A View From the Sears Tower's Ledge
Illinois Is Getting Fatter
Mayor Blames Violent Holiday Weekend On Booze, Heat
Kuma's Pats Itself On Back With Block Party
Did the president of Medill use made-up quotes in a newsletter? We...barely care. What really bugs us is journalists citing the existence of Facebook group as some kind of indicator of anything--"students and alumni joined the new 'Save Journalism at Medill' group on Facebook. On Tuesday afternoon, there were nearly 90 members ...." There are 650 fulltime students at Medill. Fewer than 90 of them clicked a button. Agh, not news. [Trib]
Renovations at the Brookfield Zoo... [S-T]
August: Osage County is getting an open-ended run on Broadway. [Crain's]
Someone stole a 6-foot tall, 150-pound sculpture from the Newberry Library. [Trib]
Mayor Daley announced his plans for tighter gun control in Chicago. He wants to ban semiautomatic assault weapons and .50-caliber military-grade rifles, use the State Police to license gun dealers, limit handgun purchases to one a month per person, and to mandate trigger locks, among other proposals. [S-T]
Are Wisconsin and Ohio backing out of our Great Lakes pact? Not so great! [Trib]
The US Olympic Committee might move its HQ to Chicago, and if they do, they might move it to the Sears Tower, and if they do, the Sears Tower might change its name. [ABC 7]
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Actually, Chicagoist, the Medill / Northwestern story IS news. Here you have the dean of one of the top j-schools in the country, (apparently) fabricating quotes. While leaving out sources might fly in some veins of "journalism", it most certainly is not a behavior to be modeled by leadership at top schools like Medill.
The Medill story is not a national one, but it is important to those who of us care about Chicago's educational community.
I have no reason to be for or against Medill. My opinion is that the quotes were fabricated, as indicated by the Deans strangely selective memory and by the fact that no students in the classes referred to in story had ever said anything like what was in the quotes.
Also, the Dean's letters were published in a magazine and he says that he doesn't need to know who the quotes were from. He is a liar, incompetent, or both. He should resign.
I am glad that someone stole that dopey, ugly sculpture from the front of the Newberry Library.
Here you have a beautiful Romanesque entrance designed by Henry Ives Cobb. It makes one think of the neighborhood as it existed in the 1890's.
Then, you have some modern art afficionado at the Newberry deciding to stick this abstract sculpture outside the entrance. The think looks terribly out of place. When horse carriage pause there for tourists to take photos, They probably wish for the six-foot metal think to disappear.
Well, now it has! Problem solved.
Margaret, I'm surprised at your reaction to the Medill story. Regardless of whether Chicagoist is considered journalism (by you guys or by us), what you do here is in the same family, so the fate of journalism ought to be a concern. What you may not be familiar with is the dean's steps to turn Medill into a marketing school.
Honestly, though, I myself am a bit smug over this. I'm in the creative writing program at NU, and Medill has always treated us as inferior because we don't hold ourselves to the same strict standards as Medill. And here's the dean fabricating quotes. Um, yeah.
I meant the facebook thing wasn't news.
As far as the Medill thing...am I really supposed to get worked up about quotes that might be fudged in a letter in an alumni magazine? Aren't those essentially propaganda anyway? I get it, he's a liar, that's a terrible trait in anyone--dean, journalist, pie maker. He should quit, or get fired, or be punished, or whatever it is. But I just don't get why I'm supposed to care about this.
But convince me. I'm all ears (well...eyes).
If you care about the future of journalism, and the direction that influential people like John Lavine are steering it, then you should care about this story.
Uh, Margaret, you at least pretend to be a journalist, so that's one reason to care. And this guy runs one of the top journalism schools in the world, one of the jewels of the Chicago area educational establishment.
And no, not all alumni magazines are supposed to be propaganda. Even if they are, that gives one no excuse to pass off fake quotes as real, assuming the man is guilty, which has not been proven yet.
I get frightened about the future of journalism when writers don't seem to care about such things.
In addition to what Stephen said, it's also a big deal when the Dean of Medill is the one doing this. Yes, alumni newsletters are propaganda, but the dean of one of the best j schools in the country should be held to higher standards even over other journalists, especially when this guy is determining the future of the school that educates journalists. Fabricating quotes is always at worst deception and at best poor form. If you don't have a real quote, there are ways of getting a point across without lying.
The problem I have with it is that the quotes are self-serving. He had a student raving about the new changes he had implemented in the school, so alumni, the ones who donate money, would support the changes that tons of the students and the faculty are opposed to.
I also don't buy the line about, well, this is just a newsletter. It's not the same as using more relaxed vernacular in a different forum. He lied in these publications (allegedly). So if he's willing to do it there, why should I believe him in hard journalism? The willingness to fabricate is there.
