Arizona to cover John McCain for the YDN

In addition to P&D and reporting, I also dabbled with the YDN online desk. For the online desk I videotaped events and edited the footage for the website. A huge perk of this was I got into events (in order to tape them) that I otherwise would have never gotten into (like the Denzel Washington Master's Tea last year in SM).

P&D, reporting, and online are just three of the many ways to get involved in the YDN. YDN also has copy staffers (who write the headlines, captions, and make sure the articles conform to Associated Press-style standards), photographers, and there is Scene (a special section that comes out every Friday) where there is lots of opportunity to get involved if you want to write theater/music/food reviews or be a little more creative.

The absolute best thing about the YDN is the people. YDN is not all work. There are plenty of fun events to get to know all the other YDN people - I met many of my best friends at Yale through the YDN.

The editor-in-chief and one of the city desk editors prepare for the YDN holiday party.

I strongly encourage all of you to look into getting involved in the oldest college daily. If you have any questions, feel free to message me!

Guest blog: Want to Go to a Hawker Center, Lah?

Editor's note: This post is by Maureen Gaj, a junior in JE who will also be guest-blogging from her semester abroad in the spring!

If you can handle 24 hours of traveling by plane, then Yale has some opportunities for you!

Well, okay, I lie. It could actually be less than 24 hours of plane torture, especially if you are some of the people who work in Brussels, London, Mexico, Montreal, and Madrid. (I don’t want to bore you with all 18 places, so for the whole list, you can check out HERE. But for the rest of the people jetting off to Ghana, China, Singapore, South Africa, and Uganda, I hope you remember a fully charged iPod, a travel pillow, and some really interesting books.

This summer, I applied for one of the International Bulldogs Programs. And suddenly, when people were asking where I would be for the summer, I was answering "Singapore!"

So Singapore (The land where food courts are hawker centers and everyone is a lah).

I had to double check where Singapore was, ensure that my lack of any language other than English would not land me into trouble, and explain to my mother that Singapore was malaria free, but it was worth all the preparations, because I think it is safe to say I had the best summer of my life.

Not only did I have the best job ever. But, I had a lifetime of experiences in ten weeks.

First, Yale found us great housing right in the middle of the Central Business District. Wicked awesome. I lived with three other girls in this cute little apartment. It was just like being all grown up, except that in ten weeks I’d be back at school, with cooked meals and bathrooms that magically clean themselves. The view from our room was amazing. I’ve included it below, because it still makes me smile.

So breathtaking. Karolina (my roommate) and I could climb out our window onto this small balcony and look out at the city at night.

There were twelve of us there in Singapore this summer, and we each found our own niche in the city. We went on trips and activities sponsored by the Yale Club in Singapore, many of which involved Devin, who is pretty much the best example of how awesome Yale alumni can be. We got to go to various events at his three different restaurants in Singapore: Brewerkz, Café Iguana, and Wine Garage. He took great care of us while we were there; he even took us on a tour of Brewerkz brewery!

Here we all are at Brewerkz with Devin (he’s the guy with the super sweet shirt and glasses on the left). Well almost all of us: Jie was on a business trip to Malaysia (she went to 5 different countries with her job!) and Betty left early, and I’m taking the photo. And we are missing Liz, our amazing coordinator.

We also did a ton of traveling. A bunch of us went to KL in Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur), and I also went to Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam and Bangkok in Thailand. It was absolutely, positively, fantastically, amazing.

And what’s even better, is Yale also paid for us to go and work at an orphanage in Siam Reap, Cambodia. That was probably my most favorite part of my entire summer. We worked at Sunshine Village and really got to have a great time with the kids. It made me really appreciate what I’ve got at Yale and at home, and made me a little more conscientious about the world. It was also great to see my first Wonder of the World (on some lists): Angkor Wat. I can’t even find words to describe this. We climbed on ruins, walked through huge gates, and saw Buddhist monks. It was incredible.

Katie, Karolina and I (complete with paint from our morning at the orphanage), with a couple of boys who liked our warpaint and copied!

All of us in front of one of the Bayon faces: Gabe, me, Katie, Bernie, Betty, Mitchell, Khadija, Karolina, Jie, Dhruv, Diana and Derek!

When I wasn’t traveling, I worked for Schlumberger in their Subsea Division, running explosion and fire analysis. It was complicated stuff, but so cool and totally relevant to my Chemical Engineering degree. So all you science majors can definitely go abroad too! There are plenty of research opportunities abroad (I know because I just checked the database).

Anyways. This summer was amazing. There just aren’t words or room here to describe it all. But, it all happened because of Yale. The program, the activities, the internship were all set up by Yale. In fact, Yale even gave me some funding through a couple of grants. And you can even use this awesome thing called ISA, which basically provides funding (based on the percent of your financial aid) for one summer experience abroad.

As if Yale doesn’t have enough for me right here on campus, it has also found a ton of things for me to do abroad too. Its kinda like Christmas where each present is better than the last, except this time, Yale is outdoing each of my summer experiences. I can’t wait for Summer 2009!

Happy Holidays!

Happy Christmas/Hanukkah/Kwanzaa/whatever you celebrate!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

One of my favorite Yale traditions is the annual holiday dinner - besides the big one for freshmen in Commons, each residential college hosts their own feast, with their own traditions.

Not only does the dining hall staff make an extra-special dinner, they show off their decorating skills in elaborate displays, like the sugared fruit below:

This year, as we ate, we were also treated to music from a quartet of trombones, composed of one Silliman junior and three School of Music students. It just goes to show the incredible talent and opportunities for creativity at Yale, that an undergrad can perform with music students, and that together they can arrange/re-adapt their own music.

Silliman in particular has a special tradition: a performance from the Silliringers! Some alum donated a lovely set of handbells, which are brought out just a few times a year for practicing ("for minutes and minutes") and the annual performance. A Youtube video below:



Of course, what would Christmas be without a little snow?

The snow falling at night

The frosted courtyard in the morning

Welcome Yale 2013!

Welcome to all the newly-admitted members of the Yale community to be, the class of 2013!

To start getting you all excited about things yet to come, a video from last year's Bulldog Days:



A quick introduction: I'm a senior in Silliman College, double-majoring in Psychology (Neuroscience track) and History of Science, History of Medicine. Some of you may recognize me from this summer, when I worked as a senior interviewer and also helped out with information sessions and tours. In my free time, I teach and perform with Phoenix Dance Troupe, serve on the Yale Scientific Magazine editorial board, and plan a lot of events for Silliman, including the Safety Dance!

Over the next few months, this space will be filled by posts about all aspects of Yale life, including but not limited to residential college pride, campus-wide parties, varsity sports, and even the occasional class or two. Our bloggers range from freshmen to seniors (such as myself), and we'll also have the occasional guest post from a professor, admissions officer, etc.

So sit back, relax, and we hope you enjoy the reading!