The Oracle (University of South Florida)

Last updated
The Oracle
Type Student newspaper
Format Tabloid print format
Owner(s) University of South Florida
Editor-in-chiefClinton Engelberger [1]
FoundedSeptember 6, 1966
Headquarters Tampa, Florida, U.S.
Website https://www.usforacle.com/

The Oracle, the University of South Florida's (USF) editorially independent, student-run newspaper, made history when its premiere issue was published September 6, 1966. It was the first college newspaper in the United States to feature full color photographs on the front page of each issue, according to the Associated Collegiate Press (ACP).

Contents

History

Creation

The Oracle replaced the USF Campus Edition of the now defunct Tampa Times, which had previously served as the school's news publication. The Tampa Times had given the student newspaper three pages of its Monday editions, the front page and pages one and two of the second section, to feature USF campus news. The newspaper made a special Campus Edition press run after its own Monday morning early editions were completed specifically to print papers to be distributed in designated racks on campus and at nearby venues. The university had not yet formed a school for mass communication, so publishing the newspaper was the responsibility of a modest journalism effort, offering four or five basic news writing and editing courses and run by its English department.

Early years

In the summer of 1966, Dr. Arthur M. Sanderson, director of student publications and English professor, entered into an agreement with the St. Petersburg Times to print an entire stand-alone newspaper which would be distributed on campus each Wednesday. Associate communications professor and Oracle general manager Steve Yates, editor-in-chief Harry Haigley and photographer/reporter Tony Zappone collaborated in naming it The Oracle, a Greek term signifying an infallible authority, among other things. (One consideration had been to name it the "USF Bull Sheet.") Its first staff consisted of about 20 student volunteers and part-time paid student staffers who used a small office space on the second floor of the old University Student Center, since torn down and replaced, as headquarters. Yates became the academic faculty coordinator of the paper and kept offices, along with Sanderson, in a room adjacent to the newspaper office for ease of consultation.

Front page color

Editor Haigley assigned Zappone, The Oracle's first staff shutterbug, the task of creating one color photograph illustrating an aspect of campus life or events for the front page of each issue. It was a feature that no other university newspaper had at that time and was a cooperative effort with the St. Petersburg Times (now The Tampa Bay Times).

Each Tuesday, Haigley, Zappone and a third alternating staff member drove 30 miles from the USF campus in North Tampa to the downtown St. Petersburg headquarters of the St. Pete Times to spend an afternoon supervising the composing room staff while mechanicals and plates for the late night press run of The Oracle were assembled. The papers were trucked to the campus each week in the early-morning hours and set out in racks around the campus.

Present

The print edition is now published Mondays and Thursdays, with digital updates throughout the week. The Oracle has won numerous awards in recent years, including Best Overall Student Daily in the Southeast region by the Society of Professional Journalists in 2016.

Awards

In 1967, during its first year of publication, The Oracle was awarded several of the Associated Collegiate Press' National Pacemaker Awards for "excellence in college journalism." Another historic effort by The Oracle was the production of a full-color campus feature magazine insert once each term, edited by Yates and Zappone, with contributions of copy and photographs from The Oracle staff and USF faculty members. The magazine was recognized by the Associated Collegiate Press as the only magazine insert published by a university newspaper at that time.

In September 1970, the newspaper began publishing on Tuesdays and Fridays and in 1972 enhanced the student news and advertising sales staff sufficiently to publish Tuesdays through Fridays in a reduced tabloid-size format. In 1989, The Oracle was named to the ACP's Hall of Fame. The paper won the 1990 Society of Professional Journalists award for Best Student Daily in the Nation (no second or third place was declared that year). [2]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">University of South Florida St. Petersburg</span> Public university in St. Petersburg, Florida, U.S.

The University of South Florida St. Petersburg campus is a campus of the University of South Florida in St. Petersburg, Florida. Opened in 1965 as a satellite campus of the University of South Florida, it was consolidated with the other two USF campuses as of July 1, 2020. USF's St. Petersburg campus is the only public university in Pinellas County. The campus enrolled 4,455 students during the fall 2019 semester.

The College Heights Herald is the student newspaper of Western Kentucky University in Bowling Green, Kentucky, United States. It is free and distributed throughout the campus and city. The school provides professional staff support and facilities for the newspaper but does not exercise editorial control. Called the Herald or the WKU Herald for short, the publication is supported through the sale of advertising and is entirely student-run.

The Battalion is the student newspaper of Texas A&M University. Started in 1893 as a monthly publication, it continues to this day, now as a weekly paper. The first paper at Texas A&M University was the Texas Collegian published in 1878. It was later named the College Journal from 1889 to 1893 and then The Battalion.

The Daily Trojan, or "DT," is the student newspaper of the University of Southern California. The newspaper is a forum for student expression and is written, edited, and managed by university students. The paper is intended to inform USC students, faculty, and staff on the latest news and provide opinion and entertainment. Student writers, editors, photographers and artists can develop their talents and air their opinions while providing a service to the campus community through the Daily Trojan. Readers can interact with the Daily Trojan by commenting on articles online or writing a letter to the editor.

The State Press is the independent, student-operated news publication of Arizona State University. In August 2014, it became an all-digital publication. It published a free newspaper every weekday until January 2013, at which point its print distribution was reduced to once per week. The editorial board announced that ASU Student Media will begin to focus on "a host of new digital products and special print products."

