Introducing the #LUBWRebrand

Dear readers:

Throughout the last year, The Brown and White staff was hard at work preparing for a major change. We underwent a significant transformation this summer and are proud to introduce a complete rebranding of our internal processes and a new, self-hosted website.

We’ve been in publication since 1894, and though our image may change, our values remain steadfast. These changes will enable us to continue to do what has always been our priority, our responsibility and our purpose: to report the news. But now, we’re have the tools and system in place to do it even better.

There are three major phases of the new Brown and White: streamlining the workflow, bringing the staff together and affecting the content in a positive way.

First, we restructured what happens behind the scenes. Our new system is more efficient and divides the responsibility among all members of the staff. While we each have our own roles, it’s the emphasis on community and communication that produces the best result. We’ve also renewed our focus on reporting significant and challenging stories, not only in print, but as we transition into an “online-first” news organization.

Of course, we wouldn’t be able to do this without the support of our new adviser, Matt Veto, who was hired in 2013 as a professor of practice in journalism and to mentor The Brown and White through a true evolution.

Matt came to Lehigh from the Missouri School of Journalism. His energy, passion and expertise continue to guide us toward achieving our goals and developing into a modern institution of journalism.

“Wally Trimble built this newspaper, along with Jack Lule, into what it is, and seeing what we we’re doing at Lehigh… it’s incredible. We’re still publishing twice a week, which doesn’t happen at student newspapers. I had a lot to work with and Jack gave me a set of criteria to get us up to speed into the 21st century, so I’m truly building on a solid foundation on my predecessors in this position,” Matt said.

Our internal changes are complemented by a new website and visual rebrand, igniting our excitement going into this semester. The Brown and White has been on the web since the early 1990s. We were first hosted online through College Publisher until we began our partnership with Lehigh Valley Live in 2011. We aimed to create a responsive and interactive site that enables us to fully engage with the greater Lehigh community and manage our content.

In the last year, we’ve increased our social media presence in an effort to create dialogue among reporters, editors and readers.

“One of the biggest things that we are trying to bring to this era is a sense of community and holistic contribution,” Matt said. “This is a learning atmosphere. We want to make sure that all of our students that are a part of The Brown and White feel like they’re contributing and feel like they’re learning, so step one was bringing everyone together.”

With change comes challenges, and we anticipate that it will take time to adjust to our new system.

“It’s hard to change because the status quo can be comfortable, but status quo never equals progress,” Matt said.

Now that we’ve made the jump to something bigger and better, we will continue to strive to uphold our journalistic standards. Through meaningful content, innovative multimedia and staff unity, we’ll aim to be known as Lehigh’s trusted news source.

“The newsroom has never been so vibrant,” Matt said.  “I’ve never seen so many people talking about news and journalism and discussing together about the best way to cover substantive issues.”

We are especially excited to include you, our readers, in our transformation, and we look forward to seeing what this semester, and beyond, will bring for The Brown and White.

– The Brown and White editorial board