Editors-in-chief from two prominent 5C news publications, The Claremont Independent (CI) and The Student Life (TSL), discussed student journalism’s role in the contemporary political landscape at Claremont McKenna College’s most recent Open Academy salon last Saturday.
The discussion, titled “The Role of Student Journalism: Informing or Influencing?” took place at CMC’s Kravis Center. The event was part of CMC’s larger Open Academy program, created to help overcome ideological divisions to solve challenging problems, with core commitments to freedom of expression, viewpoint diversity and constructive dialogue.
At Saturday’s salon, attendees debated the role of bias, funding and external influences in campus media and culture. Kendall White PO ’27 — who writes for both publications — moderated the talk, which featured Charlie Hatcher CM ’25, editor-in-chief of the CI and June Hsu PO ’25, editor-in-chief of TSL.
Following White’s brief introduction to the editors and the event, Hatcher and Hsu each delivered their opening statements, detailing the structure, work environment and unique purpose of their respective publications.
Hatcher said that the CI, founded in 1997, is a digitally-based publication that covers issues directly related to the Claremont Colleges. He added that the publication is independently funded, mostly through alumni donations, and focuses its coverage on freedom of speech and administrative overreach.
“Most of our story selection is guided by a shared vision among our staff about how the colleges can be better colleges, and very often that involves defending tradition,” he said. “It is still a misconception to think of the CI as a strictly conservative organization.”
Hatcher added that the CI has staff members falling across the political spectrum and that its editorial board is welcome to publish more liberal opinions; however, he also highlighted the CI’s roots in conservatism.
“Conservatives are often birthed in reaction to other ideologies run wild,” he said. “If you look back at the very first CI issue published in 1997, the front page headlines read ‘Free Thought is Back.’ So even back then, people on campus cherished an old value and saw it as threatened by new developments made.”
Over a century earlier, in 1889 — and just two years after Pomona was established — TSL was founded. It stands as the oldest student newspaper in Southern California.
Hsu said that TSL, published both in print and online, features four sections: News, Arts & Culture, Sports and Opinions. TSL embraces the journalistic practice of “Do No Harm” — famously recorded in the Society of Professional Journalists’ ethics code — as well as other traditional journalistic standards, like AP style.
She added that while some of the student publications at the 5Cs have a specific lens or focus, TSL aims to produce neutral, unbiased coverage of the events and issues most relevant to students.
“I think there is room for absolutely every single one of those papers at the 5Cs,” Hsu said. “I think The Student Life’s position in all of this is that it encompasses all the 5Cs, it’s on that print cycle and we have a very good position between administration and students.”
In the wake of demonstrations such as the Oct. 7, 2024, protest at Carnegie Hall last semester — which resulted in dozens of students being banned from Pomona’s campus — both editors said their papers exercised caution in word choice and shared some policies that they followed in covering the protests.
“We do have a policy of our news writers not participating in protests, which is general newsroom policy,” Hsu said. “It was such an unprecedented time, and it was a learning process with things you wouldn’t even think of, like, ‘what word are we going to use to describe this?’”
Hatcher referenced criticisms of the CI, noting that the entire tone of a story can be changed with a couple of words that might have heavy connotations.
“We felt pretty confident in our word choices,” Hatcher said, adding that one particularly relevant language controversy occurred when writers were discussing whether to call a protest “pro-Palestine” or “anti-Israel.”
“We largely switched to anti-Israel just because we’ve seen the tenor of the protests and we’re going through that process of trying to fit in what we’ve witnessed to these phrases that are imperfect, but we’re doing the best we can,” he said.
TSL and the CI also talked about how they needed to grapple with whether to use students’ names in their pieces, something that they said could put students at risk of retaliation from administration or other students.
“We haven’t named a student in our paper in years because we think that we’re college students, we’re young, we’re publishing digitally, it’s going to be around,” Hatcher said. “There are plenty of things we take issue with on campus and we don’t want that following students around.”
TSL takes a different approach to anonymity. Hsu said that it’s provided on a case-by-case basis, and that each editor-in-chief must ultimately decide whether publishing a piece with anonymous sources will help or harm the community. She added that the publication only allows anonymous sources to provide facts, not opinions.
In response to an attendee’s question about student journalism’s role amid a decline in traditional journalism, Hatcher said that student publications serve an integral role as higher education institutions are “largely in pretty dire straits right now.”
“It’s weird to think of undergraduates as on the frontlines of this particular political fight and its expression in the media,” he said.
Hsu also discussed how social media, another threat to traditional print journalism, enables the spread of misinformation and subsequent distrust in traditional media.
“Social media, especially on platforms where people can claim journalism and people can absorb that content without fact-checking, is super dangerous,” she said. “It’s really interesting to see the lack of trust in the 5Cs, which is exponentially worse in legacy media.”
Event attendee Zachary Iler CM ’ 28 said that he believed student journalism to be a crucial part of college campuses that should be kept alive.
“Despite facing some challenges that are impacting all newspapers across the country, it seems to me that journalism is alive and well at the 5Cs … and serving the role that it should,” Iler said.
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