Interviewed during last her few days on the job, the Chronicle’s Emma Pettit talks about the many parallels between the critique of higher education that’s been her beat these past two years and the critique of traditional journalism currently swirling around the education beat.
Her beat this past two years has been what she calls ‘the critique’ of higher education — most often but not exclusively coming from the right. “I try to take those criticisms seriously, and I essentially am asking over and over ‘Why has higher education lost trust with some of the public?’”
Asked about the state of media coverage, Pettit has some criticism of bigger outlets’ higher education coverage. There’s not enough of it. It lacks depth. It over-focuses on elite institutions.
After eight years at the Chronicle, she’s headed off to join audio journalism company called Longview, the folks behind The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling, The Last Invention, and a show called Reflector.
Watch the interview or read the transcript above or on YouTube. Listen to the conversation on Spotify or Apple.
If you’ve read Pettit’s work or seen her on social media — she’s still on Twitter, unlike many other journalists — you may recognize that she’s more willing than most to ask hard questions and avoid knee-jerk coverage.
“I don’t try and start stories deliberately trying to be provocative, but I do think that there are a lot of questions worth asking that sometimes get a little bit less shine,” she says. “And I definitely see my role as trying to ask those questions and trying to explore debates — not just both sides, but all sides.”
Most recently, she’s been recognized by the Education Writers Association awards judges as a finalist for two different stories —one a magazine-style field-reported narrative about the New College of Florida that reminded me a bit of On The Media’s The Harvard Plan podcast, the other a FOIA-based deep dive into the implementation of a controversial law in which general education offerings deemed overly “woke” were culled.
“The journalism I find the most interesting is where I can feel myself seeing and understanding different parts of a debate, even if I exit some story feeling exactly as I did going into it,” she says. “But I also like when I change my mind or when I have my views challenged. I just think that that makes for better journalism in general.”
Asked about the critique of journalism, Pettit urges her colleagues and readers not to ignore it. Don’t ignore your haters. Don’t fall for the conspiracy theory that the critique is entirely manufactured. And don’t shut out those who disagree with you.
“You want to be the place where people come to figure out these arguments and to argue with one another,” says Pettit — opening doors, welcoming conservative critics, and making sure that everyone feels like they have a seat at the table.
Previously from The Grade
How to fix campus protest coverage (Jeremy Bauer-Wolf)
‘Varsity Blues’ scandal reveals troubling blind spot
Calling bullsh**t on college’s contradictory diversification claims (Rick Kahlenberg)
Diversity, innovation, and strength; how to fix coverage of rural higher education (Nick Fouriezos)
Reflections on covering a hazing death at a Florida HBCU (Denise-Marie Ordway)
