Contributor Policy

a) They are students in good standing of the Peak Publications Society;

b) They are registered in at least one SFU class in the semester in which their contribution is published, or will be registered in at least one SFU class in the following semester and are willing to send proof of enrollment;

c) They are not a member of the editorial team of The Peak;

d) Their pieces are published.

1. Employees of Peak Publications Society will be paid provided they:

a) Meet all the above criteria;

b) And are credited as an associate on the contribution.

1. Pay will be calculated by the following rules:

a) Articles will be determined to fall into one of the following categories by section editors, subject to review by the Editor-in-Chief:

i. Letters to the Editor, and any other submissions which are clearly and specifically represented as content not produced by The Peak (with the possible exception of sponsored content), shall not be paid.

ii. Brief content (approx. 300 words or less) that does not require interviews or in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) World News Beat, What Grinds Our Gears, or New Music Friday, shall be paid $10;

iii. Brief content (approx. 300 words or less) that requires interviews or in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) Peak Speak, shall be paid $15;

iv. Short content (approx. 300-500 words) that does not require interviews or in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) short editorials, short humour articles, or Game Recaps of away-games without interview, shall be paid $15;

v. Short content (approx. 300-500 words) that requires interviews or in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) Senate Report or Game Recaps of away-games with interview, shall be paid $20;

vi. Standard content (approx. 500-1000 words) that does not require interviews or in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) standard editorials and standard humour articles, shall be paid $20;

vii. Standard content (approx. 500-1000 words) that requires one interview or in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) Player Profiles or Arts interviews, shall be paid $25;

viii. Standard content (approx. 500-1000 words) that requires multiple interviews, or one interview and in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) Game Recaps of home games or standard News articles, shall be paid $30;

ix. Long-form content (approx. 1000+ words) that does not require interviews or in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) long-form editorials or Features-esque listicles, shall be paid $30;

x. Research-intensive long-form content (approx. 1000+ words) that requires interview(s) or in-person event coverage, such as (but not limited to) long-form editorials and standard Features, shall be paid $50;

xi. Research-intensive Features (approx. 1500+ words), requiring multiple interviews, significant SFU-based archival research, and other investigative work involving multiple departments/offices of SFU, shall be paid $65;

b) Photographs, illustrations, cartoons, and other graphic contributions shall be determined to fall into one of the following categories by section editors, subject to review by the Editor-in-Chief:

i. $10 per event or story for photographs that are published accompanying content written by the photographer;

ii. $10 per event or story for photographs that are published accompanying content written by someone other than the photographer;

iii. $10 per simple, specified mini-illustration;

iv. $20 per simple illustration, graphic, or single panel comic generally defined as those taking less than an hour to produce;

v. $30 for all other illustrations, graphics, or multi-panel comics;

vi. $50 for any image appearing as the primary graphic on the print edition’s cover, paid instead of the above rates.

c) In the case of a contribution with more than one author, each author shall receive, at the discretion of the section editor and subject to review by the Editor-in-Chief:

i. 150% of the normal value of the contribution divided by the number of authors, with the exception that authors that are ineligible for contributor pay shall not be entitled to their share;

ii. $10, with the exception that authors that are ineligible for contributor pay shall not be entitled to their share.

d) Contributors shall only be paid once for a single contribution, and shall not be paid if it is re-published.

e) Filming and editing:

i. Small contributions such as a suggestion for a topic to be produced, or similar, shall not be paid;

ii. Brief contributions to a multimedia project, wherein the Multimedia Editor and/or the Multimedia Assistant is the primary producer or editor shall be paid $30;

iii. Large-scale contributions, wherein the Multimedia Editor and/or the Multimedia Assistant is not responsible for the majority of production shall be paid $50;

1. Pay for a contribution that a section editor has pitched to a contributor should be communicated and determined at the time the pitch is assigned, subject to review by the section editor and/or Editor-in-Chief.

