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(08/14/19 8:07pm)
This is an opinion article. Any views expressed belong solely to the author and are not representative of The Cluster.
“Live it. Love it. Loft it.”
That’s the slogan for the Lofts, the high-end student apartments across Mercer’s campus. They promise to help you start transitioning from college dorms to living on your own. But are they delivering?
In my experience at Phase I — the property above Margarita’s — the answer was “no.” Rent is $810 per month, not including utility fees or the security deposit. Despite the luxury price, Bear Card systems break and stay broken, the hallways are home to more than their fair share of bugs and — worst of all — the privacy you think you’re getting doesn’t materialize.
On one hand, the Lofts are very safe. You need Bear Card access to enter the building and your apartment. You get a physical key for your bedroom, but not for your unit, which means that scanning your Bear Card is the only way to enter. When the scanner on my door stopped recognizing my card once the summer began, I was locked out.
Lofts management let me in with their key, then sent the Auxiliary Services maintenance team to fix the scanner a while later. The issue was resolved — for a day.
It became a cycle. For weeks, I had to prop my door when I left so I could get back in. Management sent maintenance folks to try and repair the scanner multiple times, but the fix would only last a day or so before giving out again.
When I asked why it happened so often, a community manager for my building told me that I was far from the only resident experiencing this. She told me that Auxiliary Services told her they suspected that the card readers, which had just been installed that year, couldn’t handle the humidity. We live in Middle Georgia. What kind of development doesn’t consider that humidity might be a problem?
Maintenance staff installed a new Bear Card reader and door handle for my apartment. At that point, though, I only had about two weeks left in my lease and had spent most of the summer propping my door open with a flip-flop.
The humidity couldn’t be avoided. The hallways in several Lofts properties aren’t closed in; they’re open breezeways with balconies at either end. When it’s hot out, moths, grasshoppers and roaches become your newest neighbors.
I understand that students don’t choose the Lofts because they want a safe haven from bugs or expect everything to work perfectly all the time. One of the major reasons we look to the Lofts over on-campus options is the privacy.
In the dorms, residence assistants (RAs) conduct room checks. They’ll look around to make sure you don’t have any contraband, but at least you know when they’re coming (sometimes), and they don’t stay long. Not to mention, you get a physical key for most dorms, and the most expensive four-person apartment on campus, in the Gardens, runs you $3,585 per semester.
In the Lofts, it’s a different story. While they aren’t staffed by RAs, the lease states that Lofts management, maintenance and custodial staff can enter your apartment pretty much whenever they want. I can’t tell you how many times I woke up in the morning or came home after work to see them in my apartment working, cleaning or evaluating something. They’re not required to alert you ahead of time, either.
I looked through the lease to see if I could bring up my privacy concerns, and I found some pretty unusual policies.
If you’re inside when they knock at the door, they can come in whether or not you let them. If you’re not home, Lofts folks “may enter peacefully and at reasonable times by duplicate or master key (or by breaking a window or other means when necessary in emergencies)” if it’s for any of the reasons listed.
Some of those reasons make sense; for example, if they’re responding to a maintenance request you made, if you die or if you stole something from them. But others are very vague or shouldn’t warrant unannounced entry, such as “preventing waste of utilities; exercising our contractual lien; leaving notices; delivering, installing, reconnecting or replacing appliances, furniture, equipment or access control devices” and more.
I decided to move to the newest Loft, over by Five Star Stadium, this year. Although the lease is the same, I’m hopeful that the other issues won’t be a problem in the new building. So far, I’ve been nothing but pleased here.
It’s hard to stay mad at the Lofts. The folks who work there are some of the nicest people you’ll ever meet. Every morning without fail, my community manager at Phase I told me to have a great day on my way out the door, and I could always tell that she meant it. Everyone is very helpful, and they seem genuinely happy to help you.
Niceness doesn’t make up for lack of privacy or the sky-high rent, though. So when it comes to college living at Mercer, you’re probably better off finding a place unassociated with Mercer.
Once your three-year campus residence requirement is over, that is. Go Bears!
(08/14/19 7:30pm)
Mahima Sultan is a senior double-majoring in Journalism and Law & Public Policy with a minor in Criminal Justice. She has previously worked with Engage CCJ — the Center for Collaborative Journalism's hyperlocal, online publication — and has interned with The Telegraph newsroom. Last year, she served as Secretary for the Sociology & Criminal Justice Club, and will be serving as Vice President this academic year. This year, she will also be the Lifestyle & Opinion Editor for The Cluster. She plans to attend law school post-graduation and is interested in pursuing immigration or intellectual property law. In the future, Mahima hopes to relocate to the west coast to practice law.
