• Mission
  • Church
  • Ministries
  • Culture
  • Life
  • Comment
au
Christian Today
Wednesday 20 January 2021
  • Mission
  • Church
  • Ministries
  • Culture
  • Life
  • Comment

Young writer schedule   

By Mark Tronson - Press Service International
Photo - 2019 Basil Sellers Award 3 joint winners – Roydon Ng, Roden Meares, Kristen Dang

2020 has seen a massive change in many areas of the young writers program – a functionary of Press Service International in conjunction with Christian Today.

There have been four major re-directions

Panellists

Instead of the Panellists marking each and every article as in previous years, in 2020 it has been changed to each young writer selecting in Cycle 5 what they themselves consider to be their BEST article.

In 2020 the Panellists now only mark each young writer’s BEST article – one only. This reduces the Panellists work load and makes it much more straight forward for the two statisticians.

The Awards this year may be a YouTube video event due to Covid 19 restrictions.

Moving the 3rd week of young writers

This is a little complicated as it involves the moving of senior writers from Week 5 back to Week 3 – more on that later.

The Week 3 young writers were relocated to Week 5 which resulted in Week 5 being ‘all young writers’.

Week 5

Australian young writers from Week 3

Australian Over 31s young writers

International’s Over 31s young writers

Photo  -  2019 NZ Youth Development Awards, Rebecca Hoverd and Jessica Knell

5 Over 31s to Seniors writers .

There are two basic reasons for this move.

First, Christian Today editor David Chang wanted Over 31s bought into the senior writers group to maintain younger faces in senior writers – not bringing in older heads, but allowing the young writers to work through the system. He also noticed many other international Christian publications had columnists being in their 30’s and 40’s.

Second, we found there were too many young people in Week 5  -  this resulted in two Over 31 New Zealanders become NZ senior writers and 3 international Over 31s become international senior writers.

Seniors writers

Gavin Lawrie coordinates the Australian and International senior writers with a Week 1 due date– they are published in Weeks 1, 2 and 3 of each Cycle. Previously senior writers in Week 5 had to wait 5 weeks to be published.

Now, when there is a gap in the 6 articles per day publishing program, perhaps a young writer became a no-show, with many senior writers in Week 3 can be bought forward to fill any such gap. This has worked well.

Second, the New Zealand senior writers are published in Week 4 of each Cycle. They have their own coordinator Wayne Graham in Wellington, NZ. There are eight NZ senior writers – three of whom are Over 31s.

The young writer program is as follows

Week 1

Australians 18-30

Kiwi young writers

5 senior writers

Week 2

Australians 18-30

Kiwi young writers

7 senior writers

Week 3

Kiwi young writers – includes a sport writer

13 senior writers

Week 4

Internationals 18-30

8 NZ senior writers

Week 5

Australian young writers 18-30

Australian Over 31s

International Over 31s

Plus

Each of the 5 weeks has an Australian sport writer

Every 2nd week there are a number of Mission articles

Each week there are a number of Christian News items

Dr Mark Tronson also writes a number of articles

What all this means is 6 articles every day published in Christian Today

Photo  -  2019 young writer conference – Neville Hiatt, Lucy Miles, Rachel Li

Behind the scenes

Each of those weeks have their own

Coordindator  -  send the due date reminders

Editor

Photo selector

Late article chaser

Facebook uploader

Christian media connect

1-2 line overview for Facebook – a roster

Stand Alone  - 

    Aust, Kiwi, Interl’s  - 

    There is one person for each who connects to Christian Today

Every role is a win-win for the young writers with an international column and being of a fabulous team.

PSI communications

A monthly newsletter of one page with photos

A weekly young writer memo – email

The Sunday E-Blast  -  more personal

Monthly Newsy Bits

Newsy Bits video team

Occasional major event videos

Numbers of our people write books and publish them on-line and one has a small publishing company Star Label which recently publish a book of young writer articles – hard copy – 40,000 online outlets promoting the book. It’s title “God In Life”.

It is all quite an amazing outreach of the Lord. 

Photo  -  Rebecca Moore and Russell Modlin – conference leaders

Dr Mark Tronson is a Baptist minister (retired) who served as the Australian cricket team chaplain for 17 years (2000 ret) and established Life After Cricket in 2001. He was recognised by the Olympic Ministry Medal in 2009 presented by Carl Lewis Olympian of the Century. He mentors young writers and has written 24 books, and enjoys writing. He is married to Delma, with four adult children and grand-children. Dr Tronson writes a daily article for Christian Today Australia (since 2008) and in November 2016 established Christian Today New Zealand. Dr Mark Tronson’s Press Service International in 2019 was awarded the Australasian Religious Press Association’s premier award, The Gutenberg. In September 2020 Summer Moore presented her commission portrait of Dr Mark Tronson holding the Gutenberg plaque. The above photo is the upper part from this portrait.

Mark Tronson's archive of articles can be viewed at: http://www.pressserviceinternational.org/mark-tronson.html

  • Most Popular
    • The Great Roar!
      The Great Roar!
    • Republicans who voted for impeachment sold Trump for 30 pieces of silver - Franklin Graham
      Republicans who voted for impeachment sold Trump for 30 pieces of silver - Franklin Graham
    • The small Voice
      The small Voice
    • Beware the ides of January?
      Beware the ides of January?
    • The Art of Worship
      The Art of Worship
    • Two movies one unbroken story
      Two movies one unbroken story
    • The Next Generation
      The Next Generation
    Subscribe and Follow
    Facebook Twitter Google+ Pinterest
    Subscribe to our newsletter
  • Hot News
    • Your position in the wait
      Your position in the wait
    • ’Tis the Season of Crazy Faith
      ’Tis the Season of Crazy Faith
    • Hillsong Dallas lead pastors step down to 'get healthy'
      Hillsong Dallas lead pastors step down to 'get healthy'
    • Five Christians executed by Islamists over Christmas
      Five Christians executed by Islamists over Christmas
    • Learn to swim, or drown
      Learn to swim, or drown
    • The Kevin Park STORY
      The Kevin Park STORY
    • Illegal legalism
      Illegal legalism
    • Home
    • Mission
    • Church
    • Ministries
    • Culture
    • Life
    • Comment
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Terms & Conditions
Copyright © 2021 Christian Today. All Rights Reserved.