Agate clerks

Just wondering how many of you still have part-time agate clerks? Anybody have a full-time agate clerk? With all the shrinking newsrooms across the country, I was just wondering how many agate folks are getting the ax?

 

We have seven. Six are part-time (college kids), one works 32 hours per week. They're a godsend. We haven't lost any, either through layoffs or attrition.

 

suck... [/mizzougrad96]

 

yeah, we still have plenty. considering how much shit they do, I figure it's one of those positions you can't get rid of.
Plus, most times they don't make much anyway.

 

We have two, and they are very valuable. Both can go out and cover games if we're in a pinch, and write good gamers.

Don't know what we would do without them.

 

About 15-18+ years ago, we would have three schools guys rotate doing agate during the week (one three nights a week, the other two, two nights a week). Then at one point we switched over to having all the schools guys take it a night or two each each a week, to lessen the load on the three that were doing it. A few years after that, the desk added it to their list of responsibilities. Along with outsourcing our pagination, we've outsourced our wire editing (and hence agate clerking).

 

My old paper lost our best part-timer in the cuts back in March. A good agate clerk is a lifesaver. Dunno what we'd do without them.

 

They're agate editors - not clerks - damn it.!

 

We've got seven who rotate at my shop. They make my life a lot easier.

 

Beats "agate monkey."

We've got two guys who do our agate and baseball page. One of them also covers a game occasionally and can lay out a section. I started out on agate and got a full-time desk job here after college.

 

About five years ago, I was a college kid who got my start doing agate. I wanted clips, so the SE promised he'd give me one feature per week. Pretty soon, that turned into me being a true part-timer, doing everything the same as the rest of the staff, just in 20 hours per week. Of course, I was still always responsible for agate on top of everything else.

I got pretty burnt out on it, like I'm sure a lot of people do. I've never enjoyed desk work. It's always been stuff I put up with to write (and report) for a living. So, I quit and just started doing regular stringing. I loved the freedom of not being in every Friday and Saturday night during college. They didn't replace me either (as I'm sure that was about the time that all of those positions began drying up at papers that size).

Now, I'm at a larger paper in terms of circulation, but sports staff is the same size. We've never had an agate clerk in my time here (and they didn't for at least the couple years before I got here)...probably more likely that we can't find anyone to fill it, rather than budget. But I don't know that for sure. After the night I've had, I'd likely be willing to pitch in bi-weekly blow jobs if anyone wants to come aboard.

 

They don't care for that term. You ever see a monkey write a box score?