The Journal is looking forward to a new and improved communication with the Global Marketing and Communications office (GMC), including public relations. This comes after a rocky relationship on both sides.
After a sit-down meeting last week with members of GMC, The Journal feels both parties have made great strides toward a successful relationship for the future.
With the school year coming to a close, major changes will be happening within The Journal staff. Many of our editors are graduating, meaning new editors will be taking over.
Of course, the change of staff is something that happens every time a new school year begins. For our relationship with GMC, it is a chance to start over in creating a functional, beneficial relationship.
Many of our problems have been two-sided.
We felt GMC restricted access to sources we needed for our reporting. GMC said many times those sources simply were unwilling, or they not available to speak with us.
We felt GMC did not respond to us quickly enough. GMC felt we did not give them enough time to respond.
The list goes on. But when we do make mistakes, as students are bound to make, we own up to them. We always issue a correction when needed. And yes, in certain instances, we do need to work on giving GMC more time to respond to our questions.
Of course, there have been specific instances of problems in the past that GMC and The Journal will probably never agree upon, and that is OK. In most cases, we can agree to disagree — the editors at The Journal will always stand up for ourselves when we need to.
But starting now, The Journal has a new mindset. We no longer want it to be journalists versus public relations. No more “us versus them.”
In the end, we need GMC and they need us. But really, it all comes down to one thing: our readers. We want you to know that we will continue to do our best every single day to bring you complete and truthful information that you need to know as a part of the Webster University community, and we will do everything we can to stay true to that mission.
Signed,
Emily Van de Riet – Editor-in-Chief
Jacob Claspille – Managing Editor
Jessica Karins – News Editor
Bill Loellke – Lifestyle Editor
Mike Thomas – Sports Editor
Haley Walter – Opinions Editor
Andrew McMunn – Multimedia Editor
Melissa Buelt – Social Media Manager
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