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She Saw the Light
Over the last year or so, Fort Worth Weekly has printed several excellent stories by college journalists working under the direction of two Pulitzer Prize-winning journalists who also teach — the Weekly’s own Dan Malone and SMU’s Craig Flournoy. The stories highlighted, in one case, the City of Dallas’ culpability in the continued operation of the worst dump in the state of Texas and, in the other, the failure of many Texas colleges to abide by the letter and spirit of campus crime reporting laws (“Insecurity on Campus,” Dec. 3, 2004). The latter effort, part of the Light of Day Project sponsored by the Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas, recently took home an award from the Society of Professional Journalists and has sparked a federal investigation.
One young reporter, Hannah Seddelmeyer from the University of North Texas, recently wrote in the foundation’s newsletter that working on the story “opened my eyes to a new kind of journalism ... that I am definitely interested in pursuing.” She described how it finally dawned on the students how big the story was — that college after college had denied access to public records, failed to tell students the full story of campus crime, and refused to warn folks about “date rape” predators. Seddelmeyer said she learned “that when you reach a wall, it usually means there is something behind it.” Static figures it will have to spend time in purgatory for luring yet another innocent into this grimy profession, but what the hell — go get ’em, Hannah.
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