Evan Reynolds will be the Daily Emerald’s new editor-in-chief for 2023-2024, starting in summer 2023. 

Reynolds is a third-year student majoring in political science and minoring in media studies. He joined the Daily Emerald staff in January 2022 as an arts and culture reporter on the mental health beat, where he published weekly stories with a focus on local mental health projects. He is currently employed as the Emerald’s community engagement coordinator, where he handles outreach initiatives, Ethics Board meetings and internal surveys.

Reynolds is also an associate editor on the Daily Emerald’s art and culture desk fall 2022.  

“It’s been an absolute pleasure to work on the art and culture desk this year. My editor Krista and I have slowly watched throughout fall and winter term as our desk filled up with new writers, and we’re now producing so much content that it can be difficult to keep track of it all,” Reynolds said. “We’ve also implemented two new beats on the desk this year that I’m proud of, one focusing on multiculturalism and diversity at UO and one focusing on non-traditional students.”

The EiC’s responsibilities, as described by current EiC Hannarose McGuinness, are divided into three main areas: organizing content production, managing the Emerald’s personnel, and handling all behind-the-scenes clerical and administrative work. 

The EiC leads print edition planning, ensuring that deadlines are issued to allow quality content to be published promptly, making and distributing staff payroll, and meeting with the Emerald’s publisher regularly to guarantee a smoothly running newsroom. McGuinness said that the day-to-day work consists of “a lot of emails, deadline enforcement, and personnel support.”

Before starting at the Emerald, Reynolds was the EiC of his high school newspaper, The Cardinal Times of Lincoln High School. He said the position allowed him to gain experience editing different types of content. 

While working at the Emerald, Reynolds has interned and worked for several local political campaigns, including Peter DeFazio’s last campaign for U.S. Congress and Jennifer Yeh’s run for Eugene City Council. 

All of these experiences came with their own set of long hours and ethical challenges that allowed Reynolds to grow both personally and professionally, he said. 

This spring, Reynolds and the Emerald Ethics Board expanded the Citizen Journalism workshop series, which aim to emphasize the role of journalism as an essential public service and provide people, regardless of affiliation with the SOJC or UO, the tools to become citizen journalists. 

Some of the workshops Reynolds helped to organize include topics like Oregon public records law, resume building, multimedia and how to find newsworthy sources.

“I’m so excited to put these on and show the community what the Emerald’s all about,” Reynolds said. 

Reynolds said he acknowledges that taking leadership of the Emerald staff is the largest job he’s ever had and that he’ll be facing new responsibilities in this job, but plans to face all duties with “caution and humility.” 

Reynolds said he’s prepared to try new things and is ready to hear new ideas from staff members and readers on how to better the Emerald.

“To say that I have big shoes to fill would be an understatement – I walk in cavernous footsteps,” Reynolds said. “So, I’m cautiously excited and ready to get started.”

McGuinness said Reynolds’ prior work with city council campaign support has helped familiarize him with fundraising, budgeting and community outreach. During his years working at the Emerald, Reynolds has shown himself to be a strong leader who McGuinness is excited to see grow. 

“The editor-in-chief job is hugely challenging in so many unexpected ways, and I feel so fortunate to be able to leave the newsroom in what I know will be capable hands,” McGuinness said. 

With COVID-19 restrictions impacting both Reynolds’s high school paper and his experience at the Emerald, he said he noticed some trends regarding the continued impact that the pandemic has had on newspapers. 

“I think, in the wake of the pandemic, the Emerald has taken a dip when it comes to the amount of content we’re producing and the community engagement we have with UO and Eugene as a whole,” Reynolds said. “We’ve seen a sharp decline in breaking news coverage, and we’re not seeing the kind of robust readership that I think we can achieve in either our print issues or our digital content.”

Reynolds said he believes the most challenging, and exciting, part of becoming EiC will be rebuilding and expanding on the Emerald’s print and digital presence in ways that are “creative, modern and experimental.” 

The Board of Directors, who selected Reynolds for the EiC position, noted that Evan’s instinct for making on-the-spot journalistic decisions was quick, thoughtful and exactly how a journalist and editor needed to think. 
“Evan’s energy was infectious,” said board chair Jenn Casey. “His ideas, enthusiasm, and focus on building an audience not only for today’s Emerald, but to sustain beyond his year as EiC showed thoughtful leadership qualities.”

Reynolds officially takes on the role of EiC on June 21, 2023.