OU Daily, formally known as The Oklahoma Daily, is the independent, student-produced newspaper at the University of Oklahoma, with a circulation of 6,000. Though it maintains a connection with OU's Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communication, the newspaper is not a part of required learning for journalism students at OU. Some classes, however, are offered at The Daily for academic credit.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">University of South Florida</span> Public university in Tampa, Florida, United States

The University of South Florida (USF) is a public research university with its main campus located in Tampa, Florida, and other campuses in St. Petersburg and Sarasota. It is one of 12 members of the State University System of Florida. USF is home to 14 colleges, offering more than 240 undergraduate, graduate, specialist, and doctoral-level degree programs. USF is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research activity" and is accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. USF is a member of the prestigious Association of American Universities and is designated by the Florida Board of Governors as one of three Preeminent State Research Universities.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Tony Zappone</span>

Tony Zappone, became at age 16 the youngest credentialed journalist to lend press coverage to a major national political convention. He was also the youngest contributor of evidence during the Warren Commission hearings into the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. He began his career in journalism at age 14 as a freelance photographer with The Tampa Tribune, now the Tampa Bay Times, paid at the rate of three dollars per news photo used.

<i>The Daily Tar Heel</i>

The Daily Tar Heel (DTH) is the independent student newspaper of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. It was founded on February 23, 1893, and became a daily newspaper in 1929. The paper places a focus on university news and sports, but it also includes heavy coverage of Orange County and North Carolina. In 2016, the paper moved from five days a week in print to four, cutting the Tuesday edition. In 2017, the paper began to print on only Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. In 2021, the paper began to print only on Wednesdays. All editorial content is overseen by student editors and a volunteer student staff of about 230 people. It's located at 109 E. Franklin St. in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and it is the largest news organization in Orange County.

<i>Pipe Dream</i> (newspaper) Student newspaper of Binghamton University in Vestal, New York

Pipe Dream is the student newspaper of Binghamton University in Vestal, N.Y. Content is published online throughout the week at bupipedream.com, as well as in print every Tuesday.

<i>Collegiate Times</i>

The Collegiate Times is an independent, student-run newspaper serving Virginia Tech since 1903. The Educational Media Company at Virginia Tech (EMCVT), a non-profit student media consortium, owns the publication. Based in Blacksburg, Virginia, the Collegiate Times publishes local news, sports, features and opinions for 5,000 print readers every Tuesday of the academic year and prints weekly summer editions. The Collegiate Times represents the only daily newspaper produced in Blacksburg and also provides its content online via its website, mobile app, and various social media outlets.

The Miami Hurricane is the official student newspaper at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida.

<i>UWM Post</i>

The UWM Post is a student newspaper independently run by the students of the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee. Published weekly in print from 1915 to 2012, it became independently operated in 1956. The newspaper published a new issue every Monday during the fall and spring semesters and was distributed both on campus and in the Greater Milwaukee metropolitan area.

<i>The Temple News</i> Student-run weekly newspaper at Temple University

The Temple News (TTN) is the editorially independent weekly newspaper of Temple University. It prints 6,000 copies to be distributed primarily on Temple's Main Campus every Tuesday. A staff of 25, supported by more than 150 writers, is responsible for designing, reporting and editing the 20-page paper. Increasingly, TTN is supplementing its weekly print product with breaking news and online-only content on its web site. In September 2007, TTN launched Broad & Cecil, its own blog community.

The FSView & Florida Flambeau is a for-profit newspaper owned by the Gannett Company that covers the on-campus events, happenings, and trends of the Florida State University as well as concerts, museum and art exhibits, movies, literature and poetry readings, and other events from the larger Tallahassee community. In early August 2006, the FSView made national news as being the first privately owned, college-oriented newspaper to be bought by a major newspaper chain.

UVU Review is the independent, student media organization for Utah Valley University, it is completely student-run and includes a print newspaper, online edition/website, podcasting division, video broadcasting division, social media division, graphic design division, and a marketing division. The paper's name became official with its June 30, 2008 issue - the day before UVU officially became a university.

<i>Royal Purple</i> (newspaper) UW Whitewater student newspaper

Royal Purple is a student-run weekly newspaper at the University of Wisconsin–Whitewater in Whitewater, Wisconsin. It publishes online every Monday throughout the academic year, as well as quarterly seasonal print issues at 75 locations across the campus, city and at the UW-Whitewater at Rock County extension.

<i>CU Independent</i>

The CU Independent is the student-run news publication for the University of Colorado Boulder. It has been digital-only since 2006, when it became one of the first major college newspapers to drop its print edition.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">University of South Florida Tampa Library</span>

The University of South Florida Tampa Library is the main research library for the University of South Florida. Housing over 1.3 million books, academic journals and electronic resources, including 52,000 e-journal subscriptions, 443,000 e-books, and over 800 databases, the library has more than 2 million visitors each year. The library offers tutoring and writing services, laptops, a career resource center, and course reserves. The facility houses several special and digital collections, including literature, oral histories, photographs, artifacts, and the university archives. The current Dean of USF Libraries is Todd Chavez.

<i>Michiganensian</i> University of Michigan official yearbook

The Michiganensian, also known as the Ensian, is the official yearbook of the University of Michigan. Its first issue was published in April 1896, as a consolidation of three campus publications, The Res Gestae, the Palladium, and the Castalian. The yearbook is editorially and financially independent of the University of Michigan's administration and other student groups, but it shares the Stanford Lipsey Student Publications Building on 420 Maynard Street with The Michigan Daily and Gargoyle Humor Magazine.

References

  1. "The Oracle".
  2. "ABOUT US". The Oracle. Retrieved 2021-06-23.