From the Editor

photography by Julia Norman

“What? We have a magazine?”

Yes, we know. Not many people realize that the University of Georgia has its own student magazine, let alone how to pronounce it (it rhymes with magazine: ugg-uh-zeen). But we’re trying to change that (the recognition, not the pronunciation).

With this issue and the last, we’ve been improving the look of the magazine by incorporating more eye-catching layouts and fun-to-read sidebars. We’re also giving the magazine a personality of its own, creating an upbeat, trustworthy and occasionally witty voice that readers can come to expect from UGAzine. And along with that voice, readers now can look forward to amusing features like our guide to Facebook jargon and our latest department, Final Exam.

But we’re not just adding a quiz to every issue; we’re giving the whole magazine a facelift, from the table of contents to the last best page. This will be the last issue we run our Dawg Notes department. We realized that since our entire magazine is devoted to UGA, we don’t really need a department about our campus. Not to mention our favorite Dawg Notes writer, Adrienne Kay, is in Chile for the semester.

For those of you who have read our magazine in the past, you’ll notice that Around Town has become Beyond the Arch, a department dedicated to taking readers off campus and into the Athens community, like to Bear Hollow Wildlife Trail, Athens’ very own zoo. Our traditional Photo Essay department also has a new name: A Thousand Words, an obvious play on that age-old “A picture’s worth a thousand words” maxim. The Do It Yourself department, where we run simple tips on how to decorate your dorm room or make fabulous cocktails, has been dubbed On Your Own, which, in this issue, features clever road trip advice from departments editor Sarah Kohl. And finally, we renamed our personal essay department Express Yourself, originally titled In My Words.

We hope that someday students will eagerly await the day when a new issue of UGAzine hits the bins (and, of course, learn the right way to say ugg-uh-zeen). But until then, we’ll keep doing our best to make this a better magazine. If you have any suggestions or comments, please visit our website at www.uga.edu/ugazine or e-mail us at ugazine@yahoo.com.

Until next semester,

Jay Blades

Editor in Chief