BY PATIENCE COLLIER, News Editor
If you’ve been watching the Observer on our various social media streams, you may be aware we just came in third place for a national award in college newspapers.
I have to admit that I’m not all that excited about this award. Honestly, I feel that our focus is frequently taken off of informing the Central community, at the cost of gaining recognition in official circles for our work. But it’s not just us — this is something that seems to be at the center of a nasty tangle of the practice of journalism.
The public perception of journalists and media has been declining for the last several decades; we’re dishonest, profit-driven, arrogant snoops. Countless books, essays, documentaries, and articles have been written about how to save journalism and the media.
But the fact is, journalists continue to talk as if our most important audience is each other. A reporter who wins awards or is noted among their peers is not necessarily better at informing a readership of non-journalists. I’m not saying that no writers should ever write for fellow journalists, but if we’re all preaching to the choir, what’s the point?
On a personal level, I understand that these contests can be important for this stage of a career; working for an “award-winning newspaper” looks pretty good on a resume, which is something that definitely looms close in the future for many of us.
Here’s the problem: outside of the field, it doesn’t matter. This is something that I believe is a problem with journalism in general, representative of a philosophy that cares more about what other writers think of our work than about how much information reaches the public.
Layout, print-making, photography, and writing are all artistic pursuits in their own rights, with their own merits, but in the field of journalism, they should serve the purpose of presenting information in the easiest possible way to understand.
In theory, we should make all decisions with an eye to making more information available and more easily understood, with official recognition as an afterthought, at best.
If we win an award in the SPJ circle, does that mean we’re going to reach more Central students next year?
Will we get more people to care about local, national, or international politics if we have a shiny piece of paper on the wall?
The point of journalism is to inform the public. That’s it: to distribute information to the public in a clear and reasonable manner. Not to tell people what to think, not to advertise – or even to sell ad space – not to smear people we disagree with, and most certainly not to compete for recognition and prestige in our field of work.
When awards serve the purpose of pushing us to higher standards, I see their benefit. When we start making editing and reporting decisions based on getting higher judge ratings, then our focus is no longer informing the public. At that point, we may as well put down the pen and walk away, because we’re not doing our jobs.
If we spend our college careers learning to write stories we think will impress the judges of some competition, rather than stories we believe our audience needs to read, I believe we will fall into the trap of doing the same thing in our careers after graduation.
