Poly given subsidy for Fiscal Year 2019

If you found me a year and a half ago and told me I would eventually be the editor in chief of The Polytechnic, I would have almost certainly said, “What is an editor in chief?” Looking back, the amount that I’ve learned from the paper alone is unbelievable to me. I owe so much of that to the wonderful, knowledgeable people I’ve met through The Poly and late nights perusing the depths of our website.

I have never been one for introductions, so I’ll make it quick. For those of you who don’t know me, I’m Brookelyn, and I was elected to the position of editor in chief in December. I have an update regarding The Poly, so that seemed like a good place to start.

This fall, The Polytechnic submitted a budget to the Union Executive Board. Unlike previous years, we requested and were approved for a subsidy. It felt wrong not to share this, as we have long prided ourselves on being financially independent.

I took on the role of advertising director at the end of the summer. After looking into our budget, I realized that we had been budgeting for best-case scenarios for the past few years; this meant we expected to earn around $37,000 in advertising income per year. This income was supposed to cover everything—the cost of printing the paper, our office phone, subscriptions, ink, and other miscellaneous expenses.

To be frank, I could not expect myself to bring in that much money. So, we decided to ask for all the necessities of operations to be subsidized, aside from the printing of the paper. It’s simple—if the income from ads doesn’t cover the cost of the paper for that week, we don’t print. Any extra income from ads will first go towards covering all of our other expenses, but if that extra income isn’t there, we won’t go into debt.

The subsidy is there if we need it. Hopefully we won’t, but I thought it would be better to be realistic than hopeful.

Additionally, I wouldn’t be true to myself as advertising director if I didn’t include this: right now, the advertising department is just me. Soliciting advertisements is a straightforward, yet very rewarding, job. The more people we have working on getting ads, the better. I would be happy to talk to you—or any of your business major friends looking for experience—about how it works and how to get involved. If you’re interested, feel free to shoot an email to ads@poly.rpi.edu.

Also, if you’re reading this and you’ve advertised with us, thank you. You are the reason that we can put out a physical paper (almost) every week, and I am beyond appreciative of your support.

With all of that being said, you’ve made it to the “join The Poly!” pitch. If you are interested in anything with the paper—whether it’s writing, photography, layout, business, or systems—and you want to get involved, send an email to poly@rpi.edu. We’d be happy to have you.

If you have any concerns or questions about what we do, feel free to direct them to poly@rpi.edu. You can also stop by during my office hours, which are on Mondays and Wednesdays from 2–3 pm in our office, RU 3418. Feel free to pop in for a chat! I could probably talk about The Poly for the rest of my life.