Council portal

Have you ever wondered whether anyone reads Grad Post?

Short answer:

Yes, lots of people do!

Longer answer:

On average, editions of Grad Post get 25–30% opens – that is, around one third of subscribers open our email every week. This is huge! 3500–4000 SUPRA members are reading our newsletter each week.

It’s important we put quality content in Grad Post to keep the attention of those 4000 members. We want them to read all the way to the bottom and follow all the links to our website. And we want them to keep opening future editions.

Why? Because we want to have the most-read small newsletter of all time and break some kind of record? No – because we know we have important things to tell postgrads, including things that could impact their lives, both positively and negatively!

Grad Post is an invaluable resource for sharing important news with our members. It’s a small newsletter with huge reach: probably more than some accounts with big-name social media corporations we could mention.

The biggest barrier to expanding our Grad Post reach is that no one likes emails.

Most emails are boring, stressful, pointless, confusing, or spam. Therefore, Grad Post needs to be interesting, sincere, joyful, useful and accessible. Given our 30% open rate, we’re already doing a pretty good job with that!

You can help make Grad Post a high-quality newsletter to be proud of by following the submission guidelines on this page. These are based on ‘best-practice’ for publishing online.

But most of all, you can ensure Grad Post is the best it can be by sharing your SUPRA work through Grad Post.

Grad Post is published by the pubs team weekly every Wednesday, and content must be submitted by 9am Monday to be included in that week’s edition.

Submit all Grad Post content to gradpostcontent@supra.usyd.edu.au

Any work you do for SUPRA can (and should!) be submitted to Grad Post:

• notices of events
• news about campaigns (such as letters to the University or government)
• equity network activities
• announcements about representative or outreach work you’ve done.

Anything that highlights what SUPRA does for its members and constituents should be advertised as loudly, proudly and clearly as possible.

We also publish a weekly ‘fun fact’ to bring some lightness to people’s day, so if you come across any facts that are suitably fun, feel free to share them too!  

Have a look at the events and news pages of our website to get an idea of the kinds of things you can submit.

Email 25–50 words that are ready to publish. If you have a longer article or statement to publish, please provide a 25–50 word summary for Grad Post and the full text for publication on our website.

Please also include any links and attach appropriate images.

If you are advertising an event, please make sure to include:

• name and contact details for the event organiser
• a link to the event page – e.g. Facebook, Eventbrite etc. (make sure this is created before you submit to Grad Post)
• date and time of the event, and location if relevant
• who is invited to the event/who you want to attend – e.g. all postgrads; HDR students; queer students etc.

The word limit for all content published in Grad Post is 50 words. 

Summarise your content briefly in 25–50 words. It’s important to keep your Grad Post content brief so you don’t lose people’s attention.

If you need to say something more than 50 words long, a 25–50 word summary can be published in Grad Post, with the full text published on the news or events page of our website. Please include both a 25–50 word summary and the full text when you submit to Grad Post.

Include a photo or other graphic to be published with your Grad Post content, if possible.

Images should have a 16:9 aspect ratio so they display correctly in Grad Post, on our website events calendar, and on our website news feed.

If you’re not sure what this means, don’t worry, the pubs team can crop your image for you. But if you are designing a flyer or graphic specifically for Grad Post and/or our website, please make the aspect ratio 16:9. If you don’t have a suitable graphic or image the pubs team will use a stock image or design something appropriate.

Avoid using text in images. For readability and accessibility, text should accompanying an image rather than be in the image itself. Find more information in our accessibility style guide.

If you need a graphic for Grad Post, social media or a printed poster, the pubs team can help! Find more details below in Get help with publications.

The pubs team checks the Grad Post email account every Monday morning for content submissions, and to follow up any submissions as necessary – this is why it’s important to meet the 9am Monday deadline.

On Tuesday morning the pubs team has a short editorial meeting to plan that week’s Grad Post. The DSP and a representative from the casework team are invited to this meeting, to make sure we cover all the important news, events and issues of the week from both council and staff perspectives. We review the content and decide where it will fit in Grad Post, whether it also needs to be published on the news or events page of our website (or on the homepage), and if there are any other ways we should advertise it (in Student News or HDR News, for example), and flag whether it needs to be re-run in future editions of Grad Post. 

