Our Mission:
"Student Media & Publications are for the common good of the UVU student body. The
Student Media & Publications goals are to provide an avenue for freedom of expression
and to communicate worthwhile and newsworthy information to the campus community while
providing a place for student learning. Student Media & Publications shall provide
a voice for student concerns and issues to facilitate meaningful and educational communication
and interaction between students, faculty and administration." -Preamble, Student Publications and Media constitution.
Submission of Articles:
The UVU Review team is often asked how someone can get something to appear in the
paper. Essentially there are four ways that can happen:
- A student can submit an article for publication. Submissions are reviewed by the
student editors and producers and must be approved before publication or broadcast.
- A person can submit a “letter to the editor” to be included on the paper’s Opinion
page. These submissions are, again, reviewed by the student editors and producers
before publication or broadcast.
- A person can “pitch” a story— this usually takes the form of a press release and will
follow the established protocol for submission, editing and publication and/or broadcast
for UVU news team beat reporter assignments and submission.
- Finally any person or organization can pay for advertising space in either the print,
broadcast, podcast, or online news productions. Please see our latest advertising rate sheet for information on placements and costs. All advertising subject to the policies
and practices of the UVU REVIEW news organization.
The UVU Review operates as news forum for all currently enrolled students at Utah
Valley University. Any student can submit articles for consideration, and any student
can apply to be a member of news team.
1. Submit an article for publication
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For article submissions the following guidelines should be followed:
- The person writing the article must be a current student in good standing at Utah
Valley University. Faculty, staff and community members can submit articles for consideration.
In addition to being an open public forum for students, The UVU Review is also a vehicle
for journalism education.
- The Review uses the Associated Press (AP) Stylebook for news formatting. All articles
for submission should conform to this standard. The Review can assist new writers
as they learn the AP style and can help them build a story that “reads like a news
article”. Newspaper articles are almost always written in the third person and they
follow typical newswriting conventions like the inverted pyramid.
- The Review upholds the standards set by the Society of Professional Journalists as
outlined in that body’s Code of Ethics. You can find the complete SPJ Code of Ethics
here. Students must remain objective in their reporting and avoid conflicts of interests.
So for instance, if you were a member of a student club you could not write an article
about that club—it would be a conflict of interest.
- All article submissions are subject to review, fact-checking, copy-editing and final
approval by the Executive News Director, editor-in-chief, and their staff.
- Students interested in submitting articles for publication should stop by the newsroom
in SL 213 and meet with a member of staff or the Student Media & Publications Director,
Grant Flygare in SL 213.
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2. Submit a letter to the editor
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Letters to the editor and opinion/editorials (op-eds) can be submitted by any student,
staff, faculty or community member. Submissions should adhere to the following guidelines:
- Letters to the Editor need to include the full name and contact information of the
writer (email address, phone and current address), even if your preference is to remain
anonymous *The decision to honor the request of anonymity of the person submitting
the Letter to the Editor, is the decision of the Executive News Director. The decision
will be communicated to the submitting person before publication or broadcast.) Also.
the writer should indicate their connection to UVU (student, faculty member, staff,
or concerned citizen, etc).
- The best letters are short and to the point. A 100 word letter is much more likely
to be published than a 500 word essay.
- Op-eds are longer form opinion pieces from a particular point of view. So for instance
if the English department on campus wanted to write an “open letter” to the administration
complaining about the tenure process that might take the form of an op-ed. Or if the
Student Body President wanted to inform the student body about a particular issue
they were passionate about they could write an op-ed.
- Letters to the editor and op-eds are subject to review, fact-checking, copy-editing
and final approval by the Excutive News Director.
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3. Pitch a story
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Students, faculty, staff, and community members are invited to pitch a story to the
editorial staff. Pitches should adhere to the following guidelines:
- One of the most effective ways to pitch a story to a journalist is to give them a
press release. Press releases are typically 1-2 pages and they take the form of a
traditional news article—with headlines, quotes from people involved and written using
the AP style guide. For examples of press releases you can check out the university’s
newsroom blog here.
- Press releases and other materials can be delivered to the student newsroom in SL
213 or can be sent to the Executive News Director here.
- You can also pitch your story in person by visiting a member of the news team in the
student newsroom. All story ideas are picked up at the discretion of the editors and
producers. Basically, you need to sell your idea to the appropriate team member who
covers your topic.
- The best story pitches contain one or more of the basic news values: Impact—How will this affect the audience’s lives? Timeliness—Did this just happen? Prominence—Who are the big names involved in the story? Proximity— Is this story local to the audience? The Bizarre—Is there anything unexpected about the story? We sometimes call this “Man Bites Dog”.
Conflict—What are the different sides of this issue, and what are their arguments? Currency—is the story of the moment? Is this currently trending? For example, a story about
love has currency around Valentine’s Day, and a spooky story has currency at Halloween.
Finally, Human Interest—Does the story say something compelling about an individual?
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4. Pay for advertising space in either the print or online editions
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Finally, the best way to make sure your message will definitely appear in the paper
is to buy an advertisement.
Find the current advertising rate card here.
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