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Hampton Student Journalists Back With New Sense of Freedom

By Kara Edgerson
Black College Wire

Student journalists at Hampton University started a new semester with a fresh sense of freedom: The acting president and provost, Dr. JoAnn Haysbert, had approved recommendations from a task force designed to ensure, as one student said, that "they cannot confiscate our paper any more."

In the new environment, Hampton Script Editor-in-Chief Talia Buford said, "I want the Hampton Script to be a major news force." She said her goals were to have the newspaper online and to increase its publication from every two weeks to weekly.

Fia Curley, a senior print journalism and Spanish major from Hampton, Va., said she expected the quality of the paper to continue to rise, with the guidance of the journalism school. One of the recommendations was creating an advisory board that would assist the student newspaper in making decisions.

"In the next few years, I expect the writers to garner more awards in journalism and receive prestigious recognition from their work done at HU," said Curley, associate editor of the newspaper.

She compared the struggles of the newspaper with the civil rights and women’s movements.

The Task Force made four policy recommendations:

• "No administrator, faculty member, student or university affiliated organization will confiscate and/or halt distribution of the Hampton Script.

• "Student journalists on the staff of The Script have the right to a free press in order to practice their craft in the unfettered fashion envisioned by the framers of the First Amendment of the Constitution of the United States.

• "Oversight and guidance from a faculty advisor (or advisors) with adequate journalistic knowledge and an appreciation and commitment to the Hampton model are necessary.

• "An Advisory Board be established and empowered to resolve issues between the editors and advisers."

The Hampton administration confiscated the Homecoming issue of the newspaper after the editorial staff did not place a memo from Haysbert about recent health-code violations at the university cafeteria on the front page, as requested. Instead, the staff placed its own story addressing the violations on the front page and referred readers to the memo, placed on page 3.

After three days of negotiations, the staff agreed to reprint the issue, with a large disclaimer on the front page, in exchange for a task force.

The panel was led by veteran journalist Earl Caldwell, an endowed professor at the journalism school, and included two editors from the newspaper, the three newspaper advisers, the director of the journalism school, three faculty members and the special assistant to the president for operations and analysis.

The confiscation drew criticism from media outlets across the country.

On Nov. 11, before the task force findings were released, the American Society of Newspaper Editors pulled a $55,000 grant from the School of Journalism and Communications intended for a summer program training high school teachers.

Haysbert said she now realizes a number of things about journalism.

"I learned that the journalism world tends to look at student newspapers as they would a New York Times newspaper," she said.

She added that she hoped no one lost sight of the bigger picture -- the university, she said.

"We demonstrated what we are good at," Haysbert said. "HU is capable of airing, sharing differences, investigating, and finding a conclusion that is best."

Some staff members at the Script, such as Janell Hazelwood, a senior print journalism major from Portsmouth, Va., said the confiscation might have been a plus for the newspaper.

"The confiscation [had] a great springboard effect," said Hazelwood, who is lifestyles editor.

She said she hoped the findings and new standards would be actively implemented.

"I hope it doesn't go through red tape and be brushed under the rug," she said.

Buford said she experienced a few frustrations in explaining certain aspects of journalism to some members of the task force, but said she believed the process was important so that the Script would have "certain freedoms."

"Everyone learned something," she said.

Ashley Gramby, a staff writer for the Script and a freshman print journalism major from Upper Marlboro, Md., said the task force did its job.

"It opened us up for more freedom," she said. Gramby said she already saw a change in the content of the newspaper and felt it had more freedom to cover controversial issues. She said she wanted the newspaper to grow.

"I wish it can come out weekly, have a more diverse audience and more people on the writing staff," she said.

She applauded the task force recommendations, saying a load is off her shoulder now that "they cannot confiscate our paper any more."`

Erin Hill, a junior print journalism major from Detroit, said she feared that media professionals would question the value of her degree because of the seizure of the newspaper.

"I was afraid when I went in for interviews or even when I put the journalism school on my resume that people would look at it and question if I learned real journalism," said Hill, a copy editor for the Script. "The censored newspaper made it kind of hard to believe that students were getting hands-on experience in order to survive in the real world of journalism."

The new recommendations symbolize a sense of freedom of free speech, she said. "That means everything."

Hill said she was not worried about the questions that might have arisen in some minds because of this incident.

"I know what I can do and my work shows it," she said. "They can take it or leave it."

Kara Edgerson, a student at Hampton University, writes for The Hampton Script.

Official University statement

Posted Jan. 27, 2004