The Courier is an award-winning independent student publication both written and edited by volunteers at Newcastle University Students’ Union.
Originally founded as King’s Courier in 1948, the Courier now publishes a 40-page newspaper every week of term-time. The Courier is available for free around campus for students, staff and visitors in Castle Leazes, both Robinson libraries, the Students’ Union Building, the King’s Gate Centre and school common rooms, plus many more locations.
The Courier now has 14 different sections, split into Current Affairs, Life & Style, Culture and Sport. Each print edition also features a page of fantastic puzzles for taking a break between seminars.
The Courier has over 200 volunteer writers who contribute articles both for our website and for our print editions. The sections are managed by a team of roughly 50 sub-editors, who liaise with writers, edit articles and lay up the pieces using specialist software. These sub-editors are in turn overseen by a team of senior editors. The Courier is ultimately led by the Editor, who is an elected sabbatical officer at the Students’ Union. This year your Editor of the Courier is me myself, Grace Dean, a former News Sub-Editor who was involved in the Courier for three years before becoming Editor.
Anyone who is a student at Newcastle University can write for the Courier. Whether you want to review of your favourite film, comment on worldwide issues, update students about what’s happening on campus or hold your university to account with some investigative journalism, there’s space in the Courier for everyone’s voice to be heard. The Courier enables you to hold the University to account and make real change across campus. Recently we have covered contentious topics such as the limited opening times of the University’s Muslim prayer space and period poverty on campus, cooperating with last year’s Students’ Union President to lobby the University to introduce free sanitary products across campus.
We hold weekly writers’ meetings in the Planning Room of the Students’ Union on Wednesday afternoons. These are drop-in sessions from 1:30pm to 2:30pm, meaning that you don’t have to come for the whole hour. Each of our sections will have a stand with a sub-editor there and a list of articles for the week. Don’t like the look of any? Our sub-editors are always enthusiastic about writers proposing their own article ideas, so just let them know what you want to write about and they can support you. Unable to attend the writers’ meetings? No worries! All our leftover articles get posted in our Facebook groups, so make sure you join them all. Simply search “the Courier [section] writers 2019/20” on Facebook, or email the section you’re interested in for more information.
Our first writers’ meeting will take place in the Planning Room of the Students’ Union on Wednesday 2 October, and will operate as a drop-in between 1:30pm and 2:30pm. You can also find out more at the freshers’ fair on 23 and 24 September, where the Courier will have a stall.
Whether you want to build up a portfolio, experiment with creative writing, have your say or merely see your name in print, you can open a world of opportunities by becoming a writer for the Courier. In recent years, writers and editors have developed careers at the Guardian, ITV News, The Sunday Times and Good Housekeeping.
