The Vagaries of University Bureaucracy (re: TLE)

[Tage]

I almost moved it to Site News, since TWG was originally created through TLE. It's fine here, though.

On topic, hearing this seriously ruined my day. TLE offered the most practical editing and publishing experience at BYU. The fact that most submissions don't come from students is sort of the point; it's a REAL magazine. Cutting it is very short-sighted.

[Skar]

I just sent a very polite email to [email protected] expressing my disappointment in their decision.

I'd also like to volunteer to perform any work that can be electronically farmed out to me.

It's ironic to me that the department where I was mercilessly bludgeoned, along with all the other english majors, about being open minded and willing to explore new vistas is the one dumping TLE because it doesn't fit the "literary" mold.

My curiosity is aroused though, when and why did TLE have non-student head editors?  Seems like a dumb idea and I don't remember it being that way when I was there.

[stacer]

You suggested that perhaps a well thought out snail mail letter might help. I'd like to send one on company letterhead, all official-like, expressing regret and high disappointment. If it hadn't been for TLE, I wouldn't have made *any* of the professional contacts I have and wouldn't have my current job. It was through Eng 330 that I met Kristy, who announced TLE in class, and I started going with her. If I'd never read slush there, I wouldn't have gotten the next jobs I got after graduation. I've made author contacts that originated through people I knew at TLE, and I never would have gone to LTUE without TLE either--which directly led to me finding an author who is currently writing for me. Many of the people I talk to in the SFF field know Leading Edge, and my grad school was impressed that I worked on a magazine in college.

That academic/professional enough to send a letter?

[MsFish]

Huh.  I can't say I'm surprised, but that does suck.  

[JenaRey]

I think emphasizing the academic aspects that we've all learned is a very important thing as far as writing letters.  I too owe a lot of my professional success to the experience gained during my time at TLE.  The opportunities to learn are unique and should be acknowledged no matter what type of literature is being published.

This is a sad thing to hear that is, unfortunately, very reflective of a lot of problems with the Y as of late.

[Mister M]

My curiosity is aroused though, when and why did TLE have non-student head editors?  Seems like a dumb idea and I don't remember it being that way when I was there.

To my knowledge, the only non-student head editor TLE has had is Jelly Belly, who attained that position *checks watch* well, either this week or next, whenever my term officially ends.

It happens when someone graduates and keeps coming. TLE editorship is very much biased toward seniority, after all, so if you keep coming you'll probably end up there. I don't really see it being a problem, so long as the editorship doesn't fossilize in place.

[EUOL]

I really think that we should continue our efforts to the linguists department.  If they look at the people being trained, not the literature of the issue, I think that they'll realize what a bargain TLE is.

Has anyone contacted Dave or Scott yet?  Also, how about Ann Sowards?  Ookla, an official letter via Tokyopop might also be nice.

[Jelly_Belly]

It's really great to hear these testimonials from you are. And yes, I am a non-student editor, but I was a student on the magazine for 16 months before I graduated. I think Chris Kugler was head editor as well after graduating (I can't remember for sure) and Charisa was an editor after graduating as well. I can understand not having professionals being the editors for it, but for recent graduates who worked on it as a student, I don't see the problem.

I actually had asked Linda Adams what she thought about me continuing on after graduation and she thought it was a great idea. And we were really short on people who had been at the magazine long enough to be editors, so I think it was good I stayed.

[EUOL]

Mister M,

I think you're ditching BYU a little too quickly.

I have to admit, I've seen the growing piles of back issues, and have been concerned that this day would come.  I made several suggestions to try and head the event off, but I was politely ignored by both faculty and TLE editors.

Now that this has happened, I do think that what we need to do is fight for BYU to continue sponsoring TLE, but with a much smaller budget.  The truth is, you don't need to do the print runs that you do.  With places like Lulu doing POD at $4 a book, it would be very easy to switch to them as a printer.

That leaves only needing money to pay artists and authors.  We need to emphasize that the money given to TLE as budget, however, is there to train the staff.  At about $750 a semester, it would be a real bargain for the training the students would get.  

[Jelly_Belly]

Well, what are you suggesting? We already cut our print run in half (to 200 issues). For just the cost of artists and authors, it cost about $550 (some we paid out of our account and some paid by the English dept), plus $4 a book (which is the cheapest we've found). We have 50 current subscribers plus 39 people on staff, plus two copies for each artist and author so that's 28 more contributor's copies, so we need to print at least 117 issues plus some extra for those who buy separately. We maybe could go down to 150 copies, but that's only $200 less. So that's at least $1100.

Plus the English department won't take us back just for costing a little less. I think it's beyond cost, personally.

We really did fight this thing. Talk to Matt and you'll find out how many people he talked to in English, Linguistics, and the College to keep us at BYU. It may not seem like it to you all because you're hearing about this after it's all happened, but we've been trying to work this all out for a couple months now.

We do appreciate any help you all can give though. If you can think of something that we haven't thought of, we'd love to stay at BYU and we have until October, essentially to be able to find a way.

[Mister M]

I think you're ditching BYU a little too quickly.

I think you might have misunderstood. We aren't ditching BYU. We tried everything we could to stay with BYU, including offering to cut budgets, change departments, subsidize the issues out of our own merchant account, etc. In the end, we were given two choices: Go independent, or shut down. We tried other options; they were all closed on us.

Maybe it's simply the inability to convey a semester's worth of work through a simple post. But basically, we aren't ditching BYU, we're being cut off.

Edit: Ditto what Jelly_Belly said about advice. If you can think of any options we overlooked that might work, please, tell us.

[EUOL]

When did you find out about this?

[EUOL]

Okay, I re-read your words a few more times above, Mr. M, and I think that you're doing a very good job.  This is a good plan, and could work very well.  (Are you thinking LuLu for your POD publisher?)

However, I still think that there is more that can be done here.  I feel a little annoyed that, as faculty, I found out about this so late.  My strings are getting thinner and thinner, but I still have a few that I can pull.  Let me see what I can do, though--of course--I won't rock any boats.

[Mister M]

When did you find out about this?

We were first told around early March; the English Department's decision to not keep us on had occured sometime before then, how long I don't know.

For a time it looked like the Linguistics Department would take us on (and the English Department had even offered to continue providing half-budget, at least for a while, and we determined we could cut costs enough to survive off that), but then they decided not to, either.

[Mister M]

Okay, I re-read your words a few more times above, Mr. M, and I think that you're doing a very good job.  This is a good plan, and could work very well.  (Are you thinking LuLu for your POD publisher?)

However, I still think that there is more that can be done here.  I feel a little annoyed that, as faculty, I found out about this so late.  My strings are getting thinner and thinner, but I still have a few that I can pull.  Let me see what I can do, though--of course--I won't rock any boats.

Thanks. And don't feel too miffed about not being told; our advisor had to find out from Linda Adams, who found out from us, who found out from the College of Humanities. We're not quite sure when the English Department planned on telling us anything, but they didn't seem to be in a great hurry about it. (We would have told Zina ourselves, save that the department told Matt they would do it.)

And thanks for looking into strings to pull. Any help is greatly appreciated.