Opinion: Our goal is to give you what you need to know - and correct the first time
When I was a senior in high school, I was named the copy editor of the Sumter High School's student newspaper, The Cock's Quill. My editing confession: At some point that year, we misspelled a school coach's name in the paper, and we published a correction - but we misspelled her name a different way in the correction. I was mortified.
Now, as the assistant editor for my hometown's newspaper, I pay much more attention to people's names. I've heard before the saying that people's names are generally in the paper just twice in their lives, in a birth announcement and later in their obituary, so it's important to get them correct. But we like to celebrate people's successes in our community, too, and what they're doing to help others and make an impact where they are, so we hope people can appear in the paper more often than just twice. We know we need to get things right the first time, not the second or even the third like back in my high school years. I still think about that from time to time, and that was in 2005. To former SHS Coach Raabe, I do apologize.
You as readers wouldn't trust us about anything if we can't get even simple things correct like spelling and grammar.
My job is to help our reporters produce their best work so you will be more informed about what's going on in your area. I enjoy working with them to help them tell stories clearly and concisely while keeping their "voice," or what makes their writing unique to them, alive.
Alongside editing, I design many of the pages you see every week with Rhonda Barrick. We both hope that what we do in terms of design helps you in your daily life, from quick lists of information to pullout boxes about events that are coming up. One of my professors called that "refrigerator journalism" - make it so useful that a reader wants to cut it out and tape it to the fridge for reference.
Our goal at The Sumter Item is to give you the information you need to live your best life here in Sumter, whatever that means for you and your family.
As my copy-editing teacher nailed into our heads in college, brevity in journalism is important, too, so thank you for supporting local journalism, and let us know how we can better serve you.
Melanie Smith is assistant editor of The Sumter Item.