I realize I have a personal interest since I go to the school, I have bitter feelings toward Medill already, and as a creative nonfiction writer, we are always scrutinized for our veracity (by the way, CNF is ALWAYS supposed to be totally true, but people don't realize that.) But in this day when all news is suspect, and our every decision is being prayed upon by slanted media, we all should be concerned with the methods of a j school big wig who is setting the standard for journalistic ethics. /end efforts to convert
I couldn't care less about the allegedly made-up quotes. It was a marketing instrument, not journalism.
So, A2, outright lying would be OK in marketing but not advertising? What if quotes are sold as true, as really coming from a live person such as a student? That seems to be the issue.
That also seems like a low standard.
Are we so used to people in authority lying that we don't even shrug our shoulders anymore?
Wait, aren't those guns already illegal in Chicago?
Are we so used to people in authority lying that we don't even shrug our shoulders anymore?
Sad but true.
I see Margaret's point of view. The guy is a fraud and should go but it is a Northwestern story not much more than that. Last year the president of SIU was found to have plagerized his doctoral thesis he didnt get fired. These schools are starting to reflect the values of society instead of teaching them. True Journalist are a dying breed. Take a look at the local newspapers columnist and opinions fill the pages not actual fact based news.
Fed up: If you look at older newspapers, I think you might actually far more opinion disguised as news, and a healthy number of columnists.
I have to agree with Stephen, Mo, Matilda, and A2 here.
It's disappointing that Chicagoist would treat this story with such flippancy.
That Medill, one of the top j-schools in the country and tucked on this city's northern edge, has sparked a national controversy (which it is, as it has been covered extensively outside the city) is news in itself--not to mention pertinent to an online publication like Chicagoist.
Isn't the root of this issue John Lavine's radical curriculum changes (focused on online media and marketing) fueled by self-aggrandizing propaganda? Shouldn't an online publication in Chicago care about the standards that the dean at one of the top j-schools that happens to be in their city sets for himself and for the media?
And that Facebook group you were scoffing at--it's more than doubled in size since you posted this yesterday.
i think the story is news, but is it news that people didn't go to *facebook* to join a group? is that really a valid form of social protest? i think we're relying WAY too much on myspace (that's so old news, right?) and facebook to constitute actual action and real conversation/communication/human interaction.
if people are really that outraged, how about writing an actual LETTER? staging a real-life protest? showing UP and asking to talk to someone? wow, it really takes a lot of courage/effort to join a facebook group.
and before i get reamed for being hypocritical for discussing this on a blog, i am participating in some discourse on this. i'm not trying to change anything right now. i *do* agree that it's a big deal any time there's plagarism, esp. when it's coming from medill. i just think facebook and the like have taken over too much of social interaction.
You also have to look at Dean Lavine's behavior in terms of the commercialization of the Medill program. Lavine's alienated a ton of people at Medill, not just faculty, by changing the curriculum towards a greater focus on advertising and PR. Michael Miner's written a lot about this.
So it's not just a matter of a couple plagiarized quotes; it's part of a much larger story. Lavine getting hoisted on his own petard is also a power play and a small part of a larger fight over the Medill curriculum. If Lavine gets kicked to the curb over this, it'll be the excuse but not the whole reason. He's a lightning rod.
The Facebook thing, while silly, is just one throwaway bit. I'm not sure why exactly you care, when the bigger story's a lot more interesting.
Smussy,
What wasn't included in Chicagoist's summary of this news story was that real action is taking place.
16 Medill professors wrote a letter to John Lavine, informing him of their intent to send a memorandum demanding he produce his unnamed sources. The memorandum they sent to the media can be found here.
As far as the Facebook group goes, it appears that this Save Journalism at Medill group was created to do more than just piss and moan about the dean. As of noon today, the group has 190 members and has crafted a student response that supports the 16 faculty members and their memorandum and joins them in asking Dean Lavine to produce his sources. They're allowing Medill students and alumni to sign the petition until Thurdsay evening when they plan to issue their statement.
I agree that it's easy for people to "make a stand" for things online and not do much work. Fortunately, this is an example of Facebook taking things beyond the virtual world.
Smussy, I agree that online social networking has taken the place of human interaction, sadly. But people are doing something in "real life" about this. There was a petition that had been circulated back in November and signed by a bunch of Medill faculty, students and alumni trying to get faculty governance back in Medill. Lavine suspended this and is making changes all on his own without agreement from the faculty. They sent the petition to the trustees and Provost Linzer. Then after this quote thing, more faculty and lecturers signed a letter and sent it to President Bienen.
Anyone whose title is EDITOR should be concerned with fairness and accuracy, which are the foundations of journalism.
And while we're on the subject of accuracy, Margaret,he's the Dean of Medill, not the president.
You don't have to "care," but you could get your facts straight.
--current Northwestern grad student