The Concordian celebrates 30th anniversary
Student newspaper The Concordian celebrated its 30th anniversary with a reunion of former staff on March 30, 2013, at the Engineering, Computer Science and Visual Arts Integrated Complex. In attendance was alumnus Frederic Serre, who reminscences below on his early days at the paper.
In November 1983, I was a skinny 20-year-old Concordia University journalism student, sharing an apartment on Chomedey Street in downtown Montreal with my brother, an equally skinny third-year graphic design student, and three plump cats. I was also a news editor at The Link, Concordia’s only student newspaper at the time.
Inside the living room of my pad, located around the corner from the legendary Montreal Forum, five fresh-faced student journalists — Gordon Ritchie, BA 89; Anne Craig; Milva D’Aronco, BSc 87; Gabrielle Korn, BA 88; and I — secretly gathered one weekend that November to write the constitution of a brand new publication called The Concordian. A month earlier we had held hushed meetings at various downtown watering holes to discuss the idea of launching a new student newspaper that would compete with The Link.
Alert Link newshounds quickly found out about our little scheme, and in no time, word got out and tongues wagged. The very act of launching a second paper was seen as the highest form of treason.
Controversy erupted. Friendships were strained. We were accused of being right-wing nuts and thankless traitors.
As Montreal’s Gazette reported at the time in its news story, Rival campus papers slug it out as trend shifts right: “two new newspaper wars have broken out in Montreal’s English-language market,” referring to the birth of The Concordian and the McGill Magazine.
And what a war it would turn out to be — fun, mischievous and never boring, which brought out the best in competitive news coverage from both papers.
On January 4, 1984, more than 12,000 copies of The Concordian hit the stands on the Loyola and Sir George Williams campuses. The printing tab came to $750.
The modest eight-page paper contained a few ads, and was helped by a controversial Concordia Student Union start-up grant of $450 — a big chunk of coin at the time that the student association defended as being justified but which also allowed us to get three old typewriters and cover typesetting costs. They even found a tiny, basement office for us in a building on the Loyola Campus.
For the next three years of my tenure, I got to see a tireless group of students crank out a paper each Wednesday. Classes were skipped. Mistakes were made. Corrections and apologies were issued. Careers were launched. Lifelong friendships were born. It was a wild, amazing ride.
Upon graduation in 1986, my experience with The Concordian helped me land a job as a newspaper reporter, propelling me through my career as a crime journalist, photographer and cartoonist. Today, I run my own business and I’m the editor of two law-enforcement magazines.
I don’t think any of us back in 1983 gave much thought to the paper’s long-term future. Our focus was on our three- to four-year stay at Concordia. We were there to put out a newspaper, gain real-life journalism experience, pass our courses, grab our diplomas and hit the job market.
But life offers heart-warming sidebars.
On March 30, current staff of The Concordian held a reception in the swank Engineering, Computer Science and Visual Arts Integrated Complex to mark the 30th anniversary of this venerable newspaper.
A handful of us old-timers were there, including Derek Marinos, BA 96, and my old buddy, George Kalogerakis, BA 87, who today is the managing editor of the Journal de Montréal. We gave speeches. We reminisced. We met a fine group of excellent young journalists with vision and passion. We got to see how the world of student journalism has evolved, thanks to technology and news-savvy kids who know how to cover a story.
But most important, we were humbled and awed that, 30 years later, our little paper is still around, still battling it out with its old friend, The Link, and still ready to fulfill countless dreams for the next generation of student journalists.
Related links:
• The Concordian
• Concordia's Department of Journalism
• “Rival campus papers slug it out as trend shifts right” — The Montreal Gazette, January 28, 1984