Rick Rodriguez, former ASNE President and Professor at Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication focused on the power of diversity in journalism in his session today.
“Many people see the world through what journalists write,” Rodriguez said.
He emphasized that the mission of a newspaper is the help people understand each other, help people understand what’s going on.
If journalists leave out a large part of the population by not representing all cultural, socio-economic or ethnic backgrounds, they are not only being unethical, but they are being dishonest with their readers.
“There are people with stories waiting to be told,” Rodriguez said. “You have to break through somehow to let them know that what they know is valuable.”
In his experience as a top editor, he has come to realize the importance of top-down leadership when reinforcing the significance of diverse coverage.
“If top people aren’t committed, it’s not going to happen,” Rodriguez said.
As advisers, we should be beacons of motivating our students to not only cover all populations within our schools, but also to value diversity.
Rodriguez reinforced three major components – recruiting a diverse staff, covering diverse audiences, using diverse sources throughout stories.
I plan to make it a regular practice not only to encourage these three goals, but to regularly critique the paper with students to identify which populations are being covered, and which populations are being left out. It is important to get kids in the habit of considering their entire readership – are they being ethical, are they being honest in their coverage.
Andrea Krueger
Centennial High School
Circle Pines, Minnesota
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