(08/14/19 7:10pm)
Chas Pridgen is a senior majoring in Journalism and Theatre. Outside of The Cluster, he is very involved in the Mercer Players, the theatrical group on campus, as well as in local community theatre. He has recently done work with WMUB and the Center for Collaborative Journalism Newsdesk, as well as The Cluster, and hopes to pursue a career in performing or documentary filmmaking.
(08/14/19 6:56pm)
Students and faculty at Mercer University can ditch their plastic IDs, known as Bear Cards, for a digital version this year — if they have an iPhone or Apple Watch, that is.
A digital student ID can be added to Apple Wallet on the iPhone 6 and later versions or the Apple Watch starting at Series 1. The digital card program began May 20 after just over a year of planning, according to Ken Boyer, associate vice president for Auxiliary Services.
“The opportunity to add mobile credentials came about almost 14 months ago, when Blackboard Transact and Apple began working on this project,” Boyer said in an email Aug. 1. Blackboard Transact is the vendor that supplies card payment software to Mercer and other campuses.
Boyer said the digital cards will make it easier for students to keep track of their IDs, but those who prefer a physical card may hold onto it instead.
“Cardholders still have the option to choose the credential that meets their needs. If they want a card, use a card. If a mobile credential is better for you, use mobile. The choice is yours,” he said. “What I have found is folks may forget their card, but their phone is usually close at hand.”
Students who opt for the mobile option won’t need to worry about losing ID access if their devices’ batteries die, either.
“The new versions of Apple devices, according to Apple, have an additional power source that keeps the (near-field communication) chip powered even when the phone and other data functions quit when the battery dies, for approximately two to three hours,” Boyer said.
The near-field communication (NFC) chip is what allows mobile devices to utilize touch-to- pay services such as Apple Pay. The chip activates within a four-inch range of an NFC-enabled scanner, like those on doors and cash registers across campus, according to Digital Trends. This process is how digital Bear Cards will let users enter buildings, pay for meals and access vending machines.
External businesses that accept Bear Bucks as payment, such as Z Beans Coffee and Buffalo Wild Wings, have already been programmed to accept virtual Bear Cards.
Besides being easier to use, the mobile card will also register at a greater distance from scanners than a physical card, which must come in contact with a scanner.
Additionally, Boyer said going mobile offers Mercer a more environmentally-friendly option at “roughly the same cost” as printing physical cards.
Mobile credentials will also be more secure than plastic cards, in part because they require multi-factor authentication, according to a press release by The National Association of Campus Card Users, of which Boyer served as Board of Directors president in 2018.
Campus Technology reported that digital Bear Cards can be remotely deactivated by Mercer University or by the student themselves if an enabled device is lost or stolen.
Boyer said that Mercer has been working to reduce the need for mag-stripe technology, used in physical credit cards and Bear Cards, for about five years. Because this system infrastructure was already in place, the school was chosen to work with Apple, Blackboard Transact and electronic lock provider Allegion to offer the mobile card option this year.
“Mercer was the seventh school in the world to offer this option,” Boyer said. “We were a prime candidate for Apple to partner with due to the high percentage rate of Apple products used by the Mercer community.”
The mobile Bear Card is currently only available for Apple devices, but Boyer said Auxiliary Services has begun the process to enable access on other platforms as well.
(03/28/19 1:10am)
Nearly three years after he took on the homicide case of 23-year-old Mercer student and basketball player Jibri Bryan, District Attorney David Cooke said he feels justice has finally been served.
“Our number-one goal in this was to get justice for Jibri, his family and the community,” Cooke said.
Bryan, a graduate student in the business school and standout player for the Bears, died Feb. 2, 2016 when he was shot during a drug deal in downtown Macon.
Damion Deray Henderson, 37, was sentenced just over three years later on Feb. 26 to 30 years in prison followed by 10 years on probation for voluntary manslaughter and armed robbery. Jarvis Clinton Miller, 27, received 15 years in prison and five years of parole for armed robbery—a lighter sentence due to cooperation with police, according to Cooke.
In February 2016, Bryan had arranged to meet with Henderson and Miller at the Flash Foods gas station on College and Forysth streets to purchase Xanax. When he arrived, Miller entered Bryan’s vehicle and attempted to sell him fake product for $300.
