Photographs and editorial cartoons are welcomed. Before submitting text, request the Green Pages style sheet or review it on line at our website. Submissions received after the deadline or exceeding word limits (news briefs: 350 words; letters: 200 words; columns: 800 words) will not be considered. Please see Submissions for more information.

Submit proposed articles articles here.
Cartoon submissions should be sent here.

Green Pages
c/o Green Party of the United States
P.O. Box 75075
Washington, DC 20037

Green Pages Writers’ Guidelines

Introduction
Thanks for your interest in contributing to Green Pages, which is an all-volunteer effort. As a general rule everybody involved in the quarterly printed paper is very busy, including the editorial board. Please budget enough time to honor your commitment to Green Pages-reporting, writing, and reviewing your article and getting it in on time is greatly appreciated.

Green Pages is the official publication of record of the Green Party of the United States. Its primary purpose is to address the needs of the Green Party, its members and its organizations on the national, state and local levels. Coverage will focus on news of the Green Party and news affecting Green parties. Green Pages will share successes of the party and information to make the party stronger. Secondarily, Green Pages will provide a credible information vehicle for communication and alliance building with media, academics and social movements.

Green Pages is always looking for new writers, photographers, and cartoonists. With the notable exception of op-eds, the story lineup for each issue is developed by the Editorial Board and articles assigned accordingly. If you have a timely story idea, please submit a brief query (a few sentences about the general topic and your angle will suffice) to greenpages -at- greens.org. We can also assign a topic to you from the story lineup.

Green Pages contributors are a diverse lot. Recently, we have published work by professional journalists, photographers, and illustrators, in addition to pieces by college students, activists, and elected officials. Most of our contributors are registered Greens, and we ask you to indicate your state affiliation if you have one.

One of our reporters once told us, “I would have written you a shorter story, but I didn’t have the time.” Shorter stories are much harder to write. Take the extra effort to go through your story to make it as concise as possible.

Purpose
The writers’ guidelines and style sheet were designed to serve both new and returning writers and editors and should be updated as needed; please send feedback to greenpages -at- greens.org. The early sections offer submission guidelines and editorial policy; a style sheet at the end provides Green Pages’ preferred uses of select words and phrases.

Submissions
If you’ve already been in touch with a member of the Editorial Board, please send your contribution directly to them. Unsolicited materials, op-eds, cartoons, letters to the editors, etc., can be sent via e-mail.

Please submit articles as Word documents (note that this has changed from the past). Submit images as JPGs.

We strongly encourage writers to think about how their story will appear on the page. Think photos. Think graphics. Think sharp headlines. Reporters who supply photos and graphics will probably get a better treatment on the layout.

Indicate local state Green Party affiliation, if any. We typically run an author headshot and a one-sentence bio with published op-eds.

Preparing written submissions
Focus energy on researching, writing, and revising original, important ideas in a concise and logical manner, but don’t forget to schedule time for proofreading before submission.

Green Pages Style Sheet
More than anything else, we encourage you to read your local newspaper to get a feel for journalistic style and to budget enough time for reporting, writing, and editing your work.

Our standard references are the AP (Associated Press) Stylebook and Webster’s New World College Dictionary. If you don’t already have one, get a copy of the current AP Stylebook. It is user friendly and rich with precise examples. Familiarize yourself with it before the deadline approaches. The AP Stylebook covers most questions of usage. This Green Pages style sheet contains additional entries and adjustments to AP style. Please refer first to the AP Stylebook, then to this Green Pages style sheet, and only then query the Editorial Board.

Avoid common mistakes

• Race, ethnicity, gender, religion, sexual orientation, and other labels should not be used unless newsworthy and directly relevant to the content of the article.
• Use gender-neutral terms whenever possible. Avoid terms such as Chairman.
• Avoid “she/he” constructions when possible. For example, not Each candidate made his or her speech, but Candidates made their speeches.
• Use the active rather than passive voice.
• Review article word limits. The Editorial Board will not review op-eds longer than 800 words or letters to the editor longer than 350 words.
• Eliminate unnecessary words (even if you’re within the limit).
• Do not quote yourself in the body of your own article.
• Review the AP section on numerals (in general, only spell out the numbers one through nine, and use figures for 10 and above).
• Do not use a serial comma before the conjunction in a simple series. For example: States racking up wins include Hawaii, Iowa and Nebraska.
• Do not use italics.
• Ask several friends for feedback before submitting your article.
• Put your article down for at least a few days and read it with fresh eyes. Use only one space after a period or other terminal punctuation.
• Put an abbreviation in parenthesis following the first use of term; use the abbreviation thereafter in the same article. (See list at end of style sheet for commonly used acronyms.) For example: The Presidential Exploratory Committee (PEC) settled in to its meeting. The PEC is made up of 14 members.
• Refer to a person’s full name on first use, and their last name on second use.
• Avoid titles such as Ms., Mr., Mrs., or Miss. Academic or professional titles may be used when appropriate.

Consistency for locals and credits

References to local state parties should be consistent with the master list published in each issue. Usages like Texas Greens are reserved for talking about things that aren’t official actions of the state party, e.g., Many Mississippi Greens don’t think the party should endorse Trent Lott’s reelection campaign.

