Sports Copy Editor/Page Designer (Westminster, Md.)

Sports Copy Editor/Page Designer
The Carroll County Times, a 27,000-circulation daily newspaper located about 30 miles northwest of Baltimore in Westminster, MD, seeks a sports copy editor/page designer.

The successful candidate will be creative and detail-oriented and will thrive under deadline pressure. The ability to work as part of a team is critical. Newspaper design experience is a must and familiarity with QuarkXpress is a plus. We produce a 4-6 page section six days a week, a 12-page section on Sundays and special sections throughout the year. We cover preps, colleges and pros and we're looking for a designer who can help us get to the next level.
If interested, send a cover letter detailing your vision for a dynamic sports section, a resume, and five tearsheets illustrating what you consider to be your best work to sports editor Bob Blubaugh, Carroll County Times, P.O. Box 346, Westminster, MD, 21158 or email to bblubaugh@lcniofmd.com.

 

If anyone has any questions they can PM me. I used to work in the department before taking a promotion to head up the news desk a few months ago.

It's a good paper (we just won the newspaper of the year from the MDDC) that's working hard at getting even better.

 

Does anyone know how much experience is needed for a copy editor/page designer at a paper of this size?

 

That really depends on the individual paper, brownsugar. Some will want a couple of years and others are willing to look at college grads with decent internship experience and/or work on the student paper. This particular one has hired several recent grads on its desk over the years and when I worked there awhile back we had three or four who had come straight out of school. Although I don't remember the experience level of the one sports copy editor/page designer.

If you're interested in this job you might PM BaltimoreSportsGuy since he's got some obvious insight, or send Bob an e-mail and ask him. He's a decent guy, I can't see him getting too mad about an e-mail inquiry.

 

BTW, we currently have several opening on the news/features desk too.

Interested candidates can send a cover letter, resume and tearsheets to: Patrick Brannan, Carroll County Times, P.O. Box 346, Westminster, MD, 21158 or email to brannanp@lcniofmd.com.

 

Good paper. Chances are there to write, but they have a track record of hiring guys that wind up being design-only.

 

Of course, these positions ALL come open after I've just taken another job.

What happened to the past city editor? Wasn't her first name Ellen? Stupidly, I passed up a job there to go somewhere else; I never should've.

 

Ellen Cornelius. She retired last fall. Nice lady.

 

Seemed nice enough. They were interested in hiring me but I'd just taken another job. Felt some weird sense of loyalty to a place I ended up staying six months. Stupid me.

 

I'll repeat. This is a good job with fantastic people.

Their other four full-timers are professional class acts. At the very least, you'll have fun. And Westminster's not a bad place.

 

Actually, I've been to Westminster and it can be alright - if you're just out of college or have a wife/GF. They have western Maryland University  there, so there are some nice college bars. And, it's only about 40 minutes or so from Baltimore, which I guess means an hour and 40 from DC.

For a paper its size, the Times covers the Ravens, Redskins, O's, UMD, WMU plus preps. I haven't seen the paper in a while, but it used to be very well laid out and I've heard nothing but good things about the SE, who pushes out a better section than a paper of that size should be allowed to have.

Also, don't people jump from there to great gigs?

 

The guy who left to create this opening certainly didn't go to a good gig... he'll be the No. 3 guy at a paper that doesn't generally hold good design in high regard.