Allison Groenendyk has something to admit, and when she says it, she sounds almost embarrassed.

"I normally don't read newspapers," she says. "I read them when I lived at home before I came to college, but now I don't read anything besides The (Michigan) Daily."

Sitting down for a quick dinner in the Michigan Union, the LSA junior said she often doesn't have the time, or the money, to buy newspapers on a regular basis. Instead, Groenendyk gets most of her news off the Internet, or from whatever free publications she happens to pass by on her way to class.

"I'm really out of touch with current events when I'm at college," she said, adding that, when it comes to newspapers, "If I see it, then I pick it up so I have something to do between classes."

Groenendyk is not alone. Although many University students have become masters of multitasking - talking on cell phones while walking to class, studying during dinner and grabbing snacks from vending machines to avoid waiting in the party store lines - somewhere in the shuffle, the daily newspaper has been mostly left behind.

For many newspaper publishers, Groenendyk is not the exception - she is the rule, and it's a rule that has led several of the biggest national newspaper publishers to come up with new ways of attracting college-age students and young adult commuters to their audience.

Among the most popular of those new methods may be the free, commuter-oriented daily tabloid that has propped up in several big cities, including Chicago, Philadelphia and Boston. Also, The Washington Post Co. debuted the commuter-oriented tabloid "Express" just last month.

And last week, Tribune Publishing Co. - which publishes Newsday and The Los Angeles Times, among other publications - announced that after a two-year hiatus, New York City can once again be added to the list of cities. The company plans to debut the free tabloid "amNewYork" later this year.

The publications are designed specifically for young commuters - anywhere from 12 to 30 pages long, they feature shorter stories, bigger pictures and catchier headlines. Most are also free, published Monday through Friday and designed to be read in just 10 to 15 minutes - the amount of time it takes students riding the bus to get from North Campus to Central Campus.

One of the oldest commuter-oriented tabloids is the Chicago-based "RedEye," which costs 25 cents. According to the publication's website, its mission is to "deliver a distinctive and credible daily news report - in a concise, commuter friendly format - that informs, entertains, interests, provokes and is relevant to Chicago's young city dwellers."

The publication's lead stories for yesterday's date included a review of the Wilco tour, a sports story on the playoffs and a cover of the Emmy awards.

In addition, its ad campaign features slogans targeting twenty-something adults on the go: the paper is described as being "Comprehensive. In a Know-Just-Enough-to-be-Dangerous Kind of Way," "Consise. In a Three-Syllables-Shy-of-Haiku Kind of Way" and "Bold. In a Sorry-About-the-Awkward-Breakup-But-I-Need-My-Handcuffs-Back Kind of Way."

Headlining yesterday's Washington-based Express - which is published online in tabloid format - were the stories "Bin Laden took lead in 9/11 plot" and "A racy new pitch for sex drugs."

"Distributing a free quick-read paper is a great way to serve Washington's Metro-riding community," said Express publisher Christopher Ma in a written statement issued the day the tabloid started, Aug. 4. "We expect Express to be popular among public transit commuters and young people who are otherwise infrequent newspaper readers."

According to the Media Management Center and the Readership Institute - affiliates of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University - tabloids such as RedEye, Express and amNewYork are exactly what the newspaper industry needs to attract twenty-somethings, the Generation Y audience.

"It is not (members of Generation Y) dislike newspapers," Media Management Center Managing Director Michael Smith said in a statement written before RedEye debuted last year. "They seemingly like newspapers better than the generation right ahead of them. But they want media to be for them."

To Groenendyk, the idea of a free daily tabloid seems attractive - though she said she sees some possible problems with the trend. "If they were sitting out, I would probably pick them up and read it," she said. "But I could see how there could be a problem because you wouldn't get the whole story with just short stories and colorful pictures."