The Martlet

The Martlet is a bi-weekly student newspaper at the University of Victoria (UVic) in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada.

This article is about the UVic student newspaper. For other uses, see Martlet (disambiguation).
The Martlet
TypeBi-monthly student newspaper
FormatTabloid
EditorAshlee Levy (Volume 75)
Founded1948
LanguageEnglish
Circulation5,000 (per issue)
Websitewww.martlet.ca

The first edition of the Martlet was printed on December 3, 1948. For much of its history, it was published twice a week.[1] It has since cut back on its print edition to once a month since the COVID-19 pandemic.

As of 2023, each full-time student pays $3.75 per semester to the Martlet through student union dues. The student-run publication is primarily funded by student fees, advertisements, and grants.

The free print newspaper is distributed around the UVic campus and various locations around greater Victoria on a monthly basis, though it puts out an online edition every two weeks during the school year and occasionally produces breaking news.

The Martlet Publishing Society is a non-profit society governed by a volunteer-run, five-position board of directors. All staff, paid or otherwise, must answer to the board, and welcomes all students to attend board meetings. [2]

There are about 10 employees on the payroll, with significant work done by student volunteers, such as copyediting, photography, and writing. Two employees are full-time positions: the Editor-in-Chief and Operations Manager.

The Martlet is the only general-interest campus newspaper at the University of Victoria. The Martlet regularly reports on UVic Board of Governors and Senate meetings, as well as University of Victoria Students' Society Board meetings and elections.

Today, the Martlet has a wide circulation and can be found in coffee shops, theatres, grocery stores, offices, and street corners throughout Victoria, British Columbia. The newspaper maintains its strong editorial line and commitment to politics and activism.

Many national journalists and columnists in Canada have gotten their start at the Martlet and it continues to produce opportunities for student writers to become professionals. Martleteers have gone on to become journalists and editors at the National Post, Toronto Star, The Globe and Mail, Edmonton Journal, Times Colonist, as well as other leading Canadian news outlets.[3] Notable alumni include novelist W.P. Kinsella, former Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps, and former leader of the B.C. Green Party Andrew Weaver.

In recent years, the Martlet has broken stories about UVSS spending deficits, UVic's reputational enhancement project, divestment lobbying efforts by UVic student activists, issues with UVic's sexualized violence policy, the arrival of Starbucks on campus, problems in the UVic Sociology department, international student tuition hikes, student groups' support of the Unist'ot'en First Nation camp, pro-life vs. pro-choice protesters on campus, racism and antisemitism on campus, and student healthcare cuts.

The Martlet is currently undergoing a transformation as it slowly transitions to more exclusive web-only content, in line with the shifting tendencies of journalism worldwide. Along with the 5000 physical papers circulated around the UVic campus and the local community, the Martlet has over 3600 followers on Twitter and 1900 followers on Facebook. www.martlet.ca receives an annual average of 30,000 audience members via organic web search, and 17,000 audience members via social media channels.

Martlet stories are regularly picked up by larger publications including the CBC, CTV News, the Times Colonist, and Chek News.

History

The Martlet was founded when UVic was Victoria College, and was originally called the Microscope. The paper takes its name from a heraldic bird with no feet. Three martlet birds appear on the crest of McGill University, and the University of Victoria grew out of the McGill University College of British Columbia. For a brief period in the early 1970s, the Martlet was renamed the 'Cougar City Gazette' after an armed takeover by a loose coalition of disgruntled former students and at least one former(?) professor who were dissatisfied with the perceived blandness of the newspaper - perusal of the content of the Cougar City Gazette clearly reflects the change of editorial direction. The Cougar City Gazette was often quite controversial, and its existence came to an abrupt end after it published a captioned photograph that prompted Playboy magazine to threaten the paper with legal action.

In the 1960s, George Manning began his newspaper career as the Martlet's publication director. He would later become a major figure in Vancouver Island journalism, co-founding the Goldstream Gazette as well as the Lake Cowichan Gazette, community newspapers now owned by Black Press.[4]

In 1971, the Martlet was partly responsible for bringing about the resignation of the university's president, Bruce J. Partridge, when it erroneously reported that he had obtained his law degree from a correspondence school under investigation as a "degree mill." In 2001, the Martlet Publishing Society issued an apology to Partridge for publishing articles that made reference to these events in an anniversary book. A 2003 Martlet article by Patrick White stated that, though Partridge legitimately acquired his degree by correspondence, rumours about Partridge's qualifications spread throughout the university. Partially due to the Martlet's reporting, Partridge resigned in November 1971.

In 1994, the Martlet gained financial autonomy from the student union and began managing its own finances.[5]

Until 2004, the Martlet had an "advertising boycott list", which has been dropped to allow for an assessment of each individual advertisement. The Martlet has received criticism for running advertisements that some readers have interpreted as sexist, notably in fall 2004 when they ran ads for "Canada's Search for the Coors Light Maxim Girl."

In 2013, the Martlet Publishing Society voted to leave the Canadian University Press. It subsequently became a member of the now-defunct National University Wire, which consisted of other student publications including Ubyssey (University of British Columbia), McGill Daily, the Gazette (Western University), Dalhousie Gazette, and the Varsity (University of Toronto).[6]

In 2017, the Martlet briefly crossposted its articles on the online publishing platform Medium.[7]

See also

References and works cited
  1. "At 70, UVic's Martlet among B.C.'s last independent print newspapers". CBC News. Retrieved 4 May 2023.
  2. "Martlet Publishing Society Bylaws" (PDF). Retrieved 4 May 2023.
  3. Wilson, Deborah. "At 70, UVic's Martlet among B.C.'s last independent print newspapers". CBC News. Retrieved 4 May 2023.
  4. Desocoteau, Don (Sep 13, 2021). "Gazette founder leaves a legacy on Greater Victoria, Island journalism". Goldstream News Gazette. Retrieved 4 May 2023.
  5. deLeeuw, Sarah; Newhouse, Theresa. "Nice girls go to heaven, bad girls stay at the Martlet - The Resume of Sarah DeLeeuw and Theresa Newhouse" (PDF). Remembering Theresa. Retrieved 4 May 2023.
  6. Birchard, Karen (Sep 18, 2013). "Several student newspapers quit Canadian University Press". University Affairs. Retrieved 4 May 2023.
  7. "The Martlet - Medium". Retrieved 4 May 2023.
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