The Vassar Insider, formerly The Vassar Political Review, is a digital news and politics publication at Vassar College. An official Vassar College organization, it was founded in December 2017 by Andrew Solender ’20 and Alexander Barzacanos ’18.
The Vassar Insider seeks to inform Vassar students about current events, both on and off-campus, relating to politics, policy, culture, media, and other areas. We are dedicated to creating a more informed and civil discourse on campus, and to making Vassar students more capable actors in political debates and in the voting booth.
If you would like to submit a piece to the Vassar Insider, please share it as a google doc to Insider.vsa@vassar.edu. The piece should not exceed 1200 words, and should contain hyperlinked citations, three links for further reading related to the topic, and a short bio for the author like the ones in our masthead. The piece should be an analysis or op-ed about any topic within the subject areas covered by the Insider.
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In 2019, the Vassar Insider was the recipient of two awards from the Associated College Press (ACP).
In 2020, Editor-in-Chief Andrew Solender won the Mark of Excellence from the Society of Professional Journalists in the general news category for his report on Vassar's Israel-Palestine debate.
In addition to profiles in the Washington Post and Inside Higher Ed, the Insider’s work has been mentioned in articles and by reporters from a number of prestigious outlets.
The Vassar Insider is a member of the Collegiate Network, an organization of over 100 alternative college publications across the country with a collective annual distribution of over 2 million readers. While our membership in the Collegiate Network does not impact our editorial voice, it does help us offer our writers career opportunities in journalism and provide us with a pipeline for distributing our writing to major outlets and making it a part of the wider media landscape.
Andrew ('20) was the co-founder of the Insider. He was a political science major and history correlate from New York. Under his stewardship, the Insider broke national news, was featured in major publications and won multiple awards. He was the recipient of the Mark of Excellence from the Society of Professional Journalists. He works as a political reporter at Forbes.
Alexander ('18) was the co-founder of the Insider. He was an English major from New York. Alexander helped to build the website and manage the Insider's first editorial team. He is currently a JD applicant.
Teddy ('22) is the incoming Editor-in-Chief of the Insider. He previously served as Senior Political Editor, Managing Editor, and Treasurer. He is a history major and French correlate from New York. As managing editor, he helped oversee the team that won the ACP's Pacemaker Finalist Award and transitioned from the Vassar Political Review to the Vassar Insider.