References and credits should be consistent throughout. For example, do not use D.C. Statehood Greens or DC Statehood Green Party instead of D.C. Statehood Green Party.

Photographer credits should read: Photographer’s name (boldface); forward slash; local state party affiliation (not bold). Examples:
Ken Sain/D.C. Statehood Green Party
Green Party of Rhode Island

Bylines should read: By Author (boldface); rule; state party (not boldface). For example:
By Mike Feinstein and Greg Jan
—————-
Green Party of California

Editorial Cartoons

Green Pages, the national newspaper of the Green Party of the United States, is looking for witty editorial cartoons with a Green theme. The board encourages Greens with a flair for cartooning and illustration to submit their work.

DEADLINES AND WHERE TO SEND YOUR GREEN CARTOON

Please provide a mailing address and contact information, including website address if any.

Cartoons should be stand-alone panels (not strips continuing from issue to issue)

Cartoons may be multipane

Images should be in electronic format as JPGs, 200 dpi, and at least 4 inches wide, preferably larger.

Cartoons will be reproduced in grayscale

If the cartoonist has a website, Green Pages will provide a link to the site when the cartoon is posted to the Green Pages website.

Include who should be credited for the cartoon, and the cartoonist’s Green affiliation (i.e. what state, if any, they are registered in).

Still have questions? Reach us at usgp-edit@lists.gp-us.org.

Hit list

Use this list to check spelling, punctuation, capitalization and definitions. Some acronyms specifically indicate not to define them. When a definition for an abbreviation is listed, include it in your article. Terms in boldface should appear in Green Pages exactly as they do here.

Accreditation Committee (AC)
AFL-CIO [don’t define]
Black Caucus (BC)
Bylaws, Rules, Policies & Procedures Committee (BRPP)
Campus Greens
Campus Greens Steering Committee (CGSC)
Coordinated Campaign Committee (CCC)
Coordinating Committee (CC)
Co-Chair
Communications Committee (ComCom)
Diversity Caucus (DC)
Finance Committee (FinCom)
Fundraising Committee (FC)
gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (GLBT)
Global Green Coordination (GGC)
gp.org
Green [referring to party]
green [more general environmental reference]
Green Pages
Green Party-United States (GP-US)
Independent Progressive Politics Network (IPPN)
instant-runoff voting (IRV)
International Committee (IC)
Latino Caucus (LC)
Lavender Greens (LG)
Media Committee (MC)
National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League (NARAL)
National Organization for Women (NOW)
NPR [don’t define]
Pacifica
Platform Committee (PlatCom)
Presidential Exploratory Committee (PEC)
Steering Committee (SC)
U.N. [don’t define; with periods; no space; as adjective; spell out United Nations as noun]
U.S. [don’t define; with periods; no space; as adjective; spell out United States as noun]
Web site
Women’s Caucus (WC)
Youth Caucus (YC)

How to Make Your Layout Editor Happy, or, A few simple guidelines on editing with the final layout in mind

1. Keep it simple

The final layout involves styles that put text into the right font, type size, paragraph indents, drop caps, etc., so this is something that doesn’t need to be done in editing except for clarity’s sake for the layout person.

a. Keep the entire article in one font at one size.

b. Don’t bold headlines or italicize bylines or use any other text formatting.

c. The exception to this is italics: use them for periodical or book titles, or for emphasis, as when an interviewee, for example, is being emphatic: “And then the Democrats voted for it!” This lets the layout person know which words need the appropriate character style applied.

2. Avoid extra characters

Extra characters have to be removed by the layout editor. This can take a lot of time.

a. Use m-dashes (with no spaces around them) instead of double dashes.

b. Don’t use the tab key: this creates a tab character which later has to be removed.

c. Don’t use an extra paragraph return to separate paragraphs or lines. One will do.

d. Use single spaces instead of double spaces at the end of sentences. (A global search makes these easy to remove.)

e. Don’t use manual breaks or connectors (option or alt or shift-return or -space).

3. Put comments for the managing editor or layout editor in brackets and all caps [LIKE THIS] so that they stand out and can be easily removed.

a. Other than special comments for the other editors, don’t include extra text.

b. Include a word count. (Put this at the very beginning of the article: “[XXX words]”.) Include the title, author, affiliation, and bio.

c. Put the article title on a single line or paragraph, followed on the next by the subtitle, if any.

d. Put the author on the next line or paragraph, followed on the next by the affiliation.

e. Put any biographical information at the end of the article, again in one paragraph.

f. For reports from states, don’t include a byline or author affiliation. The biographical information should include only this: ‘For more about the [STATE PARTY ABBREVIATION], go to www.statepartywebsite.org.’

4. Use the Green Pages style guide.

5. Also check out the Green Pages Editorial Policy.

6. Please forward all edited articles to the Managing Editor and to the Production Editor on time–those deadlines are important!

7. Keep an eagle eye out for typos when the proofs come out, because with the more eyes looking for them, the fewer errors will get through.

a. Editing proofs is usually done by entering comments to a PDF. Instructions for reviewing are sent out with with proofs.

b. If you don’t have a PDF program that can read comments, you may need to upgrade. Several companies may provide PDF viewers; be certain that your program allows reviewing.

8. Crack a lot of jokes. The layout person will need to keep her sense of humor, and will appreciate any lightheartedness, especially right before handoff to the printer….