Editorial: What Makes a Campus Newspaper Independent?

In the wake of President Donald Trump’s ban on several news outlets from the White House, the Editorial Board feels we have an especially poignant opportunity to evaluate the role of The Student on our own campus. As a small college newspaper, we operate in a unique publishing space of editorial independence while remaining integrated into, and financially dependent on Amherst College. How do these two competing orientations impact our structure and the content we put out? We hope to explain how we see our role as both participants in and observers of the college. 

While we remain independent in our decisions about the content in our weekly issues, our dependence on Amherst is material. Unfortunately, it is not feasible to generate enough revenue from advertising to support a print-based weekly newspaper like The Student. Like many other NESCAC student newspapers, our affiliated college foots the bill. Primarily, this means that the Association of Amherst Students funds the printed editions that come out every week. College support also comes in the form of our physical production room, computers, software for our website and print layout, as well as student events. 

However, we technically remain an independent organization. We do not have faculty or administrators as supervisors, and in many ways, we collaborate with them like many external news outlets do — through a formal interview or discussion, where we are treated just like professional journalists. And more importantly, we believe that we offer our community a real service, like any independent newspaper. The Student provides information about campus and beyond in a filtered, structured manner. Students and alumni use the forum to speak directly to the administration, student body, and broader Amherst community. The paper is an archive of student concerns, campus culture, and local news that allows us to see how Amherst has evolved over time. Our independence is why we are all unpaid, but still devote more than 10 hours of unpaid work to weekly editions, simply because we all believe in the project of independent news. 

Our position as Amherst students and contributors to a small independent paper makes us uniquely accountable. While we strive to be as objective as possible in our reporting, we must ask whether a college newspaper can ever be truly independent. Some college papers, especially at large universities, can sustain themselves. The Cornell Sun, as well as the Harvard Crimson and the Columbia Daily Spectator, are not directly funded by their universities. Their funding comes mostly from alumni support and reserves built over the years. A paper structured this way has greater flexibility to publish an investigation against the will of its administration, as it knows none of its budget will be cut as retaliation. 

However, our financial dependence doesn’t necessarily mean we are less capable of offering meaningful perspectives. At many times, we managed to shed light on important events on campus that would’ve otherwise gone unnoticed to the larger community — from our 2021 investigation of the discrepancies in the college’s casual employees system to our recent reporting on veteran students’ push to change financial aid policy — without censorship from the college. We believe a college that cuts its newspaper’s funding for its reporting only invites scrutiny for the original story. Therefore, the likeliest response to our most contentious work is a difficult conversation that often results in change for good. 

Beyond our funding, the closeness that The Student has to its subjects and reports also raises questions about our independence. National news outlets face different pressures and assume different risks. When reporters enter, or are barred from, the White House, they bare themselves to the country. However, this type of reporting also benefits from the greater degree of separation from the subjects of coverage. Writers for large outlets do not have the same accountability to their community that we, as students who are deeply integrated into the campus, face. We recognize that we are, in some ways, not completely independent editorially because we are so interconnected with the subjects of our journalism. 

However, our goal is not to be an outsider or attempt to distance ourselves from the campus. We believe that our writing is more vibrant as a result of our involvement. This direct accountability to our community, we believe, makes our criticism both more measured and consequential. We have skin in the game; we cannot afford to be controversial for the sake of clickbait. When we critique something about the college, trends in the student body, or anything else on campus, it is because we truly believe that we ought to. 

Beyond direct responsibility for our writing, we also have an inevitable interest in portraying Amherst favorably. Both as a financial beneficiary of the college and as students who love our school, we have every incentive to pull our punches. Our critical writing, then, comes with an extra degree of care. We hope it is received with that in mind.

This commitment and connection to our community come through in our open structure. The Student does not have the same competitive process for contributions as some other campus newspapers, so we welcome contributions from the broader Amherst College community to make ourselves more accessible. We hope that, by our many ties to the college and its community — which we take more pride in than try to avoid — we provide a forum for discussion and debate that can enliven campus and strengthen relationships, rather than the opposite. 

Our ask, then, is that you trust us. We care deeply about this school and the people connected to it, because we are a part of it. When we reach out to you for comments or interviews, tell us what you think. All we ask is for a thoughtful response. If you feel that coverage was unfair or undeveloped, let us know. Write an op-ed. And read us with the same care we take in writing about you.

Unsigned editorials represent the views of the majority of the Editorial Board (assenting: 13; dissenting: 1; abstaining: 3)