Law, Ethics & News Literacy
Editorial Policy & Editorial Board
Editorial Policy
This year I reworded our Table of Contents to include a shortened statement of our editorial policy. Going into this side project I made sure to read our entire editorial policy on our website so I would be aware of our limitations and rights in our publication. Foundations of Journalism, the prerequisite course for joining the publication, provided me with the basis of knowledge in our rights as journalists. The Iowa Student Free Expression Law protects high school journalists and provides opportunities and freedoms that other publications may not receive. I am privileged with the freedom my staff and I have to critique our school and community in a safe setting. WSS strives to treat our freedoms with respect and responsibility to provide factual and personal work.
Editorial Board Leader
As well as working as the Opinion Editor, I also lead Editorial Board meetings along with our EIC. We decide often about cover, anonymous source usage and more during these meetings. My time on the board has been eventful in what we have decided to cover for the editorial. Specifically, our last issue of the 22-23 school year had an editorial that had to go through a lot of hoops and re-working due to legal issues. This was one of the times I have truly felt powerless to help someone in the newsroom. We were planning to run a column on a sexual assault survivors experience, but due to legal circumstances we had no way to ensure that the story could not be tracked back to the sexual assaulter and therefore were not allowed to write about it. We ended up writing an editorial on survivors' guilt and the lack of support to women, but the fact that I couldn't uplift a fellow staffer's voice particularly in a time of need is something I will never forget. My own morals took a hit because my hands were tied and it shows how survivors are often treated in a media setting.