Every word counts in a headline

November 18th, 2005

Don't make your meaning murky with a homonym

Great little story in today's New York Times about how students are getting into Harvard via the less expensive "back door." Here's the deal -- if they don't gain regular admission, they register for extension classes instead. The classes are not only easier to get into, they're also cheaper. Talk about a win-win for students lusting after an Ivy League experience. But I'd give a failing grade to the story's headline. It reads:

Harvard, for less: Extension Courses' New Allure

The first half -- Harvard, for Less -- is pretty solid. But the second half is a disaster for many reasons. First, it lacks a verb -- the key action word that will make you want to read the story. Second, the word "courses" is a homonym -- in addition to "classes" (its meaning here), it can also mean "to flow or move forward." True, the apostrophe shows the correct meaning, but it slows the reader down while he or she puzzles over it -- always a dangerous thing with a headline.

Finally, the word "allure" is just plain hard to say. (Try it yourself to see.) A surprising number of people "sub-vocalize" when they read and you don't want them stumbling on the headline.

But this bad headline is actually pretty easy to fix. If forced to stick with the same letter count, I'd rewrite it to:

Harvard, for less: Extension classes open doors

But if I had the luxury of a bigger letter count, I'd change it to:

Harvard, for less: Extension classes pry open Ivy League doors