RE:CC MAGAZINE BLOG

Magazines have been fortunate to buck the downward trend in print media circulation; readership is as robust as ever. But even the most successful print magazines are always seeking ways to beef up their Web presence. Though CC: Connecticut College Magazine continues to take precedence over CC: online, we strive with each issue to bring you more Web-only features.

With the Fall issue we’ve made great strides. There’s an online presentation by Blake McDonald ’10 about the history of the College’s common rooms. There are videos of Reunion 2008 and a robot learning to walk.

There are some of our students’ favorite recipes, in printer-friendly format. There are photo galleries and slideshows. And last but not least, there’s this blog! It offers a chance for you to interact directly with the editor, art director and associate editor (me!) and tell us what you think.

But we hope you’ll continue to interact with the print product too, in the form of letters to the editor, story suggestions and, of course, Class Notes. With this issue we’re introducing a new feature that we hope will inspire the writer in you: the First Person column, a personal essay that can be written by anyone in the College community. The inaugural column was written by Caroline Gransee ’09, who shares the valuable lessons she learned from the late Tim Russert when she interned on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
So don’t be shy: Send your compliments and complaints, comments and questions, story ideas and First Person essays to ccmag@conncoll.edu. We can’t wait to hear from you!

Posted by Phoebe Hall at 10:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Welcome to RE:CC! We hope to use this blog in part to give a behind-the-scenes glimpse of what goes into producing CC: Connecticut College Magazine, and also as another channel to communicate with our readers. If you have any feedback on the design, photography or production of the magazine, feel free to contact me here or by e-mail.

The Fall 2008 issue of CC: Connecticut College Magazine was my inaugural issue as Art Director. The cover illustration for the Fall 2008 issue was done by Gary Alphonso, a professional artist know for his contemporary “woodcut”-style illustrations (which are produced almost completely on the Mac.) Some readers may have seen examples of Gary’s work without even realizing it! When I selected Gary to do the cover, I was looking for someone who could convey the idealism and optimism of the College as it gets ready to launch a capital campaign and heads toward its centennial anniversary. Gary’s classic yet modern style was a perfect fit.

Over the next year, we will be updating elements of the magazine to improve their readability, such as the Class Notes section of the magazine. Susan Lindberg, my predecessor, beautifully art-directed and designed CC: Connecticut College Magazine for the past decade and brought it to great heights. It is my hope to build upon her strong foundation, adding further visual excitement to feature stories (such as this one, which incorporates a fantastic photograph by Brandon Mosley, a fellow designer here in College Relations) and incorporating more robust content into the online version of CC: Connecticut College Magazine.

One last note on the print version of the magazine:CC: Connecticut College Magazine is printed on a paper with a minimum 10 percent post-consumer recycled content. In keeping with the College’s green practices, our publications team is committed to using environmentally-responsible papers, printers and processes whenever possible in our printed materials, including the magazine.

Posted by Administrator at 3:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Why have a blog about CC: Connecticut College Magazine? We already have a printed magazine that comes out four times a year and is read by about 27,000 alumni, parents and friends of the College. We also have an online magazine that anyone can access from anywhere in the world. What we don’t have is that instant communication between the magazine staff and readers that a blog can provide. That’s why we -- the editor, associate editor and art director of CC: Magazine -- are starting a blog. It’s feedback that will help us plan future content, and eventually a redesign, of this publication.

From an editor’s point of view there’s always a story behind every story. More often there are multiple stories. Chance meetings of alumni in far-flung corners of the globe. A writer getting lost on the way to the interview. Something new at the College that connects to something old. But sometimes there’s a story behind a photo as well. In the case of the image of a deer in the Arboretum meadow, a photo we ran in the “scene” feature of the new fall issue, there are at least four stories behind what seems to be a striking nature photo.

There’s the story of College visual research librarian Mark Braunstein, pictured here in the Arboretum meadow where he took the photograph. There’s the story of environmental stewardship in recapturing a meadow. And there’s the story of two Connecticut College alumni at two different organizations who helped with the project. One, a former botany major, David Anderson ’76, owns a company that supplied the grass and wildflower seed to reseed the meadow. That strikes me as an apt metaphor for the College community. The faculty and alumni are continually planting the seeds for future generations of students, giving back and enriching the campus environment with their ideas and their support. The result of this continual growth and adaptation? New stories to tell in the magazine, of course. I'm looking forward to the next ones!

Posted by Lisa Brownell at 4:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)