Let's Talk Business

The fall semester is finally upon us and with it enters a return of the highly anticipated barrage of ystuds/sstuds advertising the many extracurricular activities offered here at YU. And though you’ve no doubt meticulously combed through each email, weighing its subject line’s cleverness, the author’s choice of font and exclamation count, and whether or not membership includes pizza, you may still be at a loss as to what you should involve yourself with on campus.

Don’t fret. Allow me to make a sale.

Like any “Shark Tank” aficionado knows, I’ll need to begin with the flashy, eye-catching, dude-hand-me-my-wallet, perks of writing for the Business section. As such, I’m required to mention the prestige to which an employer grants a candidate with “Newspaper Writer” emblazoned on his resume. I have to stress how a public forum like that of The Commentator’s serves as a most effective motivator for developing clear, articulate, and expressive writing. I can’t shy away from the fact that high-level executives are often made aware of a writer’s article and decide to reach out to her for further discussion.

And to be quite honest, these factors alone would provide more than sufficient reason to join our section; in today’s competitive job market, an impressive resume and noteworthy connections are just as important as a student’s GPA.

But the true value of anything can rarely be evaluated solely on its tangible, observable qualities and rather depends on a more comprehensive metric that considers all of the entity’s many subtleties and abstract qualities. In this case, simply summing-up my pitch with “Writing for The Commentator gives you a good shot a landing a job” would grossly devalue the position’s true worth. Instead, I’d like to go a little in-depth and showcase some of the less-obvious yet perhaps more valuable aspects of writing for the Business section.

The economy is a complex, all-encompassing, multifaceted world and as a writer, you’ll have the opportunity to explore it. You can investigate our politicians’ tax plans, fiscal policies, and stances on minimum wage and then weigh their respective merits. You can sift through the mass of pundits’ commentary and talk-show banter and determine whose opinion most closely aligns with objective facts and statistics. You can speculate as to how turmoil in the Middle East, the rise of Amazon or negotiations with North Korea can affect the price of pretzels at Nagel. You can sit down with entrepreneurs and executives and uncover the strategies and decisions that made them so successful.

Your travels into the business need not be so far from home. Plenty of YU alumni hold respectable positions in companies like J.P. Morgan and EY and are eager to meet with writers and give advice to current students. If you’re frustrated by YU’s Caf Card policies, perhaps you’ll decide to research the New York State tax code and figure out how it affects your choice of dinner. Based on your level of ambition, you might even take a look at our university’s finances and propose a strategy to trim excess spending or secure stronger investments.

Following your expeditions, you’ll consolidate your findings into an article, presenting them to your peers, faculty members and just about anyone with access to the internet. Such a process will naturally require you to become very familiar with your topic and therefore ensure that you’re a more informed, educated individual.

A well-respected publication for over 84 years, The Commentator is a staple of this institution and continues to serve as the premier discussion forum for a broad range of issues. Its articles from decades past still occupy a space in the library on Wilf Campus, ensuring an historical record of YU. In other words, your submissions are not merely a short-lived string of a few hundred words, but rather a timeless contribution to a reputable newspaper. And who knows? Perhaps 10 years from now someone’ll consult your article on New York taxes and convince the University to let him buy some chips for a friend.

Now you might be wondering why I’m so interested in your contributions and to be honest, it’s simple: Your viewpoint is important. In its mission to advance campus discourse and promote sophisticated debate, this paper relies on the many different voices of students at YU. This section is no different. Your political and ideological leanings, the state or country you’re from, your upbringing and your educational interests all converge to create an entirely unique identity that informs your perspective on economic and business-related issues and by sharing that, you help create a diverse, profound dialogue within these pages.

So whether you’re an engineering student captivated by FinTech, a Biology major looking to bring down the cost of medicine or an Accounting fanatic captivated by companies’ financial statements, this section and its readers are eager to see your perspective.