Writers Guidelines

Like to contribute to Edge with an article or news item? Here are some tips on what we are looking for and what you need to do.

THE EDGE is the official youth magazine of the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s South Pacific Division. With 6+ issues a year the magazine is distributed to most churches who receive its parent paper—the weekly Record, and to Year 11 and 12 students attending Adventist high schools in Australia and New Zealand. THE EDGE presents Seventh-day Adventist beliefs and lifestyle in a contemporary way to young adults.

We’re interested in articles about:

A relationship with Jesus Christ
Bible teaching
Relationships and personal growth
Current culture and how it relates to a young adult’s spirituality
Healthy lifestyle choices
Ethical and social issues from a Christian youth perspective
Unique teachings of the Seventh-day Adventist Church

Manuscripts that conform with these guidelines and in harmony with Christian principles and the teachings of the Seventh-day Adventist Church will be considered for publication.

Preparing to write for The Edge:

Read previous issues
See what and how features are presented
Inquire first
Yes, we love receiving unsolicited manuscripts, but we could save you some time if you first wrote or emailed us outlining your idea in about 100 words. We’ll soon tell you if we’re interested.
Choose suitable topics
Consider the list above, but also check back issues of the magazine to see what has been published. Come up with a new angle!
Remember your audience
The audience we aim at are Adventist youth. Their age is between 15 and 25. They don’t like to be preached to. What are their concerns?
Keep the editors happy
"No editor can ever afford the rejection of a good thing, and no author the publication of a bad one" (Higginson). The Edge receives many unsolicited manuscripts. To be accepted, yours must stand out. Make your article as presentable and easy to accept as possible.
If you are posting your computer printed (or typewritten) manuscripts, double spaced with your name at the head and on every page. Don’t forget to include your phone number, email address and postal address (most important to get that cheque in the mail after publication). Number each page.
Emailed articles are welcome, send them—as an attached document with "Edge manuscript" in subject line to The Edge editor.
Ensure you’ve edited your article yourself (or have someone else edit it). Make it as visually appealing as possible. Remember we rarely publish articles of more than 1000 words in length, so edit mercilessly. Don’t expect editors to do what you couldn’t be bothered doing.
Timing
If your article is linked to time—for instance, Easter, Christmas or end-of-year exams etc—submit it at least four months ahead. You will receive acknowledgment on receipt of your article. We will try to use an accepted article within 12 months, but this cannot always happen.

About publication

For publication we ask for first Australian printing rights only and for publishing on our web site. Payment is made upon publication and varies according to type of article, length and how much extra work the editors do in preparing the article for publication.

Contact details

Address: The Edge
Signs Publishing Company
3485 Warburton Highway
Warburton, Vic 3799
Phone: (03) 5965 6300
Fax: (03) 5966 9019
Email:

Writing tips

Write an outline first, to know where you are headed before you begin. Choose your words well, structure the article logically and, most importantly, have something to say.
Capture the reader’s attention in the first paragraph. Always check your second or third paragraph to see if it would work better up front. Sometimes, amazingly, your last one will.
Take care with your writing, so that what you send to a publisher is as close to perfect as you can make it. (Keep the editors happy.)
Don’t rush your writing. Put your article aside once you think you’ve finished, then look at it again a few days later.
Prune mercilessly. Even your most cherished sentence.
Keep it simple. Use short, active sentences and use readily understandable words.
Keep it lively. Use active voice, first person, direct speech, imagery and strong words (like "will" instead of "may"). Avoid overstatement (understatement is so much more powerful), cliche and tautology, adjectives and adverbs (these are lazy writer’s crutches).
Stick to one theme per article.
Let your story do the talking. Don’t place a moral—or add a religious bit—in the last few paragraphs. Show me, don’t tell me.
Write in spoken English (The Edge is not an academic journal), using contractions as appropriate.
Have a great ending. That means stopping when you’re finished—don’t dribble on. Don’t spring any surprises that don’t fit the article. Leave the reader satisfied that you have finished.
Once in print, check your article for editorial changes. It will help you learn what The Edge wants for the future. When we edit, our focus is on the readers and how we can improve an article for them. If we make significant changes we’ll send the article back to you before publication so you can check your article and make further suggestions.

News for The Edge [Our News Archive]

The Edge web site, along with additional feature articles and reviews, also covers youth news — what’s happening among youth groups; churches, Adventist schools, university groups—with short reports and preferably photos. Here are some pretty comprehensive tips for writing news:

What is news?

