BY BENJAMIN BRADLOW

In print | February 14, 2008

As a hastily-promoted freshman Phoenix news editor, I attended a charged late February Student Council meeting about the opening of Swarthmore’s Tri-Co program to white students. Afterwards, Jaky Joseph ’06 and Lorpu Jones ’06, then-President and Vice-President of the Swarthmore African American Students Society, respectively, came up to me and asked why the Phoenix had not had any coverage of Black History Month events. I had no good answer.

As a former Editor in Chief of the paper, I have to take my share of the responsibility for these problems. Look no further than the top job at the paper to see the issue at hand. The last African American editor graduated in 1993. During this period, it has been rare for editors and writers of color to stay with the paper for longer than a semester or two, particularly if we look at blacks and Latinos.

This fact should put to rest any notion that the Phoenix is an institution of equal opportunity or a representative student voice for minority groups. In fact, the paper is not representative of anyone, not just of minorities. It struggles to hire enough staff, and ends up promoting people to top editorial positions probably before it would be ideal. Other organizations on campus suffer from similar problems, and the effects of premature burnout mean that seniors rarely hold top leadership positions, with Student Council as a notable exception.

Attributing the paper’s diversity problems to a mere lack of talent would be naive. As the heated exchanges over last year’s SC presidential election lay bare, some minority students are apprehensive about the operations of the most important student-run institutions. The Phoenix is particularly susceptible to these perceptions, as its hiring process is opaque, its production closed off in its Parrish top floor office, and its editorial board inclusive of few students of color. The supposed closed nature of the paper is such that I cannot count how many times I have heard other students wonder if the administration oversees its production (this is not the case).

Many students plainly do not trust The Phoenix. A misspelled name or wrongly attributed photo (let alone a factual error or shoddy writing) engenders deep-seated mistrust of the paper for years. This mistrust is magnified among minority students who may already feel marginalized by the general apparatus of student governance.

In discussions with former and current Phoenix editors on the issue, I am convinced that they desire to have a more diverse staff and editorial board. This must become the number one priority for the paper. To comprehensively report on the concerns and interests of students - that is, for the paper to be relevant - its staff needs to represent the make-up of the student body, whether we break this down by ethnic, ideological or socio-economic lines.

In its upcoming hiring process in late April, the paper should actively recruit among the cultural groups, much like SC did in advance of its fireside chat on planning committees held yesterday. Editors should work with multicultural deans Tim Sams, Darryl Smaw and Rafael Zapata to develop strategies for both recruiting more minority applicants and ensuring that these applicants are given the proper opportunities to develop their writing and editing talents. The paper also needs to avoid tokenization. Some columns written by minority writers in the recent past focused on issues specific to the writer’s ethnicity. Such voices are welcome, but minority writers need not be confined to the topic of their difference.

Some might cast this column as shameless white guilt. After three years on the editorial board, maybe my current year on the outside gives me the added perspective to advocate for this change more forcefully than I did while on the paper. But this is no mere mea culpa. Nor am I under any illusions that I have presented all the answers. All relevant parties must solve this problem by coming together to right the missteps of the past and strengthen this institution. Substantial integration of the Phoenix is long overdue.

,i>Benjamin is a senior. You can reach him at bbradlo1@swarthmore.edu.

« RETURN TO OPINIONS

« PREV ARTICLE | NEXT ARTICLE »