A special committee appointed by NU’s provost has found “no evidence” that Medill Dean John Lavine fabricated quotes in a column for the Medill alumni magazine.
Provost Daniel Linzer, who’s in charge of university academics, announced the findings Friday to the Medill community via e-mail. The committee comprised three people, who all serve on the Medill Board of Advisors, according to the Medill Web site: Jack Fuller, who once was editor and publisher of the Chicago Tribune; Teresa Norton, who’s on the NU board of trustees and was managing editor of Crain’s Business Insurance; and Paul Sagan, who was once new media editor for Time, Inc.
The three found that although no records of the disputed quote could be found, it was unreasonable to expect Lavine to have kept meticulous notes from the disputed “Letter from the Dean” column that he wrote last year. They also reported that the sentiment of the quote was similar to course evaluations, and that they saw “no evidence to point to any likelihood that the quotes were fabricated.”
In the column, Dean Lavine wrote that the quote came from a Medill junior in an advertising class. Lavine quoted the anonymous student as saying:
I came to Medill because I want to inform people and make things better. Journalism is the best way for me to do that, but I sure felt good about this class. It is one of the best I’ve taken, and I learned many things in it that apply as much to truth telling in journalism as to this campaign to save teenage drivers.
In a Feb. 11 Daily Northwestern column, David Spett said that he contacted all 29 students in the class and that they all denied saying the quote. Medill Professor David Protess recently re-contacted the five Medill juniors who had been in the class, and confirmed that they denied saying the quote.
Spett’s column also pointed out other instances of the dean quoting unnamed people, and soon after, media outlets and faculty members criticized the dean’s use of the anonymous sources; the sources voiced support for the dean’s controversial efforts to bring the marketing and journalism sides of Medill closer. The quotes’ veracity was also questioned.
A student petition seeking further explanation from the dean was started Feb. 20 by Medill students Emmet Sullivan, Aaron Gannon, Tricia Bobeda and Margaret Matray, authors of Journalists Speak, a blog covering the controversy. They said they delievered the petition last week, with 240 signatures, to Lavine, Linzer and President Henry Bienen.
After receiving Linzer’s e-mail, Sullivan said Friday that he hopes the dean can speak more freely about the situation, and journalism ethics in general, now that the provost’s investigation is over. The four students from Journalists Speak will hold a forum to discuss the controversy during Reading Week, on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m. in the McCormick Tribune Center Forum.
Spett said that he was “taken aback” by the provost’s assertion that there is no evidence that the quote was fabricated. The only evidence that the quote was not fabricated is the word of Dean Lavine, he said. No one associated with the review contacted him, he said.
Medill Professor David Protess called the committee’s conclusion that there was no evidence “demonstrably inaccurate.” He cited as evidence Spett’s column and both his and Chicago Tribune columnist Eric Zorn’s re-reporting the denials of the students who could have said the quote for it to be accurate.
“The dean clearly says in his letter that ‘a Medill junior told me.’ There were five Medill juniors in the class, I had multiple exchanges with all of them, on the phone and by e-mail, and all five students vehemently denied communicating their sentiments about the class to the dean,” Protess said.
Protess said he contacted the five students after the provost send the letter, and each of them denied being contacted by the committee appointed by the provost.
“I think this is, frankly, systematic of a larger problem which is on issues of crucial importance to the Medill – to the Northwestern community. Student voices are not being heard, because they’re not being listened to,” he said.
Protess also took issue with the assertion that evidence shows that the quotes reflected the “sentiments” of some of the members of the class.
“Some of the concerns expressed by the Medill community reflect the belief that if simply capturing the mood of unnamed sources is good enough to be used in quotation marks, then our standards as a journalism school have been slipping,” he said.
Protess said he does not allege a fabrication by the Dean.
“I am not saying that I believe the dean fabricated quotes. I am an agnostic on that issue. I don’t know, and we probably will never know because the dean understandably does not have his notes and e-mail messages from a year ago, and on that I agree with the provost’s committee. That’s a pretty tough standard, I don’t know if I could retrieve things that people told me from a year ago,” he said.
“It pains me to see the reputation of the school being damaged and I also have known John Lavine as both a good colleague and friend for more than half of those years and it equally disturbs me to see his reputation tarnished,” he said.
The statement, which was e-mailed out to the Medill community on Friday morning:
To the Medill Community:
As you are doubtless aware, concerns have been raised about certain passages in the “Letter from the Dean” which appeared in the Spring 2007 issue of the Medill Magazine, the school’s alumni publication. In particular, questions were raised about the use of unattributed quotations, with some people going further to question the veracity of those quotations.
The first issue is one of editorial policy, and Dean Lavine in a recent message has pledged that the policy will be changed to require attribution for all quotations in Medill publications. The allegation regarding possible fabrication is, of course, very serious, whatever the type of article or publication. Thus, I appointed an ad hoc committee to review the available information and to advise me regarding these issues.
The committee consisted of three Medill graduates who have had distinguished records of achievement in journalism and the media. The committee included Jack Fuller, a Pulitzer Prize winner who served as editor and publisher of the Chicago Tribune and whose books include the highly-regarded News Values: Ideas for an Information Age; Teresa Norton, a member of the Board of Trustees of Northwestern University and the Medill Board of Advisors, former managing editor of Crain’s Business Insurance magazine, former award-winning partner of Hewitt Associates management consultants, and retired founder of Vineyard 29 Enterprises; and Paul Sagan, co-chair of the Medill Board of Advisors and also a member of the University’s Board of Trustees, who has served as news director of WCBS-TV in New York, co-founder and vice president for news of the New York 1 News cable network, president and editor of new media at Time, Inc., and is currently president and CEO of Akamai Technologies.
The committee unanimously concluded that although a record of the student statements that were quoted cannot be found, sufficient material does exist about the relevant storefront reporting experience and marketing course to demonstrate that sentiments similar to the quotes had been expressed by students. Thus, the committee found that there is ample evidence that the quotes were consistent with sentiment students expressed about the course in course evaluations and no evidence to point to any likelihood that the quotes were fabricated. The committee further stated that the author of a piece like the “Letter from the Dean” could not reasonably be expected to have retained for a year the notes or e-mails documenting the sources of quotations used in the letter; nonetheless, the committee advised that in the future such meticulous archiving might be desirable given the heightened awareness of the problems that can result.
I accept the committee’s conclusions. While I join Dean Lavine in wishing that material demonstrating the sources of the quotations was readily available, I have determined that no violation of University policy has occurred in connection with the Spring 2007 “Letter from the Dean.” I have confidence in Dean Lavine to continue to lead the Medill School of Journalism.
That so many people – including students, faculty, and alumni – expressed views on this matter testifies to their deep commitment to Medill. I hope you will join me in supporting the Medill School and its leadership as it works to ensure that the School’s storied role and distinguished reputation as a leader in journalism education continue as it and the profession face the challenges of the twenty-first century.
Daniel Linzer
Provost