A bittersweet goodbye on behalf of Carrot 2021/22

Mansi Vithlani, editor-in-chief of 2021/22, reflects on Carrot Magazine’s past year.

While Carrot Magazine is a young society, the last year has been one of our most successful yet. As City, University of London’s student publication, Carrot aims to create written content which fits within our four sections: City News, which keeps our students up to date with the latest at City University; Opinions, which champions writers’ stories, experiences, and views; Arts and Culture, providing our readers with honest and reliable reviews; and Politics and Current Affairs, home to crucial pieces on events in the UK and around the world.

When Carrot Magazine was handed down to me as editor-in-chief last June, it was at its bare bones, yet I do not disregard the previous team’s efforts. It can take many months and years of hard work and dedication for a magazine to become recognised. Running a student publication is difficult and comes with various challenges. For many, student magazines act as an opportunity to cover topics that they are passionate about, whilst also serving as the start of students’ journalism careers. I joined as a writer in my first year of university and it was the best decision I made, and the magazine has been a huge part of my university journey.

With the effect of the pandemic, at the start of my supervision there were not a lot of writers, content was slow and although social media had grown, the various channels did not have one strict creative direction. This year Carrot magazine underwent a major rebranding, through which we looked to create a more cohesive and professional image. This was both on our website and on social media, allowing Carrot Magazine to become more known amongst students and other student publications, with a more striking logo and clean colour palette.

As a result, we were able to hit the major target of over 1000 followers on our Instagram page, with our most-liked post so far being our timeline of City Students’ Union’s welcome week activities, engaged by almost 200 students and reaching approximately 1,362 accounts. A key focus of our social media this year was providing students with resources beneficial to their learning and life experience while at City University, offering genuine advice that students look to.

We endeavoured to supplement and complement the content from our writers on the website, rather than reshuffling content throughout. By creating posts that raise awareness of mental health support systems at the university, academic support and healthy practices to relieve stress, in the past year Carrot has reached an average of 15,284 users, according to Instagram insights. Advocating for student mental health is of utmost importance amongst the editorial team, who share individual mental health tips to help our readers, throughout our wellness section and on our socials.

With our follower account increasing on Instagram by 100% this past year, we have created a Carrot community, not only becoming a hub for students at City but also for all students and graduates living in London. We focused heavily on helping followers to enjoy their time in London by making them aware of events, parks, and local independent businesses.

As a result of these posts getting huge exposure on social media, we created a new website section, Carrot in London, for articles on the best places to visit and how to avoid tourist traps.

Another way we have supported students is through our City News section, which shares information on the latest happenings at City University and keeps students up to date throughout the academic year. In addition to wellness articles and tips from the editorial team, two additional new launches this year which inform and aid other students, a highlight for the section this past year has been City News editor, Aylin Aliev, exclusively interviewing the new University President, Anthony Finkelstein, who joined City in June. Additionally, we initiated our City Spotlight series, shedding light on other societies at the university and how they are helping and encouraging students to join, therefore expanding our audience university wide.

Our politics and current affairs section has also seen a major rebrand this year, most notably in its new Debates section, where we publish two opposing opinions on a divisive topic. In combination with the new What You Need To Know About Politics But Are Too Afraid To Ask column, which offers definitions of terms frequently used in the political sphere, we want to inform our readers and allow them space to form their own opinions.

We believe in giving students the information they need to understand while ensuring the excess noise of misinformation does not cloud them. Given the prevalence of false news, we require our Carrot authors to write accurately and transparently, combating misinformation and advocating responsible journalism, an aspect we have continued to successfully achieve throughout the past year.

Our arts and culture section has continued to provide honest and reliable reviews and has started to garner the attention of PRs. In the past year we have been offered over 50 tickets to write reviews, including the best brunch places in London, Sam Fischer and Easy life. Hand in hand our opinions section has grown tremendously this year, allowing for our writers to express themselves, whilst also providing breaking updates from the music and entertainment world, aiming to cover a range of genres within the arts and culture sphere so that there is always a wide variety of reading for everyone. The opinions section this year in particular has focused on giving a voice and championing diverse views that are representative of various ethnic backgrounds, and beliefs.

Although there is heavy focus on our online magazine, this year we decided to branch out and focus on our multimedia content. At Carrot we always strive for improvement and believe strongly in the importance of adapting to new forms of media. As such, our newest project this year was the creation of a podcast, with the handy name CAKE: Carrot and Kurrent Events.

CAKE offers writers the chance to become more involved in the society and take on a greater level of responsibility, as well as experimenting with multimedia journalism and gaining new skills in a welcoming and supportive environment. Although CAKE is in its early stages, we aspire for it to become a platform where our supporters can expand their knowledge or seek comfort when embarking on their university journey.

It has been incredible to see our writers flourish as they develop their skills in all fields. I have enjoyed hosting various events to help the members of the magazine become better writers and to facilitate networking. The first of these was a writing masterclass, during which I presented the style guide, provided writing exercises, and answered any questions our contributors had.

Another event was a pizza night for the editorial team to encourage new writers to join the team, whilst enjoying lots of yummy pizza! The Carrot Awards are another project that I started, to show appreciation for the best articles of each month. This helped to push writers to do their best and to increase the value of Carrot and I am so grateful that we all got to gather together one last time to celebrate!

It has been such a phenomenal year as your editor-in-chief, working with the most talented editorial team to help Carrot get the recognition it deserves. I have so much gratitude to everyone involved in Carrot’s success this past year. From our junior writers, our senior writers, our one-time contributors, to our columnists. Those of you involved in our podcasts, those of you running our socials, our followers sharing and liking content, the journalism department, the SU and of course the editorial team.

It is because of the dedication of everyone behind the scenes that Carrot came away with two awards at the national and regional Student Publication Awards. I am incredibly thankful that Carrot has been recognised by the Student Publication Association winning ‘Highly Commended’ for ‘Best Newcomer Publication’. We were capable of winning this award due to the branding, the increase in writers, new columns, compelling pieces, a podcast, and a lot of hard work behind the scenes. I am additionally honoured to have achieved ‘Highly Commended’ in the ‘Outstanding Commitment’ award at the SPA Regional awards. It was a big dream of mine to even be shortlisted for an SPA award, so both wins go beyond anything I could have hoped for as editor-in-chief.

My aim for the past year was to build a student publication that is as prestigious as City’s journalism department itself. Building a successful publication takes time, but we believe we have taken strong first steps to find a place for Carrot Magazine in the London student journalism scene.

Carrot editorial team at the 2022 awards

Carrot is such a heart-warming community, a place for forming close friendships and also a means for personal and professional development. I am so honoured to have had Carrot as part of my university journey and I am forever thankful for your trust in me as your editor-in-chief. I hope myself and the editorial team have made you proud this past year.

Good luck to all of our contributors and congratulations once again to our new team! What a fabulous group of journalists and we can’t wait to see where Carrot goes in the next year.

Signing off for one last time,

Mansi Vithlani

Editor-in-chief

2021/22

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