Opinion: The Washtenaw Voice gears up for social media rebrand 

Sasha Hatinger 

Staff Writer

As much as I consider myself to be “off the grid” in terms of social media, not participating with major platforms like Facebook, Instagram, X (formerly known as Twitter) and TikTok, I do recognize how important it is for The Washtenaw Voice to keep up with the times and reach a broader audience on WCC’s campus. 

The first time I consciously chose to deactivate my social media accounts was after watching ‘The Social Dilemma’ in my Mass Communication class in 2022. Before that, I would keep my Facebook deactivated for the simple fact that I had almost five thousand ‘friends’ and didn’t really know any of them. 

A few years later, I had a reality check and decided that managing an ‘alternate ego/lifestyle’ via my Social Media accounts was not helping me grow mentally, physically, emotionally, or spiritually. I then decided to permanently delete all my Social Media platforms, stop comparing myself and my life to others, and start living – for me. 

That said, I was fortunate enough to attend a few social media sessions at the National College Media Conference in New Orleans in October. There, I learned the significance of having more of a presence on social media for our campus paper–to connect with students and staff and meet them where they are.

One of the sessions I attended was called “This is the Convergence,” which really grabbed my attention when I saw it on the roster. 

The University of Kentucky’s media advisor, Ryan Craig, led the discussion, highlighting how the university’s paper, The Kentucky Kernel, has seen significant growth since increasing its presence on social media. 

In fact, according to Craig, their following on Instagram has increased by 130%, and their TikTok has nearly 18,000 followers since making their “convergence” into a primarily digital news source. 

“We’re a student media outlet,” Craig said. “We do still print newspapers. We print special sections, but we don’t print a weekly newspaper like we did for decades, and they were a daily newspaper before that.”

The Washtenaw Voice’s social media presence is essentially non-existent in comparison to The Kentucky Kernel.

My goal is to identify the needs of our readers, WCC students and staff. 

Dena Blair, department chair for communication media and theater arts and lead faculty for the Broadcast Media Arts Program at WCC, believes most of the school’s campus gets its news online. 

“Whether it’s through their social media platforms. Whether it’s through news outlet platforms, but there’s that aspect of it,” Blair said.

But what pulls WCC students and staff–and, let’s face it, our society today–towards getting their news online? 

“Social Media is addictive,” Blair stated. “Because we do get information, so incredibly quick nowadays, because of the access to the internet and our social media platforms.”

Generally speaking, almost everyone has phones–including children. We have essentially unlimited access to information in the palm of our hands, at our fingertips, at any given time of the day. With that in mind, I can understand why so many are resorting to Social Media platforms to get live updates on current events. 

“You know, it’s that we are so used to getting our … instant gratification from the media. Whether it be to make us happy, to fear, whatever it might be, we’re looking for that instant gratification, and social media gives us that in real-time,” Blair explained. 

The Washtenaw Voice is keeping a dying art alive. Printing newspapers is a thing of the past in our digital world today. According to the United States Census Bureau website, “Total estimated weekday circulation of U.S. daily newspapers was 55.8 million in 2000 and dropped to 24.2 million by 2020, according to editor & publisher and the Pew Research Center” (Adam Grundy, 2022) Those statistics are startling.

My opinion isn’t to eliminate the process of printing newspapers at The Washtenaw Voice–it is to incorporate a firm and strong digital presence to establish more loyalty for the craft of Journalism.

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