Photo courtesy of David Henne
When I joined the Chronicle during my freshman year, I wanted to be a journalist. I didn’t put much thought into why. I liked politics, I was good at writing and I knew some great people in the major. I jumped in immediately, getting invited onto the editorial board of the Hofstra Chronicle before I even officially declared the major. I was invited to join the multimedia section after writing a few pieces for the paper by my friends Jesse Saunders and Peter Soucy who were editors of the section. I did my first real work for the Chronicle for a spread about a protest on campus organized by The Jefferson Has Gotta Go team to have that statue removed from campus. It felt important. It was important. I wasn’t covering the story or working as an organizer, being the newest person in the office. I was just editing photos and putting them together in for the spread, but I was in the room where we decided how it was covered and I got to be part of the conversation about how we present this story.
The same semester, a kid from our school went onto Fox News and lied about what the protest was trying to accomplish, getting more nationwide attention on the protests. The school released a statement that included an organizer’s contact information, leading to emails containing death threats being sent to the student. You quickly learn that it matters how we cover stories when that happens. Student journalists usually get that, and there’s no better time to learn that. We rub shoulders with the same people we interview in classes, on campus, at parties. We know exactly how human our subjects are, and we understand they aren’t there to be interviewed, quoted, then ignored.
I remained with the multimedia section during my time with the Chronicle, adding on the responsibilities of Business Manager along the way, as well as writing for the op-ed, news and arts and entertainment sections. I learned more in the first few months with the paper than I ever learned in the School of Communications. James Factora, Jill Leavey and Katie Krahulik helped me through some of my earliest stories while Peter and Jesse helped me develop a sense of style in the multimedia section and taught me how to use a DSLR and InDesign.
My time with the Chronicle also taught me that there isn’t much in the way of good journalism out there. I love the Chronicle and what it represents, but at times it seems our industry rarely gets better than the work of student journalists, not in terms of technical skill or access to resources, but in terms of honesty. There are no advertisers to cut us off if we push the wrong buttons, no financial interests paying students to be talking heads like Tucker Carlson or Chris Matthews that say what their audiences want to hear. At most, we have uncooperative administration making our stories hard to tell or a frustrating section editor. Student journalists have a unique opportunity to tell the truth if they are persistent and driven. I will always remember the Hofstra Chronicle as the thing that made me love what journalism could be, and I’m certain I won’t find something like this again.
I look forward to the future of the Chronicle, with my section going to the incredibly capable hands of now senior editor Adam Flash and Jacob Lewis, our newest and incredibly promising member. Visvajit Sriramrajan, Micaela Erickson, Jess Zhang … I have the utmost faith in your leadership and look forward to what you accomplish together. You all are returning to a post-pandemic print schedule, our first in over a year, so good luck you guys, I believe in you.
