Fake news. To some, it’s the Enemy of the People; to others, it’s just a joke. However, it’s not a concept to be taken lightly. At its most, fake news can sway an election. At its least, it can falsely manipulate the opinion of one person, impacting their thoughts and actions. In both cases, it leads to a distrust of the media, which was created to bring truth to the people. We at the Chronicle, hope to exemplify the purpose of news organizations as it was meant to be.
This year, we are venturing out of the gates of Harvard-Westlake and broadening our coverage to include the issues of not only students, but also our neighbors and local businesses in our new Community section. What is important to our community is important to our school, and the Chronicle will bridge both through news.
As we expand our reach, we remain committed to maintaining our reputation of in-depth and honest reporting. While we work hard to address significant issues and provide timely coverage, we are aware that other members of the community have knowledge and perspectives that would be invaluable to the Chronicle. Thus, we now have a tip button on our website so that readers can inform us about stories that they want us to cover. Furthermore, to give voice to everyone affected by the issues that we report on, we are now accepting opinion pieces from the community, whether it be students, faculty or neighbors.
Since we are increasing both the breadth and depth of our coverage, we will have ten issues instead of eight this year. Additionally, we recognize that every person consumes news differently, so we are boosting our multimedia presence to incorporate more videos, photographs and podcasts in our coverage.
We are aware that these changes come with big responsibilities. We know that the only way to gain respect from our readers is to treat them with respect. To reestablish our commitment to the honest reporting that we value at the Chronicle, the staff signed a new Chronicle Journalistic Ethics Policy. The Chronicle has had a longstanding tradition of balanced and accurate reporting. We put the policy in writing as a way of showing our readers that they can trust us to provide the truth.
As high school journalists in a time when journalists are deemed the enemy by many, it is important now more than ever that we recognize our obligation to ask questions and present the facts as they stand. Seeing the public grow increasingly distrustful of the media only motivates us more to prove the positive impact that proper reporting can have.