Sometimes there are too many submissions to fit in one edition, or there is content that isn’t suitable for publication. In the unlikely event your submission can’t be published, the pubs team will let you know.

If you need help with a publications project, contact Louise, and she’ll put you in touch with the appropriate person in the pubs team to assist. There’s no need to cc the whole pubs team when you contact her 🙂

The pubs (publications) team is:

Louise Corney (Operations Manager)
9am – 5pm, Monday to Friday
louise.corney@sydney.edu.au

Louise coordinates the publications team.

Rachel Engdahl (Administration and Publications Officer)
9am – 5pm, Tuesday to Thursday (and non-pay week Mondays)
rachel.engdahl@sydney.edu.au

Anthea Fitzgerald (Administration and Publications Officer)
9am – 5pm Monday – Wednesday
anthea.fitzgerald@sydney.edu.au

Emma Davidson (Administration and Publications Officer)
9am – 5pm, Wednesday – Friday (and non-pay week Tuesdays)
emma.davidson@sydney.edu.au

Rachel, Anthea and Emma job-share the role of Administration and Publications Officer. Note that they all work part time, and their role is split between publications and administration (including reception).

The pubs team have made an online form which you can use to request them to make a flyer, graphic element, social media advertisement, poster or other publication. If you need help with something, just fill in the form and they’ll get back to you!

https://forms.office.com/r/WFxVqpvNHi.

Note: you don’t need to use this form for Grad Post submissions – use the instructions above. 

If you need help with any other publications work, or something more complex, or if you have any questions, contact Louise.

When it comes to making an announcement, advertising an event, or creating a call to action, it’s not just how many people you reach, it’s what you say, and how you say it – that’s the part the pubs team can help with!

The pubs team edits and proofreads all SUPRA’s publications, and they can proofread your work for SUPRA too. Don’t be shy! Everyone who writes anything needs an editor. The pubs team even edits and proofreads each other’s work. 

If you publish an advertisement for an event or campaign on the Uni website, Eventbrite or another non-SUPRA platform,  send it to the pubs team first to be proofread. They can help you avoid typos and factual and grammatical errors, and give you feedback and suggestions to make your advertisement as clear and impactful as possible.

If you’d like a pubs officer to proofread a simple ad, social media post, Eventbrite listing etc., email it to admin@supra.usyd.edu.au and they’ll get back to you quickly. If you have a longer document for proofreading, such as a report or letter, contact Louise.

The pubs team has a lot of knowledge about publications and communications, and they’re happy to share it with you! Contact them if you need advice about any publications projects you are planning for SUPRA – you can either use the project brief form or email Louise.

Our writing style guide consists of a word list of our preferred spelling and usage of words commonly used in  SUPRA publications, and a guide to our ‘house style’ for everything from bullet points to formatting dates and using textual dashes.

The pubs team uses the writing style guide to ensure consistency across all our professional publications. You don’t need to be totally familiar with these documents, but you’re encouraged to refer to them when writing communications for SUPRA.

Download SUPRA word list as a Word document [17KB]

Download SUPRA writing style guide as a Word document [58KB]

Our accessibility style guide contains important information on how to write for and design accessible print and online publications.

Download SUPRA accessibility guide as a Word document [55KB].

Download SUPRA graphic style guide as a PDF [4.2MB]

Our logo comes in a few variations suitable for different design situations. Refer to the graphic style guide for how to use our logo effectively. Download PNG files of our logo below. Note: these files are for use on digital publications only. For print publications, please contact the pubs team for print-quality EPS files.

Full logo (black text)

Use this verstion of our full logo on light backgrounds.

Download full logo (black) as a PNG file [132KB].

Full logo (white text)

Use this version of our full logo on dark backgrounds.

Download full logo (white) as PNG file [126KB].

Main logo

Download main logo as a PNG file [192KB].

Secondary logo

Download secondary logo as a PNG file [34KB].