Observer Department: Editorial
50 shades of black
In reviewing a recent issue of Entertainment Weekly, I noticed that the pictures all look so very perfect. Not a single blemish or fat roll or misplaced hair. Every tooth is straight and white, every eye is shining brightly and all of the skin is glowing. Clearly, Photoshop is used…
Happy Holidays
Every year at this time, social media starts to blow up with posts from people who are angry because they would rather say “Merry Christmas” than “Happy Holidays.” New this year, I’ve seen memes that called red Starbucks cups an attack on Christmas and “Holiday Trees” an attack on the…
I want words to be my superpower
put an editorial column in this section of the newspaper. In theory, it sounds like an easy thing to do. Just pick an interesting topic, discuss it with the staff and write up a few columns expressing the newspaper’s views on the subject. Simple, in theory. Reality, of course, is…
Letter: Police Academy
With All Due Respect In the last edition of the Observer, two separate articles were written about the nuisance created by the police academy now present at the Haverhill campus. The complaints centered around the supposed intimidating drills the recruits practice on the quad, the amount of parking spots taken…
Letter: Film Classes
Dear Editor, I am writing in response to your article titled, “Film Classes Are Struggling At NECC.” While it is true that we have faculty, but not equipment to run a film class, we do in fact have the faculty and the equipment to run video, film-based still photography, studio…
NECC Observer Honored
The NECC Observer recently learned that it was awarded an honorable mention in the 2014 New England College Newspaper of the Year contest. The award is bestowed by the New England Society of News Editors. The awards were handed out at NESNE’s 2014 spring conference at the New England Newspaper…
Two-Party System Undermines Democracy
This year we have the largest, most diverse group of presidential candidates I’ve ever seen. They vary from uber-conservative to bleeding-heart liberal and fill the entire spectrum in between. It seems as if there are far too many to fit them all comfortably into the two-party system that we demand.…
Meta Toolkit
A news employee wears a lot of hats, especially on a small, student-run paper like this one. That can be a really good thing! It’s a great opportunity to learn a whole lot of valuable skills and acquire some very useful knowledge. To take the best possible advantage of that,…
Why it’s Important to Write Well
It's not always important for your writing to be clear. The thing that's important, for a journalist, is to know why, sometimes, it should be clear, and why sometimes it doesn't need to be -- because it really, really needs to be in a newspaper. The vast majority of people…
Veterans Association
Background: Through online research, I found that NECC is one of seven (out of a total of 15) Mass. community colleges (CC) without a private veterans area. The nearest CCs to NECC, North Shore CC and Middlesex CC, both have particularly large veterans area, which are fully furnished with tables…
