CREDIT: STEPHANIE LAI
The Gazette at Western University is cutting its print production to twice a week, effective September.

The 2014-15 school year for The Gazette at Western University has been an eventful one.

The paper received backlash in September for its frosh issue, which included stories about drug use and dating teacher’s assistants.

Effective September, the paper will be moving into a more digital- focused mentality and publish only twice a week.

Editor-in-chief Iain Boekhoff says the decision was made in January and months of research was put into it.

“Students are on the go, they’re on their phones and tablets and other electronic devices,” he said. “We need to be producing content to reach as many people as possible, and we should reflect the realities of student life. Most people are on their phones and not picking up the paper.”

Boekhoff says training staff and volunteers was also a consideration.

“For most people here, their first internship or their first job will be focused on producing content for online,” he said. “They’ll have to have multiple skills, not just writing a story for a day or two later but writing a story within minutes of it happening and tweeting and live blog … we want to give those specific experiences to our volunteers and our staff.”

Focusing on web production has its benefits. Boekhoff says readers will have access to more diverse and timelier coverage.

“You’ll have a website that’s continuously publishing or perhaps an app or tablet edition, and you’ll also have the print product, which will be unique compared to the stuff we have online,” he said.

Boekhoff also says this will also free up time and energy.

“We’ll drive our content creation to new levels, and we’ll be able to produce a wide range of elements to one story,” he said. “We might have live coverage, video and a print story. That requires three, four or five people to do. For us that’s valuable experience.”

Currently The Gazette is still publishing on a four-time-a-week basis, but is implementing some live blogging.

Boekhoff – who is staying on as editor – will miss the “cool experience” of publishing four times a week.

“It’s really unique because it’s engrained into our culture. We’re in here every day all day of the week,” he said. “But overall everyone is excited for this change and really excited to move into the future or move into the present of where the journalism industry is.”