Above: Front page of the debut issue of Ylife, as it appeared Monday (the tennis picture was later changed to reflect the late withdrawal of Maria Sharapova)
What’s the latest on orientation? Who’s doing cool research on campus? How come I can’t park in my usual spot today?
For students who want answers to such questions – and plenty more – York has launched Ylife, an online newsletter for students, just in time for the start of the Fall 2005 session. The newsletter, which will appear weekly, debuted Monday with a line-up of news and information for students drawing in part on York’s award-winning YFile daily newsletter.
“Students themselves often ask how to get YFile, so it made sense to design a newsletter specially for them,” said York publications director Berton Woodward. “We hope this will give students an even greater sense of belonging to the York community.”
To VP Students Rob Tiffin, “Ylife will be an important new way for students to learn more about the exciting things happening on the Keele and Glendon campuses, and be introduced to fellow students and alumni actively engaged in our community.”
The first issue of Ylife featured timely stories on summer orientation activities at York and the “Ask-a-Student Service Expert” information service, a first for a Canadian university. Also spotlighted were York alum Nick Czernkovich, whose first day at his new job as a CBC television weather presenter found him covering the Air France crash, and Atkinson student Ohenewa Akuffo, a women’s freestyle wrestler competing for Canada at the World University Games in Izmir, Turkey.
YLife will regularly include stories about students, interesting research at York and campus activities, as well as updates on the Lions men’s and women’s interuniversity sports teams. It will also include a selection of what’s on items from the York Events site, media stories about York, plus announcements about campus operations including parking, computer networking, important dates and more.
The newsletter, published by the Publications unit of York’s Marketing & Communications Division, will be updated every Monday. It will be available by clicking on icons placed on various York Web sites, including the Current Students home page. A message linking to Ylife will also be sent through the Notebox alert system, which is accessible to more than 55,000 York students. And anyone interested in receiving YLife can subscribe by visiting the Subscribe page and signing up online. Students can also propose stories and make comments via the Contact Us page, which also includes links to all the main student Web pages on York’s central Web site.
If you can’t find Ylife for some reason, the URL is as easy to remember as its creators could make it: www.yorku.ca/ylife. Any University unit, club or organization that would like to include a Web link to the Ylife page can use that URL and go to the Contact Us page to download a button.