2. If a contribution does not meet the standard criteria for the amount of pay that was previously determined, and if the editor chooses to publish the contribution despite this, then at the editor’s discretion based on the circumstances, the contributor’s pay may be decreased according to the criteria their published submission meets.

     Ex. The Opinions Editor agrees with a contributor that they will submit a 600-word contribution and be paid $20. The contributor submits a 400-word contribution, without asking the Opinions Editor in advance. The Opinions Editor determines that the contribution can still be published, and publishes it at 400 words. The Opinions Editor should decrease the pay for that article to $15.

1. If a contribution exceeds the standard criteria for the amount of pay that was previously agreed upon, without the section editor’s explicit prior approval, then the section editor may increase their pay at their discretion, but they are not obligated to do so. The section editor will notify the contributor of this change prior to publication.

     Ex. The Arts Editor agrees with a contributor that they will submit a 200-word contribution and be paid $10. The contributor submits a 400-word contribution, without asking the Arts Editor in advance. The Arts Editor publishes the 400-word contribution. The Arts Editor can increase the pay for that contribution to $15, or they can leave it at $10.

     Ex. The Opinions Editor agrees with a contributor that they will submit a 400-word article and be paid $15. The contributor submits a 600-word contribution, without asking the Opinions Editor in advance. The Opinions Editor cuts it down to 400 words, and publishes the now-400-word contribution. The Opinions Editor can increase the pay for that article to $20, or they can leave it at $15.

1. If a submitted contribution differs significantly from the published copy, because the section editor was forced by circumstances to add a significant amount of extra material to the contribution, then the contributor shall be paid based on the quality of their submission, not the quality of the published version. The section editor will notify the contributor of this change prior to publication.

     Ex. The News Editor agrees with a contributor that they will attend an event and interview a particular person, and receive $30. The contributor submits the article, but they did not do the interview. They are unwilling or unable to do additional work themselves to correct for this. Because of this, the News Editor is forced to conduct additional interviews. Under the circumstances, the News Editor judges it to be unreasonable or harmful to The Peak’s interests to discard the contributor’s submission entirely, so they instead incorporate the extra content into the original submission. The News Editor should decrease the contributor pay for that article to $15, $20, or $25, depending on how much work the original contributor did.

1. If an article arrives late, and the contributor did not clear this with the section editor in advance, then the editor reserves the right to decrease the article’s pay at their discretion. Pay decreased for this reason should not be decreased by more than 50%, assuming the article runs. The section editor will notify the contributor of this change prior to publication.

2. If a contributor feels that their pay is being determined unfairly, they may submit an appeal to the Editor-in-Chief.

3. Notwithstanding any other part of this policy, if a contributor who is a sitting officer or employee of the Simon Fraser Student Society or Graduate Student Society at SFU is involved in creating a contribution that engages with issues of student politics, or any other contributor is involved in creating content that comments upon or benefits any organization or group from which they may or may not receive any pay, regardless of whether that pay is specifically for producing that content, that piece shall not be paid.

4. Notwithstanding any other part of this policy, if a contributor who is a current member of a club, organization, group, or sports team is involved in creating content that comments upon or benefits any organization or group from which they do not receive any pay, regardless of whether that pay is specifically for producing that content, that piece’s pay shall be reduced by 50%.

5. Notwithstanding any other part of this policy, section editors and the Editor-in-Chief reserves the right to kill or reject a piece. The Peak withholds the right to reject submissions.

6. Contributors must not submit their invoice until after the final print issue of the semester has been published and invoices must be received by the Business Manager no later than the end of the month in which the last issue was published.

7. If a contributor does not collect their pay within six months of the last print issue of a semester, that contributor will be considered to have forfeit their pay for that semester.

8. This policy may be amended, replaced, or abolished by a majority vote of the Peak Publications Society Board of Directors.

9. Contributors who complete an assignment which is not published may discuss payment details with the section editor and ultimately the Editor-in-Chief.