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Editorial: No experience necessary

We know there is a byline at the bottom of this editorial, but here are the people who write it each week. Our names are Julian Andrews, Jono Gruber, Matthew Gutschenritter, Meg Robbins, Nicole Wetsman and Emily Weyrauch. All of us are white. All of us come from high schools that had the resources to support a student newspaper and four of us worked on that publication. Five of us grew up in a state touching the Atlantic Ocean. All of us are liberal-leaning. Our goal is to represent the entire student body, so we are falling short if our staff does not reflect as many of the perspectives, experiences and interests of Bowdoin’s students as possible. This week we will send out applications for next year’s Orient leadership and we would like to reach out to people who do not necessarily fit the current mold.
We are proud of the weekly paper that we produce. We think our stories are well-reported, we stick by journalistic ethics and we cover topics that are important to the campus. We are happy that we’ve been a forum for discussion on campus and that our opinion section has included a diverse range of perspectives.
We are also lacking in some key areas: writers who don’t have experience writing journalistic articles before college often fall through the cracks because we don’t do enough to train them, and some avoid approaching us in the first place out of fear of being under-qualified. Because our article topics are generated by a group of students that represents a relatively small community on campus, we miss some potential stories from groups we don’t have connections to, and our newspaper doesn’t include as many conservative voices as we would like. While we have strong women members of leadership, there is very little representation of racial and ethnic minorities on our staff, especially in leadership.
These are not new problems, and they are not ones that are exclusive to our campus. As Margaret Sullivan, Public Editor of the New York Times wrote on the importance of newsroom diversity this year: “When the group is truly diverse, the nefarious groupthink that makes a publication predictable and, at times, unintentionally biased, is much more likely to be diminished. And that’s a good thing.”
We want to let all students—not just those who seek us out and come into our house (which is notably removed from the most trafficked areas of campus)—know that the Orient can be a place for them if they are interested. We are looking into the factors—social, cultural, political and financial—that discourage students from joining our staff and we are committed to doing our best to break down these barriers.
We want to share the opinions and experiences you bring to the College. We want to hear the stories that you think are important and want us to cover. We’d like to talk to you about how to make the Orient better and more inclusive. Most importantly, if you’ve ever wanted to contribute to the Orient, we’d love to have you. No experience necessary.
This editorial represents the majority view of the Bowdoin Orient’s editorial board, which is comprised of Julian Andrews, Jono Gruber, Matthew Gutschenritter, Meg Robbins, Nicole Wetsman and Emily Weyrauch.

Editorial: Put it into practice

The sun is shining, the weather is (arguably) nice, the quad is sparkling green after a brief snowy coating and Randy Nichols is filling his polar bear water bottle and gearing up for a big weekend. It’s Ivies, baby.
This fall, the 2015 NESCAC Alcohol and Drug Survey results were released, revealing Bowdoin students’ attitudes on Bowdoin’s alcohol policies and bystander intervention. The survey was first conducted in 2012, and in the three years since then, Bowdoin students have shown improvements in their self-reported “sense of responsibility” to intervene in difficult situations involving intoxicated friends. Bowdoin students have increased 10 percentage points across the board in terms of intervening in the case of a friend driving drunk, vomiting, passing out, harassing others, threatening students, threatening to injure their self, embarrassing their self or drinking to “escape” emotions.
One of the biggest jumps was in sense of responsibility to intervene if a friend was “too intoxicated and might ‘hook up’ with someone.” Whereas in 2012, only 49 percent of students reported that they would intervene, in 2015, 67 percent of Bowdoin students claimed that they would get involved. This increase is encouraging, especially considering the widening of conversations that Bowdoin has been having about sexual assault. It correlates to the increase in Bystander Intervention trainings through Associate Director of Health Promotion Whitney Hogan, which every upper-class student leader is required to participate in.
The survey asked about “sense of responsibility,” and the results show that the majority of Bowdoin students feel very responsible to step in in a variety of potentially dangerous situations involving alcohol. Now, it’s Ivies! While some of Randy Nichols’ “best memories of Bowdoin” happened during Ivies—we’re very excited for our pictures with you, Randy—it’s also the time of year when we hear most from Randy about drug and alcohol safety. We receive “Survivies” and other protocol emails throughout the week, and Security is present all throughout the weekend. Many Bowdoin students will be choosing to imbibe in some way this weekend, and some of the scenarios presented in the survey may come up. This weekend offers a great chance to put these values into practice and step up when these situations occur in real life. The majority of Bowdoin students claim to feel responsible to do so, and now is the time to make good on those promises.
Ivies can be super fun. We can nap, we can laugh, we can cry and we can nap. And, it’s a time to, thankfully, be ourselves; our attitudes and sense of responsibility have improved greatly, and it’s important to keep it that way.
This editorial represents the majority view of the Bowdoin Orient’s editorial board, which is comprised of Julian Andrews, Jono Gruber, Meg Robbins and Emily Weyrauch.

Editorial

This piece represents the opinion of The Bowdoin Orient editorial board.

April 22, 2016

This year, we have seen the power that Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) can enact. The organization’s actions and responses have become a visible part of campus culture, and BSG frequently shows up on our front page. BSG has been redefining itself and its role on campus. It has released statements of solidarity with the victims of racist attacks at the University of Missouri, as well as two statements of solidarity with students at Bowdoin following the “gangster” party and the “tequila” party. In the fall, students voted in overwhelming support of adding the seat of Multicultural Representative and throughout the year BSG’s “public comment” time has proved itself a heated platform for airing grievances and debate. This has led to an increase in discussions about the role of BSG in representing the student body and the standards it holds itself to. For instance, it has adopted new, more comprehensive procedures for the impeachment of its members and introduced a Good Standing Amendment that allows the BSG Executive Committee to review previously confidential disciplinary records should members fall out of good standing with the College.

In past years, during the week of BSG Executive Committee elections, we have written an editorial endorsing a candidate for president. This year, though, we think it’s more important to use this space to urge you to vote and to make sure you have all the information you need to make an informed decision. While we used to use our interviews with the presidential candidates to inform the position we took, this year we are posting clips of these interviews online for you to evaluate. We are also presenting you with all of the candidates’ candidacy statements in the Opinion section and we have extensive coverage, both in print and on Twitter, of last Tuesday night’s debates, if you were unable to attend.

Ballots were sent by email to all students this morning, and voting will be open until Sunday night. While we realize BSG has its limits, its position as a governing body nonetheless makes it the face of our student body. If the laws it enacts and statements it makes reflect our campus, it should do a good job of representing us. So, be aware of the information you have available to educate yourself about the candidates. If you have opinions on what BSG should be next year, then you should vote for the candidates you think best represent your interests. If you choose not to vote, know that abstaining is tacit agreement with whatever decisions are made on BSG next year. Seniors, too, can vote in this BSG election, as well as students who are abroad, facts that are often overlooked. Voting in this election—like any other election—is a privilege that we have in deciding what our governing body looks like and how we are represented as students and citizens. This year has shown us that BSG’s actions affect our lives, which makes our decisions as voters all the more important.

This editorial represents the majority view of the Bowdoin Orient’s editorial board, which is comprised of Julian Andrews, Jono Gruber, Meg Robbins and Emily Weyrauch.

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