The Mast wants YOU

In the quest for accuracy, reader responses are crucial to a newspaper’s integrity

April Reiter

Mast Editor in Chief

Gone are the days of yellow journalism where tales of slander, libel and hyperbolizing lined newspaper pages. And thank goodness for that.

The modern newspaper, whether a high school monthly or the New York Times, holds itself to the high standard of integrity. It prints the facts, and only the facts, to the best knowledge and understanding of everyone involved in production, from the editor in chief to the writers. This is what the reading public expects, and rightfully so.

We at The Mast have regrettably struggled with recent accuracy issues. We strive in every issue to do our best to deliver the most accurate content. Yet, as humans are wont to do, we do miss things. We do make mistakes.

Our readers, though, can depend on our commitment to accuracy and know that we take very seriously our renewed efforts to avoid any problems with accuracy in our pages.

Preventing inaccuracy depends largely upon the bonds of trust between writer and editor, and editor and copy editor, which involve a commitment on everyone’s part to the highest excellence in accuracy.

It also depends on a community of engaged and discerning readers who hold us to our high standards and help point out inaccuracies.

When we do find that we have published an inaccuracy, whether in spelling of a name, miscalculated numbers, or an incorrect fact, The Mast will always publish a correction or retraction in the subsequent issue in the section where the inaccuracy occurred. Additionally, we are now able to update these corrections on our Web site more promptly than in print.

As another part of the accuracy check process, The Mast welcomes letters to the editor or comments in any way regarding reader observations. Although we surely don’t want to make mistakes, we will never deny when we’ve made them.

However, all of these policies, although very successful in preventing inaccuracy, have not created a perfect filter for the occasional error in information.

We, at The Mast, find this unacceptable. In response, we have made a few changes, which will all be instituted by next week’s issue, to bolster our push for accuracy.

These changes include the addition of writer contact information to the end of every article. Readers can feel free to contact the writer of the story with any comments or notifications of inaccuracy.

The Mast now also includes the e-mail addresses for every editor in the circulation box, which can be found at the bottom of this page every week. Readers are encouraged to contact any section editor with questions or comments about content.

Although we don’t have the budget to hire a fact-checker to corroborate sources and attributions, we will compensate for this lack by requiring writers to provide contact information for sources. In the event of a discrepancy, editors can function as fact checkers and contact sources.

All of the writers, editors and photographers for The Mast take their commitment to the integrity of this paper and of all newspapers very seriously. However, we also recognize we can’t be perfect and that the occasional mistake will probably find its way to print.

Because of this, we will always depend greatly upon our committed readers to help hold us to a high standard by bringing inaccuracies to our attention. We request that our readers continue to support our efforts by reading with a scrutinizing eye and by giving us their comments, suggestions, ideas or even words of praise. This sort of open community of ideas is, in our minds, what a modern newspaper is really about.