To be considered news, an event must have one or more of the following qualities:

Impact
If an event has impact on only a limited number of people, it is not as likely to be news if large numbers have been affected. While there may be other circumstances that would make one person’s loss newsworthy—such as the chance to witness that it created or a miraculous escape—the newswriter must always ask, How wide an interest will there be in this item? Unless quite a few readers will be interested, the event is probably not news.
Timeliness
News must be current. Publishing a news item on Man landing on the moon for the first time isn't really News anymore.
Prominence
Events involving well-known people or institutions usually are of greater interest than events involving people who are unknown. But even with these people, not everything they do is news.
Proximity
An event must have some impact on the area where the "Record" circulates. It needs to be "close" to the readers, although not necessarily close physically. For example, what someone from the South Pacific is doing at the General Conference office in Washington, DC, may be of interest even though it is far away. And what is going on in the smallest church in the most remote area of the division may be of interest because it is "close to our hearts."
Conflict
Clashes between institutions or people are newsworthy.
The unusual
When people do extraordinary things, it may merit reporting. Anything that is different from the run-of-the-mill is potential grist for a good story.
Currency
Try to capitalise on things that already are being talked about. For example, if everyone is talking about a Goods and Services Tax, then show what kind of impact it will have on a conference, school or church, or even the buying power of the average Seventh-day Adventist in that area.

Writing the lead

"The lead—the first sentence that introduces a story—either captures the reader or scares them away," say Professor Carl Sessions Stepp of the Maryland University School of Jornalsim. "A good lead is like ice—so slick that before they realise it readers have slid into the middle of your story."

A news lead need not be clever or dramatic. But it must make the reader want to find out more about what happened. "The easiest thing in the world is to stop reading," says Barney Kilgore of the "Wall Street Journal."

Although he says it isn’t possible to offer "a precise formula" for writing leads for news articles, Professor Stepp offers the following guidelines, noting a good lead should:

Take less than 25 words.
Express a single thought.
Be direct.
Use action words and active voice. Avoid the verb "to be" and passive introductions such as "there is." Select a main verb that conveys action, movement, something "happening." It’s best if your main verb is "Not" something like "is," "was," "said" or "stated."
Have the dominating element—the single most gripping point—as near the beginning of the sentence as possible.
Tell the news itself, not circumstances surrounding the news. Avoid having the main verb be "announced," "took the stand," "called a press conference" or similar words.
Avoid non-essential information: long titles, full names of government agencies, unnecessary attribution, acronyms, jargon. That comes later, if at all.
Interest you as a reader.

Structuring an news article

Most news articles should be written in what is called the "inverted pyramid" style.

The lead should summarise the most important aspect of what happened, and the balance of the article should provide other facts in descending order of importance. As a writer, you should assume the editor will trim the article from the bottom up, paragraph by paragraph.

Using quotes and attributes

One of the greatest weaknesses in Seventh-day Adventist news writing is the failure of reporters to get input from others when reporting an event.

Few Seventh-day Adventist news articles include any quotes at all. And as a result, few reports are anywhere near as readable or as punchy as they could be. Quotes create variety, even though only one person writes the article.

Quotes also enhance credibility. We expect news articles to give us facts. Thus, the reporter is obligated to provide facts not opinions.

However, opinions about facts are often more interesting than the facts themselves. Thus the crucial thing is that we clearly delineate between the two—and quotes are useful in accomplishing this.

While it is out of place for the reporter to make such statements as, "This is the best thing ever done for youth in the history of the conference," it is quite acceptable to quote someone else who makes such a statement. The statement, which is an opinion, may be right or it may be wrong. But the person said it. And that is news.

Not only do quotes enhance news reports by projecting an image of objectivity, they also make the article easier to read. They function in news articles in much the same way conversation does in story writing. They provide both visual and organisational belief.

Even though a person may have attended the function and seen everything that was done from beginning to end, they should not feel qualified to write about it without having spoken with at least three or four people to get their reactions, background details, plans for future events and the like. Quote from one of the event’s organisers, from a participant, and from a beneficiary of the service provided.

Avoiding clichés, jargon and other pitfalls

News writers who write for Seventh-day Adventist publications need to write to Seventh-day Adventists about Seventh-day Adventist activities—but they need to do it in such a way that their statements will be comprehensible to any person who might happen to pick up the publication.

Instead of talking about a worker, why not say minister, teacher, literature evangelist, Sanitarium Health Food Company employee or church employee. Similarly, we cannot assume that everyone understands what AUC, PNGUM, WPUM, CPUM, ADRA, SPC, SPD and a host of other Seventh-day Adventist acronyms stand for. Thus, never use an acronym or any other form of abbreviation until the entity’s name has been written in full.

Names of individuals cause editors more bother than almost any other aspect of our work. Please, please, please, give us people’s names and not their initials.

Well! All that was a mouthful. At least we can now say "I told you so!" Actually, if you are reading this you have a better concentration span than I do (or you skipped through to the end).

We hope to hear from you soon!