I am not, despite what some may think after a glance at my glorious visage above, queen of the newspapers.

I cannot look at a NIU student and realize: Ah, you. You are the one who wants to read about the obvious flaws in Ozymandias’ plot to unite the world of Watchmen. Or you are the one who hopes the Northern Star prints a psychological analysis of Jersey Shore every day (Why do you really GTL, Snooki? Why do you seek acceptance this way?).

It’s just not my thing to read minds, you see. However, I try the hardest I can to ensure the paper has content which relates to students and members of the NIU and DeKalb communities. To do this, the staff members of the Northern Star—the editors, reporters, photographers, etc.—try our hardest to connect with our readers.

We partake in the usual activities: we all ask a lot of questions, accept story ideas, seek random students out so we can ask what they want to read about, among other things.

However, after calling for transparency from NIU, I’m now trying to make open the workings of the Northern Star. In that vein, I wanted to lay out other plans I have to connect with the populace.

Some of the most basic things we’re trying out include hosting various features on the Distractions page: Greek of the Week, Dorm of the Month. You can send your submissions for these pieces to [email protected].

We encourage readers to provide us feedback through email, Twitter, Facebook and any other outlet you can think of.

We’re also looking into other ways to interact with the community on a grander scale. As the fifth anniversary of the Feb. 14, 2008, shootings nears, I am making plans to call an advisory panel. The members of the panel can speak to what they think NIU and DeKalb wants to see from the Star—if anything—in regard to the anniversary. If possible, I’m interested in hosting panels on other subjects, too, like the 2012 presidential race.

In between everything else, I’m trying to work out an open house event where anyone can visit, students can be interviewed for a job at the Star and community members can learn about the paper’s operations.

I can’t promise anything, but I’m absolutely sure everyone will drop their Friday plans to learn from the Star staff what is the difference between serif and sans serif fonts.

The staff is always looking for ways to improve the paper and make it as interesting and informative as possible. If you’ve got an idea of how to help us meet those goals, send it along.