Why would anyone work for a newspaper? A great question (and one any Sunnie has asked at least once while up late fighting with InDesign) — with its constant challenges and the constant insistence on the death of the journalism industry.
I can offer you my reason: hope.
I’m in a class this semester with Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Molly O’Toole ’09, this year’s Distinguished Visiting Journalist at Cornell (and, I should mention, a former news editor of The Sun), and she asked us what we loved about journalism. My own answer hinged on telling the stories of the people around me, of my classmates and neighbors — it is a public service, this hope.
In our 141 years, this has always been the case. We, as we always have, ask hard questions and work tirelessly to uncover the truth; we interview, research, argue, photograph, design, report and write to highlight the lives of the people here on the Hill. We face the challenges posed and jump in together.
On the horizon of my time on The Sun, I hope you’ll take this as a personal invitation to come start your own.
Whoever you are — a first-year or a senior, an anthropology or a zoology major, a future journalist or someone who’s crossed it off the list — there is a place for you here. Your voice, yes yours, matters.
Our recruitment meetings this fall will be on Sept. 8 and Sept. 9 from 6-7 p.m. in Goldwin Smith Hall G22 and on Zoom. See cornellsun.com/join-the-cornell-daily-sun for more information. Our team of editors will be there to answer your questions, including why they themselves work for this newspaper. We hope to see you — the future of The Sun — there.
Email [email protected] with any other questions, and stay tuned for more information.
— K.S