The Public Editor discusses the columnist selection process and gives his take on The Sun's decision to allow a recent column to be publish anonymously.

The public editor gives his take on the recently mis-reported story on CIO compensation.

The Public Editor addresses the controversy caused by the latest Everyday Ethicist column.

The Public Editor considers the duty to reference causes of death in news stories, and tackles The Sun's ongoing editing blunders.

While The Sun shines in the areas of journalist integrity and covering big stories, a lack of focus on editing consistently brings down the overall product.

The Sun elected its 128th Editorial Board on Saturday, ending the six-week “compet” for new editorial positions and officially setting the hierarchy for the next year. At this important nexus of past and present for The Sun, I will comment both on the general implications for the paper and the process itself.

Today kicks off The Sun’s final week of publication this semester and marks the last time in 2009 for this column. With that in mind, I would like to address some reader comments I have received and tie up loose ends with a few thoughts of my own.

The Sun has spilled much ink on the Student Assembly’s decision to reduce Cornell Cinema’s part of the Student Activity Fee and the subsequent affirmation of that decision on appeal. The issue has ruffled feathers, and I want to give readers my idea of how it all played out.

The strongest aspect of the coverage is that after reporting the story, The Sun’s pages served as a forum for people on both sides of the issue to be heard. The weakest, however, is that the news coverage — and even some of The Sun’s own editorial product — was somewhat underreported, missing important facts that could have provided better context.

The relationship between The Sun and its readers should be a two-way street. The paper’s coverage, obviously, is a gateway through which the campus community can stay informed. But the paper is ultimately beholden to its readers, and reader feedback must be one element to guide The Sun’s decision-makers in their overall vision for the paper.

A front-page, above-the-fold story in the Sep. 21 issue of The Sun, “Undergrads May Teach FWS to Reduce Cost,” caused some distress; it turned out to be wrong. When a front-page story is not correct, a comprehensive look is worth the effort. A few factors were at play here, and The Sun has since taken steps to do right by its sources and its readers.

Taken at its face, the story seemed like a real scoop. With a foundering endowment and a call for spending cuts, departments across Cornell are making difficult decisions on a tighter budget; hypothetically, having undergraduates teach First-Year Writing Seminars might help reduce costs. It might also alleviate problems associated with a growing undergraduate population but a declining number of graduate students.