You might consider ragging your columns instead of full-justification. I think that would relax the look a bit and perhaps personalize it a bit more.

It seems that your 5-col is full-just and your 4-col is ragged. Which are you leaning toward?

Are you going to use a sans serif for the body?

I might consider a friendly headline font.

It would be easier to tell if you posted pdfs. But to me the current headline font looks rather light and spacy, you could look at a heavier version (it doesn't look like Minion to me though). Utopia has a headline weight.
It is okay to have uneven columns, for example four of one width and one narrower, or three and two (not each different) but I don't think that 12" will support five equal width columns. I would make the images fall on the grid as well, have you got horizontal as well as vertical gridlines? What are your outside margins?
I would choose a font and size and work out your measure on an average width of 40-50 characters (including spaces) and then make decisions on the number of columns and gutters.
Tim

More questions I'm afraid, is that the maximum amount of copy you expect for the front page? You need to be realistic about the average amount because you will find yourself compromising your design from the outset, take the front page of the past editions and try to work it into your new layout.
The area above the nameplate seems too large for my taste and the gutter is a touch too wide. Closer inspection shows you have inch and foot marks standing in for apostrophes and quote marks, no fi fl ligatures, the drop cap on the hate story is clashing with the copy, in the Swann story the columns are starting from different points. I preferred the uppercase nameplate you showed in your first post about redesigning, the small caps version is not as engaging. Elements I would start with are: 1. make the story area larger by reducing the area above the nameplate (whose name escapes me) and the index area at the bottom of the page; 2. bring the stories closer to the byline, reduce the size of the byline and keeping those distances consistent throughout 3. experimenting without the boxed story area, try vertical rules to separate stories or doing without them if the picture covers the width of the columns the stories should appear separated anyway.
I hope I am not being too negative on the layout, there are some positive developments but it does need refining.
Tim

Question regarding curly quotes: I've enabled the option under Preferences>Application>Interactive, however it doesn't actively replace the inch and foot marks with curly quote. Is there a better, more effective way of doing this?

And regarding ligature combinations: Am I to just keep an eye out for these and replace by hand, or is there an automatic way to do this?

Very interesting thread. I'd love to see the final version.

Two main issues:
1. Editorial
2. Design

Editorial - one problem:
Page 5 - credit line: who's Peter Ostrovski - a well known writer like Rick Reilly? Why that huge credit line? What is important the story about the art or Peter (and the photographer)?

Design:

Nice try. But you need to have a plan.

You have a huge problem with leading.

Page 3 "where....fire" - nice layout
Editor's choice - bad layout.

Page 4, 6,7,9 - nice try; 10 nice -;
Page 5 - bad layout

I know that you're young, student etc etc. But do it right, or don't do it. Maybe hire a designer, even for a small fee.

Hiccup. Burp. Sorry. Not again. Burp.

Has anyone else been able to grab the newest PDF? Safari doesn't recognize the link, I am assuming it's due to the '.' in the file name.

It's coming along.

I would recommend tightening up the layouts by using more rules to demarcate articles, especially between editorial and advertising matter, and above all your headlines.
The rules will also help organize your white space.
The rules should go close to the text, as you have done in many instances: be consistent.
(think of it as the fine tolerance with which a door/trunk closes on a well-enginerered car.)
Don't use the same fine rules inside an article, certainly not next to the bylines, this is a terribly confusing idea: the design system says "fine rules at edge of articles".
For the callouts, if you must use rules, use a different, thicker rule.

Alright.. thanks for all the help. I'm surprised by the continued interest, but I hope it's still there. I've got a couple questions -- by the end of this (when I graduate), I want my newspaper to be a design monster. A city on the hill, so to speak. Our local newspaper (the Daily Pennsylvanian) has just responded to us by adding a digest for the first time in some 125 years, which is pretty cool.

My questions:

(1) Rules: More rules? Does that mean all the way up next to the headline too? When do you thick vs. thin rules? How much gutter is too much gutter?

(2) What are callouts? And why would I use a thicker rule?

(3) What's "another point of leading"? You mean from 11.7 (where it is now) to 12.7 for the 11pt. font?

(4) On mixed weights, new body font: point well taken. Any other suggestions besides Gotham I should look at?

Thanks for the help!