READERS and I share a little secret that reporters don't want to hear: Most people, surveys show, don't read past the headline of news articles. Even fewer read past the "jump" off the front page -- that moment they have to turn to the inside of the paper to get the rest of the article.
An environment reporter at a major metropolitan daily whom I know recently moaned to me that a vital bit of information from his piece was bumped down in the article, making it run just past the jump. He knew the point would be lost on almost all of the paper's readers. In addition, he said, exasperated, the weak headline softened the blow the article was supposed to have, making it less likely that readers would even begin his piece.
Thankfully, that's not what the majority of headlines do in newspapers. Headlines have two purposes: to accurately, quickly, and succinctly convey the information in an article and entice people to read the story.
All of the above is why those big letters on the front page of newspapers are crucial to its image. If a word is misspelled in a headline, you better believe the paper loses a lot of credibility, even if the article is an immaculate, Pulitzer-quality piece of work.
Unfortunately, many college newspapers don't have the luxury of experienced, full-time copy editors spending hour after hour creating these gems, and sometimes they're changed last-minute, late at night.
To see how well The Cavalier Daily was presenting itself to readers, I evaluated each of last week's front pages, assigning each lead headline -- the bigger one -- a letter grade from A to D. (Luckily, I graded on an extreme curve and spared the headlines of Fs and plusses or minuses.)
It was pretty easy to get an A in my book: Clearly, with correct grammar, tell me what the article's about and don't leave me asking questions.
I gave the paper seven As, five Bs, six Cs and three Ds. Monday, Oct. 10 through Thursday, Oct. 13, the paper had four front-page stories, and on Friday, Oct. 14 there were five. Monday and Friday were the best days of the week, averaging a B+ for the day's headlines, and neither day had a D headline. The middle of the week seemed to be a slump point, with a C average and the only day there was no A given. Tuesday was a C+/B-, though I always hated when teachers did that slash thing with grades to me. Thursday was a B- day, slowly climbing back up.
Let's clean this up. Readers will read past the headline if you give them a reason to.
Headline rating and reasoning
Monday: "C'ville team loses in semi-finals in unmanned car race." Grade: A. I know exactly what I'm going to be reading about. What's more, I'm excited and interested in the article.
Tuesday: "Medical School funding exceeds most schools." Grade: D. It's a confusing structure, because there's a dropped gerund. The headline is supposed to tell you that the University's Medical School gets more funding than many other schools, but I'm left hanging at the end of the line. Plus, what kind of funding is this, and what does it mean? I'm left with so many questions that all I know is the article's about money and the Medical School. The subhead didn't help much: "National Institute of Health survey ranked Medical School 33rd in nation this year compared to 41st in 1996."
Wednesday: "Board of Trustees expels AU president." Here the problem is allocation of resources. With the little room allowed in the headline space, it is more important to know why the president was fired instead of who did the firing. Something along the lines of "AU pres axed over unethical purchases" would convey the article's point a lot more clearly.
Thursday: "ETS releases new testing option." Grade: D. I'm not sure what ETS is -- it's been a long time since those SATs -- and I'm not sure who they're testing, which test it is or what the option is. Turns out, it's a completely new test to see how well college students are learning. How about something like, "New test to gauge student learning," or something more clever?
"UBE announces fall election results" Grade: C. Ok, well, who is it? Who won? News is about people. That's like saying that somebody spoke yesterday at the University. Well, who is it and what did they say? Plus, the more important part of the story was that most spots went uncontested.
Friday: "Student neighborhood reports burglaries." Grade: B. Call me a ninny, but it wasn't actually the neighborhood doing the reporting. Students reported burglaries in their neighborhood.
Lisa Fleisher is the Cavalier Daily ombudsman. She can be reached at ombud@cavalierdaily.com.
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