Questionnaire #1: With Katrina Sanville former Editor-in-Chief of The Mass Media (2022-2024)
Question #1: Can you please introduce yourself and tell me about your role in The Mass Media? How much did you interact with the other student publications on campus?
My name is Katrina Sanville, I graduated from UMass Boston in 2024 as an English Major. I was also a member of The Mass Media's staff since my freshman year, where I served as an Arts Writer for a year, Arts Editor for a year, and Editor-in-Chief for two years. I am currently finishing up my Master of Library and Information Science degree at Syracuse University!
Question #2: Can you tell me anything about the relationship held between The Mass Media, Writ Large, and The Watermark?
The Mass Media is both our newspaper and an umbrella term. Most students know it as the student newspaper, but we also provide funding to Writ Large and The Watermark using the optional student fee that is baked into our tuition. The Watermark was creative works, and Writ Large was op-eds. Part of The Mass Media's budget went towards funding both publications, through printing and release parties and any other wishes the teams had!
Question #3: Riley Hammond’s editor’s note to ‘The Waterfront’ talks briefly about submission patterns and habits for the two previous student publications. Can you tell me anything you remember about this period? Who was involved in the decision to merge the two journals together?
During the majority of my time at UMass, Writ Large and The Watermark were separate entities, and they each produced on an every other year basis (I think; details are a bit hazy!). Between my junior and senior year, Riley and I discussed the possibility of merging the two into one publication, as the publications separately had seen dwindling submissions. We met with our advisor, Chuck Henriques, and we discussed the logistics of that, including budget and goals for the new publication. Since we were taking two different publications with different vibes and merging them into one, we had to think through what that would look like on a regular publication schedule. Riley continued to work on the revamp throughout my senior year, but I didn't get to check in on her too much due to The Mass Media having its own ups and downs.
Question #4: How much institutional support would you say that University Administration gave The Waterfront / Writ Large / The Watermark?
Honestly, there wasn't a ton of institutional support. I know the English department promoted us occasionally, but part of the reason we had to merge was a lack of submissions. I also think upper administration had no idea it existed, since the publications printed so infrequently (and they weren't causing "trouble" the way The Mass Media was 😉), which was a drawback. I was always there as representation for The Mass Media in student panels, and there wasn't much representation for the other publications, so I wasn't able to balance vocalizing for the other publications and make sure The Mass Media stood its ground as a publication. Hindsight 20/20, I would definitely suggest creating connections with professors, specifically ones based in Creative Writing. When I was at UMass, we often went and spoke to the journalism classes taught by Paul Haney, and I know Timothy Oleksiak has mentioned sharing our writings for publication in Writ Large/Watermark when I took Advanced Nonfiction!
Followup Question #1: To circle Question #4 a moment about institutional support, is there anything more you can say about the archive, the English department or the MFA staff in specific? Do you know if, for example, the MFA program offered prize support or awards for The Watermark?
When I was with MM we were working on archiving our content, but UMB's librarians were very slow to digitize and held our copies hostage, so Watermark and Writ Large suffered similar issues. As for the support, the most we got was an email blast. I know there's a lot of red tape when it came to prizes and awards, so that may have been the issue. Occasionally, professors would mention us, but it was mostly email blasts. Other than that, there was very little support.