On Wednesday morning, the entire editorial staff of the Daily Emerald—the independent student newspaper of the University of Oregon—went on strike in protest of the attempts of its board of directors to install a publisher with control over the paper's editorial content.
Today, college newspapers across the United States and Canada stand in solidarity with the editorial staff of the Daily Emerald in support of the independent collegiate press and student-controlled editorial content. We are deeply dismayed by the unethical actions of the Emerald's board of directors and strongly support the strike until the staff's demands are met and independent student journalism can be safeguarded from such attacks at the Emerald and on college campuses nationwide.
On Thursday the board of directors had the audacity to publish its own version of the Oregon Daily Emerald using content from the Associated Press and a front-page statement from the board. This move is as offensive as it is stupid.
In November, the board of directors hired Emerald alum Steven A. Smith as a consultant, and he drafted a plan that included a call to hire a publisher. Smith then authored the publisher's job description as well as his own terms of employment for the position, which the board approved without negotiation. On Feb. 24, the board voted to hire Smith as the Emerald's publisher and to give him unprecedented control over the paper's editorial content and day-to-day operations.
Since its inception, the Oregon Daily Emerald has served as an invaluable learning resource for its student journalists, but if the board continues to revoke student control over the paper's content, its mission and legacy will be invalidated. Without objectivity and independent content in the newsroom, the paper cannot properly train its student reporters and the campus will lose an irreplaceable source of information, outside of the influence of university public relations efforts.
The Emerald, like many papers across the country, is in dire financial straits and faces the possibility of closure. This financial reality, however, should not force the staff to compromise their guiding ethics as journalists or to sacrifice the paper's autonomy. The decision to give a publisher sway over content would in no way solve the paper's financial crisis; as such, this seems to be a callous overreaching by the board and the university and an attempt to take advantage of a financially struggling but influential student organization while the time is right.
We are living in a tough time for the newspaper business. Left and right, the financial crisis is forcing papers to shut down or sacrifice their autonomy under corporate control to remain viable. Now more than ever, we must stand strong and stand together to maintain our editorial independence. Any measure of overarching interference in content undermines our journalistic standards and is unacceptable, no matter the financial situation. Practicing journalism under the possibility of censorship and the meddling influence of an administration undermines the purpose of a free press. We hope that the board of directors will recognize this undeniable fact and immediately meet the staff's demands. Until then, we stand with the Oregon Daily Emerald.
Other schools siding with The Daily Emerald: The Brown Daily Herald, Brown University, The California Aggie, UC Davis, City on a Hill Press, UC Santa Cruz, Collegiate Times, Virginia Tech, The Cornell Daily Sun, Cornell University, The Daily Aztec, San Diego State University, The Daily Bruin, UC Los Angeles, The Daily Californian, UC Berkeley, The Daily Cardinal, University of Wisconsin-Madison, The Daily Evergreen, Washington State University, The Daily Iowan, University of Iowa, Daily Kent Stater, Kent State University, The Daily Lobo, University of New Mexico, The Daily Nexus, UC Santa Barbara, The Daily Northwestern, Northwestern University, The Daily of the University of Washington, The Daily Pennsylvanian, University of Pennsylvania, The Daily Princetonian, Princeton University, The Daily Reveille, Louisiana State University, The Daily Targum, Rutgers University, The Daily Texan, University of Texas at Austin, The Daily Wildcat, University of Arizona, The Gateway, University of Alberta, The Highlander, UC Riverside, The Independent Alligator, University of Florida, The Martlet, University of Victoria, The McGill Daily, McGill University, The Michigan Daily, University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, New University Newspaper, UC Irvine, The Stanford Daily, Stanford University, The State Press, Arizona State University, The Ubyssey, University of British Columbia, The UCSD Guardian, UC San Diego, Washington Square News, New York University.
