The Media Advocacy Board (MAB) announced earlier this month the creation of an ombudsman position tasked with critiquing all undergraduate student publications. Senior Jeremy White recently took up the position, officially making Tufts the first university in the country to have an ombudsman at the undergraduate level, according to the MAB.
Ombudsmen, or public editors, serve as impartial officials who generally investigate and address complaints made against a publication, government agency, corporation or other entity. Administrators originally proposed the idea to the MAB as a way to promote student involvement in the debate over free speech at Tufts that has resulted from the Primary Source scandal.
"It's something that the university needs," MAB Chairman Patrick Roath, a senior, said.
White hopes to provide an impartial voice as he oversees on-campus student journalism. His position, which is paid, will offer an outlet for students to voice their comments and concerns, he said.
White, a former news editor for the Daily, will also receive assistance from sophomore Caleb Zimmerman, who will serve as deputy public editor. In that role, Zimmerman will support the public editor and may provide his own opinions on free-speech issues, White said.
When the public editor writes a new column, he will submit it as an opinions piece to many different print publications; those outlets "can run it if they so choose," Roath said.
His first column, on the role of the public editor, appeared in the Daily last Tuesday, and his second piece was published today.
White and Zimmerman will also use a new blog, which will include the public editor's columns and commentary on campus publications as well as national and international media, according to a posting on the site.
"The blog is where columns come up first, where we interact through comments and e-mail and regularly update material," White said. He will also use the social networking site Twitter.com.
The creation of this position comes two years after a free speech debate that erupted on campus when The Primary Source, a conservative campus magazine, published a racially charged Christmas carol and a piece on Islam. The Committee on Student Life found the Source guilty of harassment for the two items.
"There was a big debate -- what is the limit of free speech [on campus]?" White said.
As a private institution, Tufts is not bound by First Amendment free speech protections, as are public colleges and universities. Last January, University President Lawrence Bacow created a task force to draft an official university-wide speech policy. The group hopes to finish its work by the next Board of Trustees meeting in May.
The idea for the public editor position arose as the administration explored other methods for dealing with the free-speech debate.
"At a town meeting that the president held, a professor stood up and said that there's one thing to have free expression, but there should also be mechanisms to explore some of the community and journalistic issues that arise," Dean of Undergraduate Education James Glaser said. "He mentioned the idea of an ombudsman."
Administrators have since pushed for a student-driven solution to free-speech problems on campus.
"It became clear that there was a need for a student oversight role in campus media," White said. "I think the public editor was created in that spirit."
Glaser agreed that the new position would involve students in the freedom of expression discussion in a productive way.
"Dean [of Student Affairs Bruce] Reitman and I thought that's a wonderful idea," he said. "It enhances freedom of expression, and it also makes it possible for students to comment on and discuss and argue about things that appear in the press."
Glaser and Reitman then proposed the idea to Roath and the MAB.
Glaser emphasized, however, that although members of the administration were involved in the position's creation, only students have worked on its planning and implementation.
"Our intention as administrators is to be out of the way. We're not going to tell them what to write or what to do," he said. "Our job is over."
The neutrality and independence of the role will prove key to its success, White said.
An event marking the official launch of the public editor program will take place next Wednesday in Sophia Gordon Hall. Alicia C. Shepard, National Public Radio's ombudsman, will give a talk on journalistic ethics.
White hopes the event will raise on-campus awareness of the public editor program.
"Because the work is online, it's not as easy to make students aware of it," White said.
White's blog appears online at http://blogs.uit.tufts.edu/thepubliceditor, and he uses the Twitter username "tuftsmedia".