According to The Telegraph, Bryan likely realized the pills were not authentic and asked for his money back, but Miller pulled a gun to threaten him into buying the fakes. Bryan, however, pulled his own gun. It is unclear who shot first, but Bryan shot Miller in the neck and Miller shot Bryan in the head.
Henderson approached the vehicle, took Bryan’s weapon, fatally shot him and fled with his cash. Police later caught up with Miller, who implicated Henderson.
Although Bryan was a student, Cooke said his sudden death had an impact outside of Mercer.
“This really hit the community hard, not just the Mercer community but the greater Middle Georgia community. I think there was just this shock and dismay that this happened,” he said. “(Bryan) had won a humanitarian award, not that long before. He was known for caring about the community, not just for being a talented basketball player.”
Henderson and Miller first appeared in court for Bryan’s death in June 2018, but it was ruled a mistrial.
“There was a question of whether or not the way something was presented was proper, so out of an abundance of caution, a mistrial was created just to protect Mr. Henderson’s rights,” Cooke said.
According to The Telegraph, Associate District Attorney Sandra Matson said in her opening remarks that Henderson and Miller’s past “involved guns, and it involved dope.”
Franklin Hogue, the Macon lawyer who represented Henderson, objected on the grounds that Matson’s comment unfairly implied criminal history and asked for a mistrial ruling.
While the retrial was scheduled for January 2019, Cooke said Henderson chose instead to negotiate a plea deal. Had the retrial taken place, Henderson could have been convicted of murder and given a life sentence, Cooke said.
The Telegraph reported that the negotiation benefited prosecutors as well; the retrial could have resulted in even lighter charges for Henderson and Miller had the jury decided that Bryan fired his weapon first.
“Anyone who understands the court system knew that this was a good sentence for us, particularly in light of the facts,” Cooke said.
He said Henderson will be eligible for parole after 20 years, but will likely spend all 30 behind bars “because of his previous record.”
“The significance of that is for a life sentence, people typically serve 30 years, so it was very close to the same sentence he would’ve gotten had he been convicted of murder,” he said.
Cooke said that before negotiating the plea deal, his team discussed the offer with Bryan’s family to ensure their support. The Cluster reported in 2016 that according to teammates, Bryan’s family was always his priority, and he was known for taking trips home to Savannah to visit his mother and two-year-old son, Jibri Jr.
“Whenever we had free time [or] a day off — they could give us an hour off — he was going home to see little Jibri,” teammate Jestin Lewis said. “He would say, ‘I’m gonna go see little man.’”
At the time of his death, Bryan was dating a member of Mercer’s dance team, Nia Jordan, and had just three classes left to take to earn a Master’s degree -- a goal he told Jordan he was pursuing in honor of his grandmother.
“Overall, it was a sad and tragic case, but I’m grateful that we were able to get justice for Jibri,” Cooke said.
(03/28/19 12:32am)
The Student Government Association (SGA) heard a proposal for a bylaw amendment March 25 that would require the Public Relations & Elections Committee (PRE) to advertise election qualifications to students outside of the Senate.
Freshman Sen. Harrison Ivins proposed the amendment after only one ticket emerged for 2019-2020 president and vice president, with the only candidates currently serving on SGA. Adam Penland, president, is running for re-election with Michaela Jones, junior senator and academic affairs committee chair, as vice president.
Ivins said the issue arose because SGA did not share information about the March 13 qualifications meeting -- required for potential candidates -- with the student body.
“What we ran into this time is that it wasn’t properly advertised, and people weren’t aware of when they needed to run,” Ivins said. “SGA constitutionally could hold an election without telling anybody about it, which … shouldn’t be possible.”
He said SGA did not make any social media posts, send any emails or give the student body any official notice of this year’s qualifications meeting outside of mentioning it in Senate meetings.
In response, his amendment would solidify the role of PRE in promoting qualifications.
“This amendment is being proposed to require advertising of SGA qualifications so that the student body is aware of when the elections are and how they can sign up,” Ivins said. “This is to avoid some of the conflicts that we’ve run into in the past, especially in this year’s SGA presidential elections, to make sure that future students are aware of when they need to sign up.”
Under Ivins’ amendment, PRE would begin advertising qualifications as early as two weeks in advance from at least two SGA social media accounts.
Senior Sen. Hayes Rule said that while he was not opposed to the amendment, he felt the response from SGA was too immediate.
