This year has been a difficult one for many student organizations on campus, The Daily included.
We’ve offended various groups on campus through cartoons and columns and have had our own internal struggles as well.
I want to take this opportunity to take complete responsibility for what has gone wrong this year. I don’t believe in making excuses, and that is not what I seek to do. Rather, I want to give a few short explanations for why things weren’t up to par this year.
First, I had no idea what I was doing when I took this job. I had seen The Daily run like a well-oiled machine under its previous editor, Meredith Simons, and wasn’t aware of how much oversight and constant hands-on control it took to make what she did happen.
Unfortunately, my biggest problem affected everyone on my staff. We had lost a lot of experienced staff members to graduation and internships last May, and while I had full confidence in my staff, the majority of them were as inexperienced at their new jobs as I was.
I’m not saying this to put the blame on them, however. I should have been harder on them at the beginning. I should have had a more clear-cut and defined vision for how they would perform. I should have known more about management and leadership so I could pass it on to them.
I should have done a lot of things differently and in the past few months, those thoughts have kept me up more nights than I can count. I don’t know if I’ll be able to forgive myself for not living up to the expectations of the OU community. And I don’t expect anyone else to forgive me.
Somehow I’ve still managed to make it out of this school year with my optimism intact. And if there’s one thing I truly believe, it’s that no matter how bad an experience is, you can make it good if you learn from it.
This year’s staff at The Daily, including myself, has definitely learned from every problem we’ve encountered this year. Many of the editors from this fall and spring’s editorial boards are working as editors next year. I have complete confidence they will do an amazing job, and I know a part of that is because of the problems they’ve seen this year.
I know they will be prepared to handle almost any challenge that comes their way, and I know they’ll be more proactive in keeping those problems at bay, leaving more time to focus on how they can best serve the OU community.
I will not ask anyone to excuse me of my failures this year. I simply ask you to not hold it against The Daily in the future, because as I said earlier, I have faith that next year’s staff will live up to the expectations this year’s couldn’t always meet.
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Oklahoma2012 2 years ago
@buzzsaw99 "the MOIST poorly written drivel I've read this month." It seems to me , you calling her a poor editor, is a bit like the kettle calling the pot black.
soonerboomers 2 years ago
easily could have done a better job
brandeis 2 years ago
Dude it's a school newspaper at a low ranked public university. Don't worry so much.
whatsherface 2 years ago
It's about time you took responsibility for how much you've driven this paper into the ground. Of course, you are one small piece of the puzzle, but as the editor-in-chief, it begins with you.
I hope that this apology is a sign for MUCH better things next year.
buzzsaw99 2 years ago
The moist poorly written drivel I've read this month. Poor sentence structure, poor paragraph and thought structure... You were the person responsible for editing the entire rag? Good Lord! I hope you have other talents because writing isn't one of them.
patch 2 years ago
"It seems to me , you calling her a poor editor, is a bit like the kettle calling the pot black."
Would you mind explaining how you decided to put your two commas in the places you did?
A mere typo is not as bad as flagrant punctuation errors.
TheAntiTrevorClark 2 years ago
Aw, shucks, Miss Editor Lady, it wasn't that bad. Don't be so hard on yourself, sillypants.
LauraGibbs 2 years ago
The quality of the writing at the Daily, while generally not very good, has been abysmal this year. In contrast, the writing over at the online ROUTES project at the Journalism School has been much better than at the Daily; I've read some very informative articles at ROUTES over the past couple of months; their articles on immigration contained some good material. http://routes.ou.edu/index.php
Perhaps next year the Daily will do some real investigative journalism and might also find some opinion columnists who have well-informed opinions. I also hope that they will institute some kind of proofreading procedures to eliminate basic writing errors before the paper goes to press. It's hard to teach writing here at OU when the Daily itself is setting such a poor example.
briareus 2 years ago
The quality of the Daily is usually very low, but this year was unbelievable. Shocking. The stupidest thing written by the Editorial Board was a claim that they had decided they were no longer going to print anything that "offended" people. Of course, "offense," like "beauty," is in the eye of the beholder. It takes a combination of remarkably stupidity and vanity to think that you can decide for the entire human race what is "offensive" and what is not. Just shocking, and certainly a very bad reflection on the OU journalism school.
William 2 years ago
Translation:
"I'm sorry...I did not realize that when you oversee a journalistic medium, especially in an educational institution full of a variety of students, people would be offended. I just didn't know. I have done a bad job because I offended some people and that's bad."
So will you be working again next year? I'd really like to read a paper that feels good and never has anything to say should it counteract with anyone's emotions.
Seriously? Trying hard NOT to offend people was the WORST THING YOU DID at this job. Half the reason people griped so much about their hurt feelings was because they knew the Daily is not a newspaper, but an emotional playground where the whims of political correctness are juggled with authority. Your job is not to make any of us feel good. Your job is to convey the ideas of all kinds of people. Your job is to inform us, challenge us, and brings thoughts and news to our attention. Half the information out there is "controversial" or "offensive". I say if someone isn't complaining to you about their feelings you're doing it wrong. Remember that the people complaining to you about how disrespectful that article was are not people concerned with what the article actually has to say. They are concerned with their own comfort, and they are the only people to whom you're apologizing.
dio 2 years ago
You guys seriously need another student newspaper to challenge you.
@IDIOTS
"...too many have immaturely and selfishly used this forum as an emotional outlet."
Do not forget to include yourself.
thegerman41 2 years ago
Jamie- don't be too hard on yourself. yes there were mistakes but everyone is human, people on here make mistakes whether or not they are willing to admit it or not...
eightbitgirl 2 years ago
It's almost over. And I can honestly say that I couldn't have done a better job, so I can't judge at all. Thanks for your hard work.
Lansdallius 2 years ago
I'll admit, this year's paper wasn't the best, but if you guys think you can do better, put up or shut up. Get on the staff for next semester, try to fix it.
IDIOTS 2 years ago
The same people who are saying that Jamie shouldn't worry so much are the same people who have been consistently ripping on her from the very beginning. Is this some indication that you only threw out your criticism for the sake of criticizing? That you didn't actually mean the insults you spewed, but were just looking for an emotional outlet on a public forum? The most embarrassing thing about the Daily this semester hasn't been the content of the newspaper. Not by a longshot. It's been the pathos garbage posted in the online comment section. While some of comments have been legitimately logical responses to the Daily's numerous errors, too many have immaturely and selfishly used this forum as an emotional outlet. Did we really not expect that our words would have meaning? That the acid we spewed would burn? Maybe the University community can use this opportunity to recognize that the Daily is run by students, just like the rest of us, and that everyone is entitled to learning opportunity in a supportive environment. If we can support the Daily, rather than exhausting them with criticism anything but constructive, perhaps a better student paper could emerge from our campus as a result. Jamie is taking accountability of what the Daily has said. It's time we did too--sorry guys.