Sarah Stultz: A reunion of fellow newspaper advocates
Published 8:45 pm Tuesday, February 4, 2025
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Nose for News by Sarah Stultz
Last week I had the privilege of attending the annual Minnesota Newspaper Convention for a day, and it reminded me of a school reunion of sorts seeing all these familiar faces and friends of others in the newspaper industry from across the state.
While I was there, I attended two classes, one on ethics in journalism and another on the resources available to us as journalists through experts at the University of Minnesota.
The ethics class was great, featuring a professor of journalism at Bethel University, former Albert Lean Scott Winter, who walked those in attendance through a series of scenarios.
In small groups and as an audience we weighed what we would do in those scenarios, what we would publish, what we wouldn’t and how we came to that decision.
It was a very valuable exercise and it reminded me that not every community is the same, and, therefore, not every newspaper’s response would have been the same to every scenario.
I know I changed my mind a couple times during the course of the discussion on each scenario.
These tough decisions are ones we’re making all the time behind the scenes that many may never even think about — whether to include or not include certain photos at various crime or crash scenes or whether and how to cover a story.
We used the Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics as we walked through the different scenarios and considered some of the valuable principles of that code: to seek truth and report it, to minimize harm, to act independently and to be accountable and transparent.
At the end of the day we have to take responsibility for our work and explain our decisions.
Later that evening, we attended the annual Better Newspaper Contest, where we at the Tribune were proud to take home 14 awards for the newspaper and the magazine. It feels good to be rewarded by our peers in the industry and makes me want to do even better this next year.
At the end of the night each year, the presenter gives away the Mills Trophy, which is awarded to the top weekly newspaper each year, and the Vance Trophy, which is given away to the top multi-day newspaper in the state.
We’re lumped into the multi-day category, so we’re in there with some of the big papers, like the Post Bulletin and The Forum of Fargo-Moorhead. Each year, I’ve left a little envious of those who win — this year it was the Steele County Times for the Mills Trophy and the Post Bulletin for the Vance Trophy — and in the back of my mind I want to do all I can to someday win that award, too.
I don’t know if it’s physically possible, but it can’t hurt a girl to dream!
In the meantime, thanks for letting us share your stories and for trusting us with the news that’s important to you.We do not take it for granted.
Remember, we’re all in this community together.
Sarah Stultz is the managing editor of the Tribune. Her column appears every Wednesday.