CT alum here. I was the editor in chief of the CT from 2009-2010 and was also a news editor, photo editor, copy editor and reporter. So my experience ran the gamut. I am now an editor for a newspaper in California. I'm using a throwaway from when I was editor and was scoping out feedback for our website from r/web_design, but I've been a Redditor for years.

First, although "It's better than others" is never a great defense, I will point out the CT is typically considered in the top 25 or 30 college papers. I've read dozens and dozens of other papers, and really -- some are just HORRIFIC. Painful to read.

The current CT editor-in-chief placed fourth for best feature reporting in the country this month, and our managing editor won the award for the second best reporter for ALL colleges in the country. Our website was nominated as one of the best college news websites in the country as well. These are REALLY huge deals in the college journalism circles. Not all writers are great, for sure, but we always have a handful of staffers on board who are freaking amazing. This is the second time a CT reporter has placed in the top three of reporters in the country in three years, up against Harvard, Yale and UCLA.

Which brings me to the biggest issue -- we're not a journalism school and our liberal art student body does not have the work ethic that the kids at Harvard or Yale do. There are maybe three to five people in each grade out of the entire school who 1) REALLY want to work for the newspaper and put the time into it 2) are already strong enough writers that they can just keep improving and 3) have a good reporting sense. Split those up between all sections, design, photography, etc - and you make up maybe 10 percent of the staff.

It's extremely hard to train beyond that for lack of money, time (a lot of people work other places too plus school) and the fact that a lot of people just DON'T want to put the effort into it needed. Seriously. I ran into so many people who were like "Yeah I'm in comm and I want to work for the New York Times. Oh you want me to write a story a week and actually TALK to people for it instead of Googling? Fuck that." The turnover is insane, just because people take issue with our basic expectations.

Certainly, there's plenty that the staff could be doing to improve it. As editor, I tried to do focus groups with different organizations to gauge what people wanted to read, and set up booths where people could fill out surveys but got little feedback for the amount of time/effort the staff put into those.

I am happy to explain anything else, but that's my two cents.