Letter from the Editors

Hello Tufts, and welcome back to another semester!We, the spring 2017 managing board of the Tufts Daily, are writing to introduce ourselves and lay out some of our goals for the semester, which include carrying on with groundwork laid by our fall predecessors and launching several initiatives of our own. Last semester, the Daily began a scholarship to enable financially-restrained first-year students with an interest in journalism to pursue a position on the paper.This semester, we are committed to expanding this scholarship and laying the fundraising foundation to keep it growing every year. We believe that scholarship opportunities are essential to making our paper more inclusive to students of all backgrounds.

In addition to making our newsroom more inclusive, we are striving to make our coverage more intentional. We will be releasing a statement that recognizes the limitations of traditional journalistic objectivity and emphasizes a greater commitment to conscientiousness and intentionality. While the Daily maintains its non-partisan character, we recognize that no media outlet is completely objective and that everyday decisions small and large tilt us one way or another. Often, this tilt is toward a status quo that tends to exclude traditionally-marginalized voices. This approach will be reflected in the topics we choose to cover, whom we approach for interviews, the headlines we run and the many other decisions that go into making a daily newspaper. This all begins with our soon-to-be-released objectivity statement and will be carried on through several other initiatives being planned by our Inclusivity and Intentionality Committee.

Continuing on the theme of conscientiousness, the Daily will be reducing its overall print circulation while increasing the scope of our distribution by expanding to the School of the Museum of Fine Arts and other locations. These changes were made in an effort to use fewer resources and produce less waste while still growing our readership. This cutback on printed papers will be accompanied by a pivot towards digital journalism as we plan the rollout of an app and a redesign of our website.Thinking about the semester ahead, we know that there will be times when people will take issue with our coverage. When those moments occur, we ask anyone who has thoughts about our coverage to reach out to us. Sitting down and having conversations in which all parties can explain their points of view and priorities is essential to improving our understanding of each other and to us producing a better paper.

This is a very interesting time for journalism on both the national and collegiate levels, as quakes in the political landscape shake the everyday lives of Tufts students. As the president-elect challenges the free press at every turn, the fundamental mandate of journalists to speak truth to power has never been more imperative. To this end, the Daily will strive to do its part to add clarity to conversations, balance to issues and fact to debates.

Here’s to the work ahead.

Sincerely,

Kathleen Schmidt, editor-in-chief

Jei-Jei Tan, managing editor

Miranda Willson, managing editorSebastian Torrente, production director