Post editors encourage McDavis to rethink ideology on speaking to publication.
The relationship between the President’s Office under Roderick McDavis’ leadership and The Post has been a historically rocky one. There have been variations over the years, as editors come and go, in McDavis’ willingness to sit down for interviews with Post reporters.
Post reporters face a steep learning curve when they begin covering Cutler Hall, and The Post has committed missteps in its reporting over the years.
But advocating for access, particularly to Cutler Hall, is something Post reporters are plenty familiar with. This year alone, editors of various ranks have met with officials in Cutler, consulted with McDavis’ staff and worked with the university’s media relations team to get information that we — and our readers — find important. We have no reason to believe this will change when The Post is under new leadership in the fall.
This semester, The Post’s sit-down newsgathering interview with McDavis was canceled after The Post published aneditorial that was critical of an op-ed McDavis published the same day, a violation of preconditions McDavis made with The Post’s opinion editor — conditions the rest of the staff was unaware of.
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We urge Cutler Hall to put this in the past and make efforts to regularly meet with The Post in a newsgathering capacity starting as soon as possible.
We also realize that such a working relationship must be predicated on trust — something The Post has sought to build with the President’s Office.
We write frequently about student groups’ access to key decision-makers, and we would like to stress how important such meetings are to us, as well.
We know you have questions for McDavis. So do we.
How does he feel about 31 Coventry Lane? Or Megan Marzec’s time as Student Senate president? About conversations on race that took place this year?
We would love to ask those questions, and we know you would benefit from hearing their answers.
We hope the President’s Office acts on the notion that speaking with The Post is a chance to directly speak to students. That’s a valuable opportunity, and one we continually urge the President’s Office to exercise.
Editorials represent the majority opinion of The Post's executive editors: editor-in-chief Jim Ryan, managing editor Sara Jerde and projects editor Allan Smith. Post editorials are independent of the publication's news coverage.
