National Review is making digital subscriptions free for all college students with a valid ‘.edu’ email address, the magazine announced earlier this month.
“We have always wanted to get National Review to young people,” Publisher Jack Fowler said.
National Review, founded by William F. Buckley Jr. in 1955, is a flagship publication of the conservative movement. It runs National Review Online, but always has kept the content of its magazine, with a circulation of about 150,000, behind a subscriber firewall.
Students can sign up for the free digital subscription on the magazine’s website.
“The academy has always been a priority for National Review,” Fowler said. He described how Buckley’s public life began with the publication of “God & Man at Yale,” a book critical of his experiences in higher education.
“If Bill were alive, he would applaud this decision.”
National Review is looking for new ways to reach out to students, who it sees as the future of conservatism. Fowler, a father of five, said that conversations with his own children have shaped his thinking on how to reach students. Removing the subscription fee, Fowler believes, will increase readership significantly.
“Opinion journalism has never been a financial priority for college students. Never will be,” Fowler added.
With the digital edition, students don’t need a mailing address to receive it, and the delivery is instantaneous.
Last year, National Review hired two alumnae of the college’s Dow Journalism Program, Jillian Melchior `09 and Betsy Woodruff `12. The director of the program, John J. Miller, is the magazine’s national correspondent.
