You may not think much about how the Daily Kent Stater makes it to newsstands every day. Our stories are a quick read between or during classes, and the Sudoku on the classifieds page can help you get through the most boring of lectures. But the fact of the matter is while you spend 10 minutes or less with us every day, we put countless hours of preparation and an entire night of production toward each edition of our publication – and we’re not alone.

Kent State is home to eight student-run media organizations, including the Stater. TV-2 is the campus’ television station, with two nightly news broadcasts Monday to Friday at 5:30 and 6:30 p.m. Black Squirrel Radio lives online and broadcasts 24/7 at www.blacksquirrelradio.com. Students also maintain five semesterly magazines – The Burr, the general interest magazine, formerly the Chestnut Burr yearbook; Uhuru, the black student magazine; Fusion, the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues magazine; Artemis, the women’s issues magazine; and Luna Negra, the literary and oldest magazine.

All of these organizations are maintained and perpetuated mainly by students in the School of Journalism and Mass Communication, and our media often draw criticism that they don’t accurately represent the students they serve.

So we’re inviting you to be a part of the future of Kent State’s student media. Applications for the student leader positions for all eight units are due tomorrow to the Office of Student Media, Room 204 in Franklin Hall. Interviews will be held with the student media oversight boards next week, and applications for all staff positions should be available in the office by the end of the month.

We’ll be the first to admit that we’re not perfect, and we only have so many ideas on how to better connect to you. The more diverse voices we get involved in producing our products, the better representatives they will be of the audiences they serve. Leader positions and entire staffs change each semester, so if you have a vision for how we can improve, we welcome your input and look forward to seeing you around Franklin Hall in the spring.

The above editorial is the consensus opinion of the Daily Kent Stater editorial board .