Print Comparisons 

Period #1 as defined as Post 2002 // Period 2 defined as Volumes #8 and #9 of The Watermark, in 2002. 

We have compiled enough data to now begin comparing print runs from 2002 to 2026 across a wide array of publications. 

Much of this work is based on prior data assembled from questionnaires with former editors. I have constructed a bar graph. In one column goes the one concrete face we have from our page on financial reconstruction. Quote; A December 12th, 2002 Mass Media newspaper article by Evan Sicuranza states, quote,“The journal, which is funded by the Student Activities fees, costs about $10,000 to print. 4,000 copies are printed each year. [emphasis mine]The journal ranges between 90 and 120 pages in length. This is one of the only concrete 3rd party facts we have that are not dependent on editorial memory or my own interviewing: an outside body, even though it is adjacent in organizational structure, has provided data. Not myself or an editor in question. 

Secondly, I am quite confident when it comes to some publications. Triptych, for example, because I bought it myself and put the print run in the colophon. Others, like that of Volume #26 of The Watermark, I recite with great and reluctant trust in my sources given their proximity to the finances. Others still, like Watermark Volume 35 are based on editor recollection.

In the other bar, I have gathered these publications. All of them come after 2002. Should I receive any Pre-2002 data, please note I will correct this chart. I have also, in the interest of honesty, included the student paper, which was confirmed in the 2026 issue of Beacons (The alumni magazine) to put out around 1,500 issues biweekly as of 2026. 

The first thing I did was arrange the numbers I have in descending order. The first thing I noticed was there was an almost direct correlation between the year and the date (with the exception of the student paper). The closer to the present, the smaller the run. The closer to 2002, the larger the run. The first thing I asked myself was: why. 

And then it hit me that the majority of the data I had gathered was tied to a student-funded initiative for an Issue #1, #2, or #3 and that the only publications from students to meet or exceed 100 copies were No Infinite Volume #3, and Provocateur #1. Although by this time, I am unsure if No Infinite qualified as an Alumni journal, or not. The exception being Andrea Ward’s Watermark. It would be only half-correct to say that between 2002-2026 campus burdens of funding have declined considerably. This is well documented in our essay on financial reconstruction. The other half of that statement is that while campus burdens of funding have declined, that burden has also been shifted onto student publishers. Take for example this from Questionnaire #10:

Question #7: To the best of your knowledge, did anyone in the archive or university admin know about your work building a student-led publication? What would you have thought if someone from the archive or the university did show up to class and ask to learn about your class’s project as a student-led publication?

1. No, I don’t believe any administrators knew about our work. I think it was pretty contained to the ecosystem of the English department. It would have been great to talk to archivists to learn more about the history of student publications at UMB. I would have also been happy to speak to administrators about securing resources and/or funding to support the project.

Institutional absence is not institutional refusal. Institutional absence is not indicative of malice. There does not need to be a plot to deny students funding for absence to result in the cost of literary culture exported onto the structurally poorer. It is simply administrative, and bureaucratic.