Starting last Monday, the New York Times began charging readers to access articles online. The newspaper is allowing users to read twenty free articles each month, after which they will have to pay for one of a variety of subscription options described on the website. Arthur Sulzberger Jr., chairman of the New York Times Company, defended this change in a letter to readers, saying that it will allow for the “continuation of our journalistic mission.”
Without doubt, these subscription fees have angered many readers and pose an issue for colleges and universities that order print copies of the paper on campus, but do not have online accounts for students.
Several years ago, Connecticut College began purchasing hard copies of the New York Times for the campus with money from a donation. When this money ran out in the middle of last year, the school was planning on ending the distribution of the papers. SGA, with the help of Government Professor Tristan Borer, created a Newspaper Task Force and fought to remain a part of the readership program in order to keep students informed.
“We do not want to be the kind of college that doesn’t allow students to have access to world news,” said Borer. “We are lucky that we were able to reinstate the readership program, and we need to make sure that we stay on it.”
Professor Borer has been in contact with representatives at the New York Times over the past few weeks in order to keep students informed about the changes that are taking place. Daily access to the New York Times is mandatory in all of her classes, as well as other courses in the government department.
“I try to get a copy of the paper whenever I can, but there are only so many copies around campus so I end up relying on the online version pretty often,” said Annie Cutler ’14.
Because Connecticut College receives a certain number of copies, anyone with an “@conncoll.edu” email account, including faculty, will be given a discounted rate of around 50-75% off the normal price for online access to the newspaper.
However, some students are not convinced by the lower price. Anna Williams ’13 says that she is not very likely to pay to read the website. “Honestly, this is just going to make me put more of an effort into getting a hard copy of the paper around campus,” said Williams. “The layout of the website isn’t ideal and giving twenty free articles a month doesn’t even amount to one article a day.”
Because many students have family who have the paper delivered, they can receive unlimited access by using their parents’ access code. Claire Brennan ’13, an international relations major, has decided to use this approach. “My mom gets the Times at home every day,” she explained, “and I’m planning on using her account to get access. I think it’s ridiculous to have to pay for something online that is nowhere near the quality of the newspaper itself.”
Hopefully this obstacle will not discourage students from keeping up on the news. “I’m going to wait and see whether this change affects the amount of information that I can easily access. If it starts to seem like I’m limiting myself, maybe then I’ll pay for more online access,” said Ryan Dillon ’13.
It seems that the faculty and administrators at Connecticut College are doing all that they can to ensure students full access to such a highly respected newspaper. “A core part of our school’s mission is to make students into global citizens,” said Borer. This new change in the fee policy will make this mission a bit more of a struggle, but the New York Times is willing to cooperate with schools that participate in their readership program to make this adjustment slightly easier on students. Borer explained that we will know within the next few weeks exactly how much money online access will cost for students and this will determine how the school will approach the issue. •
