Get Involved

As many students at Durham know, Palatinate is by far the university’s oldest paper currently celebrating its 60th anniversary, and its editorship has been graced by such illustrious names as George Alagiah, Jeremy Vine and Hunter Davies. It is a free publication released every 2-3 weeks, and created and funded entirely by the student body. Getting involved is easy – all you need to do is keep your ear to the ground, and read on…

Writing

Without an able team of keen journos – be they reporters, features writers, columnists or reviewers – we just wouldn’t have a paper. If you’re one of those people who constantly needs to get something off your chest, please, spare your poor friends and hit a readership of thousands instead by writing comment. If you’re a shady investigative digger, contact us with your latest shocking scoop. If you’re the one that sits at the back of a gig every Friday night, smoking your cigarillo (out of the window, of course) and donning the most uncool shades you can find, then quick, leg it to our music meetings. And there’s much more… Arts also includes Theatre, Film, Listings (What’s On) and Books, and there are the Features and Sports sections; something for everyone, and for every style of writing.

Scroll down to join our mailing list, through which you’ll be informed about upcoming meetings and editorial vacancies, and get regular details on how to get involved with writing for us. You might get requests for reporters to cover certain events, or you could suggest an idea for an article you’d like to write. As a writer, you have no obligations – you can write one article and decide that it’s not your scene, or keep coming back as a regular contributor. It’s completely up to you.

Editing

This is for the more hard-core – find yourself sifting through articles and choosing what actually goes in the paper (as well as writing a thing or two yourself!). It’s a skilled job, requiring someone who’s full of ideas and who has a keen eye for good writing and layout. It’s helpful to be a dab hand with Adobe InDesign and Photoshop, too, though we can teach you this.

When vacancies come up on the editorial board – usually at the start of term – we’ll advertise them on the front page of this website, and hold interviews to find the best candidate. Don’t be intimidated by this! Many people worry that they don’t have enough experience, or that they won’t be good enough, but we look for fresh ideas and lots of enthusiasm as well as expertise.

The commitment involved in editing varies greatly, but tends to be around 6 to 8 hours on each issue in total, including meeting and layout time. However, joining a section as an editor is your chance to shine, as there are always spaces which need filling, and it often requires a bit of creative genius to source a story at the last minute. All in all, editorial positions are perfect for those who are thinking of a career in media, and need some much-sought-after experience.

Subediting

Are you good at spotting mistakes? Does misuse of apostrophes send you on a rant about sliding standards of English? If you’re known for your pedantry and your impeccable SPAG, you’d make a great Sub. Subeditors check copy and layout of pages before they go to print… and get to put everybody else right. It’s less of a time commitment than a full editorial position, but subs gain many of the same skills in layout and sensitive editing of text, and it can be a useful leg-up to the main editorial board. Get in touch with the Chief Subeditor on the contact form.

Photography

A newspaper is nothing without its photographs, and our team of paparazzi, replete with shady teal-coloured caps and mangy photographers’ vests, is always recruiting new staff. The level of commitment is similar to that of writers – you’re on call if you’d like to be, but there’s no set task to be done for each issue. Use the contact form to get in touchwith our photography editor.

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