A reader told me a few days ago that she got a fourth-hand email that referenced the 2008 Pulitzer Prizes for journalism. Someone from outside the state had flagged to her attention that it looked like an Eagle editor had been on a selection jury, and she didn’t think that could be true. It is. In 2007 and 2008 I had the honor of being invited to serve on a nominating jury for the prizes.
The administrator for the prizes works to put together nominating juries that are diverse in geography, newspaper size, company ownership, etc. Jurors spend three days in March working at Columbia University in New York. I learned upon reporting for duty on the first morning which category’s jury I would serve on (this year it was local news reporting; last year was commentary). The number of entries varies by category — for the categories I read each year, there were a large number of entries, so we worked some long hours to get finished on time.
Juries narrow the field to three finalists and submit those to the Pulitzer Board, which chooses the winner in April. It was a great honor to be invited, and a humbling and inspiring experience to spend long days reading the best journalism in the country.
You can find a list of all jurors at the Pulitzer site by clicking on the 2008 winners link, then scrolling to the bottom for the link on nominating jurors.
Two readers, Chris and Justin, took issue with a sports story on the KU basketball team’s visit to Wichita. Both were pretty upset at reporter Jeffrey Martin’s reference to a fan in a wheelchair and a passage in the story when she met Darnell Jackson up close. This is one of those instances in which I can only say, “Yes, you’re right.”
Both Justin and Chris felt like the story was insensitive, and I agree that’s how it reads. As I explained to Justin, I’m certain Jeff never intended to embarrass the woman he referenced in the story. This was a case of trying to be funny — which backfires more than it works in the written word, I think — and needing an attentive editor to pull the plug on a bad idea.
I had the same reaction as Chris and Justin when I saw the story in the paper. We committed multiple fouls: I think referring to a woman as “lady” is offensive to many women and we shouldn’t do it; we should never refer to a person in a wheelchair as having an “affliction”; and the phrase “with all due respect” placed in front of an insult will never mitigate the insult. Justin raised an excellent point in his email about whether referencing a person’s use of a wheelchair is relevant at all and compared it to people noting someone’s race. In fact, the Eagle has written guidelines specifically against referencing race unless it’s directly relevant to a story.
We’ll take some learning from this on matters of sensitivity.
A reader said he heard that our owner, the McClatchy Company, reported a negative cash flow through the first quarter of the year. Actually that’s not quite right. McClatchy posted a loss from continuing operations of $0.01 per share. Here is the transcript of CEO Gary Pruitt’s Q1 earnings call.
As it turns out, western Kansas already has some spectacular breaks.
I spent last weekend in the far northwest corner of the state looking for birds with the Kansas Ornithological Society. In eight years in Kansas, I had never made it to the western part of the state, and anyone who knew I was headed to Goodland made less-than-kind remarks about my choice of a weekend getaway.
But it turns out the joke is on those who haven’t taken the time to get off the interstate out west. True to the reputation of Goodland, it’s probably fitting that I had to drive through a May blizzard to get to the hotel Friday night. But I spent a beautiful weekend driving gravel roads and visiting the incredible Arikaree Breaks near the three-corners area of Kansas, Colorado and Nebraska.
I don’t know if high gas prices really will keep more of us home during the vacation season. But if you haven’t taken time to appreciate this part of the state, you’ll find the drive well worth the reward if you appreciate magnificent and pristine landscape.
I realized today that I haven’t shared the newsroom’s goals for the year with readers. In The Eagle’s newsroom, we have four overriding priorities for the year, and every department (metro news, business, sports, etc.) writes measurable goals that support these priorities:
1. Developing a harder-news edge to the front page, with dominant stories that are based on breaking news or investigative reports versus “softer” feature stories. And making sure all elements of a page – the articles, design, photography and headlines – work together so story packages are clear, compelling, accurate and balanced.
2. Reporting more “enterprise” and investigative news. Enterprise stories are those that aren’t readily available in a press release or on a meeting agenda. Our aim is to seek out the less-obvious stories – those now going unreported – and to improve our editing and reporting so all important questions are always answered in a story. A key part of this goal is reviewing and analyzing more public databases, and ensuring that government operates in the open.
3. Building huge audience growth for our Web site, Kansas.com. We’re aiming for at least a 20% increase in monthly unique visitors, through increased news, information, tools and features for Web users – and also through better innovation, and more individual responsibility throughout the newsroom.
4. Focus on individual growth and learning. Every staffer will log 30 hours of training time through in-house seminars and other training opportunities.