Staff members senior Neb Beleke, sophomores Isra Mohamed and Molly Schochet discuss a concern about a misquote with Echo’s adviser Lori Keekley and Hill. The set up in question was on the second page of the print edition, and while it turned out the source has misread it, the discussion was used as a learning opportunity.
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The most important part of being a journalist is ethics. The ethical code we abide by is what makes journalism trustworthy, possible, and beneficial. For this reason I make education about journalistic ethics and law a priority on Echo.
Not only have I devoted time to researching and learning about it, I have organized education campaigns and done presentations in class. While at the National High School Journalism Convention in 2019, I competed in the Press Law and Ethics onsite competition and earned an Honorable Mention. |
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What I've done |
In November I met one of my idols, Mary Beth Tinker. Tinker was a plaintiff in the historic Tinker v. Des Moines Supreme Court case that states that “shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.” Her case sets the precedent that protects my rights as a student journalist.
Ever since I had first written her a thank you card during freshman year, I had wanted to meet her. So when I saw she was a speaker at the National High School Journalism Convention, I knew I had to meet her. The short conversation and interview inspired me, and our news editor, to write a story exploring why journalism matters. |
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Following the publication of that piece, my co-Editor-in-Chief and I did a week-long presentation on ethics, guidelines and practices that our publication abides by. This was all in an attempt to educate our staff on the importance of ethics.
Below are some of the slides I shared with the staff. |
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Outside of the Echo staff, I have run school wide campaigns surrounding the First Amendment, and mentored another school on Freedom of Information Act requests, finding sources and fact checking. The experience of helping other student journalists learn more about their rights reminded me how lucky I have been, and just how important journalism education is.
For Constitution Day I helped run a school wide project where students learned the five rights guaranteed in the First Amendment, and got to visually represent which one they felt was the most important by tying a colored ribbon into a piece of chicken wire. I was astonished how many classes couldn't name the five rights, and this project helped to change that. It was really interesting to see what rights were considered most important by the students in our school. Though Echo is very fortunate that the community we are in is very easy to work with, my time on staff has not been without issues. Most recently, there was a phone blast sent out about a shooter threat, so I went to the police department to request the police report. My request was met with a demand for the case number, which I knew wasn’t needed. We had previously received police reports with no problem. I contacted the Student Press Law Center and a lawyer who has helped us before to confirm, and sure enough I shouldn't need the case number to get the file. By the time we could have received the files the story would no longer have been timely, so we decided not to do a story. |
Until a few weeks ago, Echo hadn't received a letter to the editor since 2016. But suddenly two of my classmates were sending in letters. It was an overwhelming experience, but only because I had no experience with it. We published both letters because it is important to share the voice of the people.
I also make a conscious effort to validate the voices of people I may not agreed with. We try to recruit people from across the school in order to get all view points. As a staff Echo is very homogenous. A lot of people come from very similar backgrounds, but we make an effort to highlight differing opinions. This fall, when we covered the rise in vaping, especially among teens, we were careful with our sources. Because it is illegal to vape under the age of 18, we made sure to contact sources who were over 18. Additionally, we confirmed multiple times that our source was aware of the possible repercussions of going on record. As a rule we avoid unnamed sources because it is harder for readers to trust an unnamed source, and we want to be a trustworthy news source. |
Ethics in action |
Outside of Echo |
An important part of being a journalist is being impartial, and being seen as unbiased. For me, that means staying a political observer, not an active participant. While I will certainly exercise my right to vote come November, as of now I have stayed very impartial. It has allowed me to cover political stories with out fear of being seen as biased.
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