“There’s not a whole lot of negatives to it, but at the same time, I think by doing this, it sets a little bit of a precedent of reacting to things and having to change our Constitution immediately after something happens, which I think in this case, it’s a little bit of an anomaly,” Rule said. “I’d like to try to keep the Constitution as interpretable as possible and not try to have a bunch of weird, strict rules.”
Ivins said that the amendment was a reaction, but a necessary one.
“It was in a way a reaction to what was going on, because it’s a reach-out to the student body because there are a lot of students who are upset about the situation,” he said. “This is us showing them that we don’t want this to happen again and we’re going to make sure that it doesn’t.”
Senior Sen. Jabril Edmondson motioned to table a vote on the amendment to allow more time to consider it. There were no objections.
The amendment will be back on the docket Monday.
In his report, Penland said that elections for student of the year and teacher of the year will take place March 26 and 27.
He said SGA will host the qualifications meeting for class senators and senators-at-large April 3, and those elections will be held April 9 and 10.
(03/28/19 12:04am)
Mercer Police have responded to three car break-ins, two instances of harassing communications and other crimes, such as theft by taking and fraud, across campus in March 2019.
Harassing communications
Chief of Police Gary Collins responded to a report March 5 that the complainant had received 19 emails from a stranger, Stephen Thomas Hatez, over a 24-hour period.
The police record provided to The Cluster said that Hatez, 34, had also sent harassing communications to Mercer’s campus in late 2018. He is now prohibited from contacting or visiting the school.
“Mr. Hatez acknowledged receiving a letter from Mercer Police Department (to) Cease and Desist contacting Mercer University and (stop) coming to any property owned by Mercer University,” the report said.
The complainant Hatez is accused of contacting is not a student, but identifying information was redacted from the report.
The report said a warrant has been issued for Hatez’s arrest.
Another instance of harassing communications was reported on March 15 in the Connell Student Center.
Responding Officer Charlie Platt wrote that the complainant, who was not a student, reported receiving harassing phone calls from Martin Jerome Walker, 28.
The report said the complainant did not know Walker previously. No other information was provided.
Fraud
Mercer Police responded to a report March 5 that a student had received a fraudulent check while selling items online.
The student was selling unidentified items on Craigslist and was contacted by a purchaser, Kameron Andrews. The student said he received a check from Andrews that was issued in a different name.
“Once a price was set, Andrews sent a cashier’s check that appears to be fraudulent with $1500 over the amount,” according to a police report by Platt.
The check sent to the student was in the name of Kevin Thomas -- not Andrews.
Platt reported that Mercer Police contacted Thomas and “had his local bank look at the check to confirm that it was fraudulent.”
Theft by taking, entering auto
A student reported March 1 that $170 worth of their clothing had been stolen from within Legacy Hall.
Police also responded to three car break-ins across campus affecting students’ vehicles.
(03/18/19 6:31pm)
Updates to Tarver Library
The Student Government Association (SGA) announced in an open meeting March 11 that construction is underway in Tarver Library to provide more 24-hour study space for students.
Junior Senator Michaela Jones, chair of the SGA academic affairs committee, said the library plans to finish turning the entire first floor into a 24-hour area by the end of the semester.
“They’re working on getting more tables and chairs and whiteboards down there” as well as portable power cords and additional dry-erase markers, Jones said. “The plan is to have this done by finals of this semester, so hopefully that space will be available to everyone late April.”
She said that replacing the tables and chairs in the study rooms has long been in the works, but that high costs have proven to be an obstacle. Now that the semester is approaching its end, the library can access leftover funds from their yearly budget to put towards renovations.
Jones said the library is also working to ensure students’ safety when using the 24-hour space. She said there will be a gate that pulls down and locks to block off the stairs when the library closes. Six new security cameras will also be installed.
Another update coming to Tarver involves printing services, Jones said.
“Instead of the kiosk thing we have now, they’re going do something called proximity printing. Basically, they’ll have printers around the library, and based on where your computer is, a certain printer will be assigned to that location,” she said.
While the library has responded to these student requests, Jones said the University is not yet open to making printing free because costs would have to be covered through a technology fee added to tuition. Since not all students utilize the printers, Mercer is unwilling to charge all students for access, Jones said.
New student organization approved to work with local school for children with learning disabilities
SGA recognized a new club on campus geared towards local students with developmental disabilities.
“They are The Buddy Bunch, they are a service organization dedicated to serving people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, which I think is an area that … our students will be passionate about,” said Junior Class President Emily Harvey, student life and organizational affairs chair.
