Last week, the Herald began covering one of the biggest stories of the year with an article that contained a relatively serious factual error. The article by Jamie Golob reported ASM’s Student Services Finance Committee denied funding to Wunk Sheek and the Campus Women’s Center, but the Herald’s reporting of previous Women’s Center funding was incorrect.
The Sept. 22 Badger Herald article read: “[The Campus Women’s Center] received $125,261.11 and again received funding for the 2009-10 year totaling $133,199.80.” In reality, the Campus Women’s Center received a dollar amount in the neighborhood of $85,000.
As of the deadline for this public editor column, the error had not been corrected online.
Almost every student who reads news reports on the SSFC process will have no capability or will to investigate these numbers themselves — nor should they. That, after all, is why they pick up a newspaper. The obscurity of these particular topics and the lower likelihood they will be corrected by readers makes diligent fact-checking all the more important.
Herald readers (and editors, for that matter) most likely agree with the sentiments of an anonymous online commenter, who wrote: “Can the Badger Herald please start checking their facts BEFORE publishing a story. I understand that does require effort, but it would be nice to be able to TRUST what is supposed to be a factual article.”
So where did the Herald’s numbers come from? An error in transcription. The budget numbers the Herald reported actually came from a group listed directly above the Campus Women’s Center in the 70-page Chancellor’s Report where these budget items are found.
After half-deflecting the blame on the prevalence of jargon in SSFC and the improbability such a specific figure could be wrong, Editor in Chief Jason Smathers acknowledged the simplicity of the error, saying, “Someone just wasn’t paying attention when they were looking at the numbers.”
From now on, Smathers says Herald masthead editors will have a copy of the Chancellor’s Report on-hand so numbers submitted by reporters can be easily verified.
Fortunately, the Herald’s coverage of the Women’s Center story has improved — highlighted by another installment of Alex Brousseau’s “News Explainer” in yesterday’s paper. The news analysis column has been a tremendously valuable feature for casual readers of the Herald’s news section.
On Comments
The Herald first became aware of the Women’s Center mistake through an online comment submitted to Badgerherald.com. Almost every newspaper in the nation has now realized that before they have a chance to notice, online commenters are correcting their errors and forcing writers and editors to be more accurate. So a well-deserved kudos goes to the Herald’s online readers for catching this and many other online errors over the years. Keep them coming. Just the specter of your wrath has long made The Badger Herald a better paper.
“Alum caught for soliciting minor” — a top story?
Last week, the Herald printed a story about a former UW student who was arrested for attempting to solicit a minor online. The suspect was nabbed by undercover cops at the arranged meeting point. The article was on the front page of the newspaper and had a “top story” designation on Badgerherald.com.
But why?
“It was put up there originally because we were under the assumption that [the suspect] was a UW student, and that had been printed in other sources,” Smathers said in a phone interview. “It wasn’t until 11:30 p.m. that we heard that the [suspect] had actually graduated in spring ’09.'”
Even if the suspect were a current student, it is hard to see why this story would get close to top billing, if not for the salacious details of the online encounter that are all-too-tempting for a college newspaper to revel in. Certainly, a greater effort should have been made to rearrange the front page of the paper. Readers cannot see how late editors are working at night — they only see what is on news stands every morning. The Herald would be remiss to lose sight of that.
Staffing Issues
A common complaint of newspaper editors who deal with reader feedback is they don’t realize the immense effort it takes to publish a complete newspaper. Recently, the workload has become even heavier for the news staff. Two editors are currently out of commission — one for medical reasons and the other has left the paper — and it is hard not to infer some connection between the mistakes made in the last few weeks. (Some cannot be addressed here, considering the limited space available to opinion writers.)
But there are no excuses in this business because the work of journalism is no less important. The Herald will likely be rewarded for persevering during this difficult period with a battle-hardened news staff.
Bassey Etim was the managing editor of The Badger Herald. He is currently a news assistant for The New York Times. Please send complaints and comments on Herald coverage to [email protected]. All complaints will be investigated by the public editor.
