Law, Ethics and
News Literacy
I value education in law, ethics and news literacy as a fundamental part of journalism, especially for students. As an experienced editor, I have been challenged to apply this knowledge in order to make the ethically sound decisions for my staff and our community.
Restorative Justice Circle
An ODYSSEY Media Group staffer posted on social media expressing perceived unfairness of certain editorial choices, as well as racial inclusivity among the staff. The editors take these accusations seriously, always seeking action steps to help staff members feel secure and seen. In order to work through this conflict, I participated in a restorative justice circle with her, our adviser, and the Editor-in-Chief of her publication. This allowed equal space for everyone to express the impact of the social media post and to approach a solution to improving the publication environment from a place of understanding.
Checklist by Audrey Enghauser
Fabricated
transcriptions
February 2021
One staffer had fabricated their transcriptions for multiple stories by adding words that were not said by the source. This included the transcriptions for their feature magazine story, and thus, I gave the staffer an opportunity to re-transcribe. When these revised transcriptions still did not meet the standard, I omitted their story from the magazine. Moving forward, we require the staffer to have their transcriptions reviewed by an editor before sending stories to the Cabinet, and multiple editors work closely with them to ensure their ethical understanding. To take further action and help the staff as a whole, I created a transcription checklist that clearly states the rules of transcribing to ensure staffers are accurately representing their sources throughout the production cycle.
Photo by Luna Reichert
Screenshots by Audrey Enghauser
Social media
backlash
When our staff posted about the first football games of the season in 2020 on Instagram, we received backlash from the CCHS student body. Students commented accusing us of encouraging attendance at the games during COVID-19. While these comments made us feel misunderstood, from this experience I learned that while some people at our school may not know the values and intentions of our program in the way that we do, we must continue to uphold our responsibility of providing them with factual and reliable news. The leadership cabinet collaborated to draft a message for our Instagram story to address the situation as well as a direct message to a student to discourage any abusive language and reinforcing our mission and vision statements.
Anonymous bus driver source
For my Letter from the Editor column about the bus driver shortage in our school district, I interviewed a bus driver anonymously due to the sensitive nature of their complaints. I believe it is important to use anonymous sources sparingly to maintain credibility, however, by including this voice in my story I minimized harm brought to the driver through my journalism while still sharing this relevant perspective.
Screenshot by Audrey Enghauser
Factual error and correction
The Digital Managing Editor wrote a story based on an administrative press conference about a new security system used by faculty. Upon the publication of the story, our adviser received feedback from an expert of the system about a factual inaccuracy. Together, the editor and I first re-transcribed the original audio of the press conference so that we could ensure that we accurately reported the interviewees’ statements. Then, we had a phone conversation with the expert to clarify how the security system works and apologize for our error. We explained the steps of our retraction policy and followed through by updating the story and publishing a correction and omission.
Fact-Checking
For a sports news story in our recent magazine issue about the unequal facilities for girls and boys sports at our school, it was important to verify the student testimonials about unhygienic locker rooms to ensure we were not publishing hyperbolic statements. Before we sent the magazine to print, I met with a volleyball coach as well as the school Athletic Director in order to confirm the quotes.
Screenshot by Audrey Enghauser
Request for anonymity
A student I interviewed for my story “Seeking settlement” explained why they were opposed to reparations, and later disclosed that they did not want their name included in the story. I made them aware that this may mean I cannot include their quotes. I brought this issue to my adviser, to which he explained the ODYSSEY avoids anonymous sourcing in most cases and that potentially controversial views on a subject are not grounds for anonymity, so I excluded their voice. This experience taught me that I should always be approaching my correspondence with sources from an ethical standpoint and consider what is best for the story.
Handling an emotional source
One aspect of maintaining journalistic ethics when interacting with sources that I dealt with was sensitivity to the interviewee’s emotional circumstance. When I joined a Zoom call to interview two faculty members involved in a school event, one source joined the call with their camera off and was audibly crying. They told me that they were dealing with a family tragedy and would not be able to interview but continued to ask me to send them interview questions to answer at a later time. I extended grace and kindness, making it clear that I did not need them to answer questions via email nor stay on the call. I remained polite and professional and thanked them for coming to the Zoom and telling me. I am now more prepared for unexpected responses from sources in my interviews and have more confidence in my abilities to respond to such an emergency properly in the future.
Screenshot by Audrey Enghauser
Screenshot by Audrey Enghauser
What does it mean to be news literate?
I attended this session at the 2020 National Scholastic Press Association conference in which the senior director of education and training at the News Literacy Project taught students how to identify and understand misinformation and bias, and how to apply this knowledge to journalism. This gave me tools to be a more critical reader, and from that, a more critical reporter.
Literacy through research
In researching the gentrification of the community of Linnentown (see Reporting and Writing), I gained skills in news literacy as I searched through old relocation records, letters between politicians, federal acts and old photos in addition to the little information I found on the web. For my story about the desegregation of the CCSD (see reporting and writing), I also strengthened these skills because I had to cross reference sources to double check the timeline of integration in Athens. For both of these stories, the information wasn't readily available, so it required me to find it on my own and evaluate a variety of sources.
Screenshot by Audrey Enghauser
Scans by Audrey Enghauser
Journalistic ethics presentation
At the beginning of the 2020-21 school year, our Co-Editor-in-Chief gave a presentation on journalistic ethics. I printed out and studied the SPJ Code of Ethics and took diligent notes. This information guided me through many future situations and gave me a framework in which to understand my role as a journalist. We were assessed on this material by writing a constructed response to a potential ethical dilemma. I received a score of 9.5/10.
Media literacy assignment
In the Journalism I class, we studied news literacy in the form of in-depth examinations of various articles, looking for how these authors accomplish their goals in their writing and what we can learn from these stories and apply to our own writing. This helped inform my understanding of how to be thoughtful in my diction and portrayal of fact in my own stories.
Screenshot by Audrey Enghauser
Screenshot by Audrey Enghauser, stylebook by ODYSSEY staff
ODYSSEY
Staff Manual
Our program’s staff manual outlines everything an ODYSSEY staffer needs to know to fulfill their job on staff, such as staff protocols and legal advice. We refer students to the manual frequently when dealing with law and ethics issues such as retractions, prior review, and fair transcription, and provide our protocols to any sources we conflict with in order to maintain transparency and accountability.