A group of journalism students at Staffordshire University have produced a newspaper to promote political and news comment site Pits n Pots.

The unique publication, which will be delivered to some 50,000 houses across Stoke-on-Trent next week, features 16 pages of community and political news as well as features and profiles of community champions.

The initiative saw volunteers given just three weeks to assemble a team, research and create content and finally design the paper.

Andrew Bettridge, who edited the paper, said:

It was a brilliant effort by the whole team to get the paper produced in such a short space of time. It was a lot of hard work but we all had great fun working on it and we are all very proud of the finished result. I hope the people of Stoke-on Trent enjoy reading it.

“The skills we have picked up from the teaching staff at Staffordshire University have helped us to put together a slick and professional newspaper.

Mike Rawlins of the Pits n Pots website said:

“The site is run by local volunteers who write about politics and issues that they are interested in. They write because they are passionate about what they believe in.”

The project is backed by The Journalism Foundation which has been working with Pits n Pots to reprofile the site while boosting community engagement.

Head of the foundation Simon Kelner, former editor of the Independent, and managing director Charlie Burgess, formerly of the Independent and the Guardian, visited the Staffordshire University newsroom during the process.

Burgess said:

“It was great to work with such an enthusiastic group of students who understood what The Journalism Foundation was doing. The project would not have been possible without them – and I hope they felt it was of benefit to them too. Staffordshire University were fantastic with their support.”

Jackie Gregory, senior lecturer in journalism at Staffordshire University, said:

“Around a dozen students, who all have a busy university workload, gave up many hours of their own time to produce this paper. They worked under pressure with great dedication and humour. It was a learning curve but they can be proud of the result.”

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Activist and human rights campaigner Jemima Khan is to join the Independent as an associate news editor.

Khan will be writing interviews as well as contributing comment and features pages of the Independent and cut-price sister title i. She will also take on some commissioning duties.

She joins the Independent after guest-editing April’s edition of the New Statesman, which focused on freedom of information and free speech.

Khan interviewed Nick Clegg for the edition, about life in the coalition government and his relationship with David Cameron.

Simon Kelner, editor-in-chief of the Independent and i, said: “Anyone who knows Jemima will know that she is a forceful character with strong views. And anyone who saw her issue of the Statesman will have seen that she has an editorial flair.”

Khan said that she was “thrilled with the opportunity”.

“I am a huge fan of both papers and am very excited to be able to work with a talented team of writers and editors,” she added.

Khan appeared in an advert for i earlier this year alongside comedian Dom Joly. The Advertising Standards Agency ruled in May that the advert was misleading in its claim that i contained “no celeb gossip nonsense”.

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The Guardian reported this morning that sales of the Independent’s new daily compact i are understood to have “dropped off to close to an average daily sale of 70,000″.

Initial sales were thought to be at about 180,000 the report claims, based on information from “several sources”.

In the third week after launch, the week commencing 8 November, average daily sales ranged from about 75,000 to 85,000; by the end of last week average daily sales appeared to be hovering close to 70,000 to 73,000, according to industry sources.

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As reported last week, the weekly Neath Guardian owned by Trinity Mirror is to close, and in its last issue, Simon Kelner, editor-in chief of the Independent and the Independent on Sunday reflects on his days at the newspaper.

“It seems inconceivable that a town whose people thrive on knowing what’s going on, who make it their business to know everyone else’s business, will have no town crier.

“Hard though it may be to believe in this multi-media age, but the Guardian once occupied a central role in the life of the town, and sold (yes, sold) upwards of 10,000 copies a week.”

Roy Greenslade reproduces the article on his Guardian blog…

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An apt subject, given newspaper editors’ current preoccupation with where and how our MPs are living in London. Press Gazette’s Peter Kirwan notes that he is increasingly convinced that a national newspaper editor has moved into his street, in an ‘untidy’ corner of the city.

Kirwan takes a look at other journalists’ choice of location:

“When he edited the Sunday Times, Andrew Neil lived in snooty Onslow Gardens off the Fulham Road. Today, Simon Kelner of the Independent scrapes by in Belgravia. As everyone knows, Polly Toynbee occupies a small castle next to Clapham Common (when she’s not living in Italy).

“Not so The Editor.”

‘Most of the editorial executives who run the nationals could do with a blast of Real Life,’ Kirwan comments; he reckons his street might give ‘The Editor’ just that.

Full story at this link…

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Simon Kelner, managing director and editor-in-chief of the UK’s The Independent newspaper, rubbishes rumours that it might go online-only. Full story…

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Roger Alton, former editor of The Observer, has been appointed editor of The Independent.

Simon Kelner, who has edited the title for the last 10 years, has been promoted to managing director and editor-in-chief of the daily and Sunday titles.

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