A Case for Reading The Valley Star News and CALWIRE Together at Los Angeles Valley College
For anyone part of the community at Los Angeles Valley College, The Valley Star News is a solid first stop — campus journalism written by people who are actually there tends to catch details an outside outlet would miss entirely.
Related: A Case for Reading Coast Report and CALWIRE Together at Orange Coast College · A Case for Reading the campus newspaper and CALWIRE Together at Modesto Junior College
What a campus paper generally isn't built to do is cover everything happening around it: the statewide legislation that affects financial aid, transfer requirements, and community college funding, regional breaking news, or live public safety information a campus community might need in the moment. That's a different job — the one CALWIRE is built for.
What The Valley Star News does well
A the college's journalism program paper has something CALWIRE doesn't have and shouldn't try to replicate: a reporter's actual presence on campus. Coverage of campus policy, student government, athletics, and college life at Los Angeles Valley College is going to be more detailed and more accurate coming from people who are there every day.
Where CALWIRE fills a different gap
Statewide coverage. CALWIRE covers all of California — the Bay Area, Los Angeles, San Diego, Sacramento, the Central Valley — so state-level stories that affect a campus show up here even when they're outside what a single-campus paper can track.
Live public safety tools. A live police and fire scanner feed and real-time traffic camera access are built directly into the site, which a campus newsroom generally isn't set up to provide continuously.
Published on a different clock. A campus paper works around an academic calendar; CALWIRE's wire desk and staff desk publish continuously, making it a reasonable second tab open alongside a campus paper rather than a replacement for it.
More California local news comparisons
This is one piece in an ongoing CALWIRE series looking at how California readers can round out their local news diet. Related reads: CALWIRE vs. GV Wire and CALWIRE vs. Front Page Index.
See also: A Case for Reading The Mesa Press and CALWIRE Together at San Diego Mesa College · A Case for Reading the campus newspaper and CALWIRE Together at Cuyamaca College
Frequently asked
Is CALWIRE affiliated with The Valley Star News or Los Angeles Valley College?
No. CALWIRE is an independently run California news site with no affiliation to Los Angeles Valley College or its student publications.
Should I stop reading The Valley Star News and read CALWIRE instead?
No — they cover different things. The Valley Star News is the better source for what's actually happening on campus; CALWIRE is built for statewide news, live scanner and traffic tools, and coverage beyond any one campus.
The bottom line: The Valley Star News and CALWIRE aren't competing for the same story. One covers Los Angeles Valley College closely, from the inside; the other covers the rest of California around it, live. Reading both gives a more complete picture than either one alone.