Freshman Aniya Watts, founder and president, said The Buddy Bunch will volunteer at Woodfield Academy, the only school in Macon catered specifically to children with learning disabilities. Woodfield serves about 80 students, according to Watts.
“One in 10 students in Bibb County has special needs, and that’s not including students in private school systems,” Watts said. “Bibb County already experiences a big lack of funding, so that in turn only hits special education programs way harder.”
The club aims to volunteer biweekly to foster meaningful relationships with students, offer homework help and tutoring, plan and fundraise for programs such as Special Olympics and raise awareness about Woodfield.
Watts said that to make sure club members can provide informed help, The Buddy Bunch has formed a relationship with another student organization, Mercer Educators in Action (MEIA).
She said many MEIA members major in holistic child, a program that trains teachers to accommodate both general and special education students and working with the new club would allow them to apply those skills.
SGA approved The Buddy Bunch unanimously.
Two funding requests approved to support W.O.M.E.N. initiation ceremony
Women of Minorities Empowering the Neighborhood (W.O.M.E.N), a new club on Mercer’s campus aimed at providing mentorship to minority girls in Bibb County schools, was granted both seed money and special funding to purchase materials for a member initiation ceremony. The requests amounted to $250 and $800, respectively.
The induction will honor over 100 members, said Freshman Sen. Sheridan King, W.O.M.E.N. co-founder.
This is the first seed money fund SGA has awarded. A bylaw allowing for the establishment of a seed money budget to help new organizations get off the ground passed in the Senate Feb. 25 after Fiscal Affairs Committee Chair Harrison Ivins, a freshman senator, proposed the amendment.
SGA will reconvene March 18 on the second floor of the Connell Student Center and stream the meeting live on their Facebook page.
(03/14/19 9:45pm)
Mercer University is still under investigation by the Department of Education under its Office of Civil Rights (OCR) in Atlanta for an alleged act of discrimination on the basis of age.
A student on Mercer’s Atlanta campus filed a report Jan. 10, 2017 that said a professor refused to give her an extension on a final paper, despite handbook guidelines that allowed him to do so, for discriminatory reasons.
According to a report provided to The Cluster by OCR Attorney Kokayi Issa, the investigation began May 2018.
“The Complainant alleges that the University discriminated against her on the bases of race, disability, sex and age, and retaliated against her,” the report said.
The student said a professor gave her a failing grade and said in her complaint that the professor failed her rather than extended her deadline “in retaliation.”
The report did not specify what the University is accused of retaliating against.
Kyle Sears, director of media relations at Mercer University, confirmed in an emailed statement that the investigation is ongoing.
“The investigation began with a discrimination complaint filed by a former graduate student on the Atlanta campus,” Sears said. “The University has provided a written response to OCR indicating that there is no evidence to support the student’s complaint.”
OCR is a subagency of the Department of Education that holds schools accountable for abiding by civil rights laws that prohibit discrimination based on race, sex, ability, age and other factors.
OCR’s role in the investigation is to determine whether the university retaliated and discriminated against the student based on race, disability, sex and age, as well as whether the professor failed her by refusing to accept the final grade.
(03/12/19 2:44am)
The day after a Macon man fired six shots at a group of students and a recent graduate walking in Mercer Village in January 2018, University President Bill Underwood said that the school would increase its security measures.
Underwood said in a statement following the shooting that “for the foreseeable future, and certainly until we understand more about the incident last night, you will see additional security visibly present during evening hours in the Mercer Village area.”
Mercer Police and members of the school administration told The Cluster in February 2019 that strengthening surveillance in Mercer Village was their first major improvement area.
Senior Communications Director Larry Brumley said that Mercer hired three private security guards to patrol the area where the campus borders I-75. Within weeks, Underwood decided to make the security installation permanent.
“The campus safety consultants that the University brought in after the January 2018 Mercer Village incident recommended that we make permanent the use of private security guards to supplement the work of Mercer Police officers,” Brumley said. “They are specifically tasked with monitoring key entry points to campus.”
In addition to the physical security presence, Brumley said Mercer Police also have more vision of the area thanks to the addition of new and upgraded surveillance cameras.
He said three new cameras were added and another six upgraded to newer models. In total, he said there are more than 600 security cameras on the Macon campus.
“Some of the cameras are monitored live by Mercer Police dispatchers,” Brumley said. “All of them record video that is saved on computer servers so that video can be reviewed later as needed.”
Another security issue students raised last year involved the emergency text alert system. Mercer Police can use the system to send a text message alert to all students, faculty and parents who opt in to let them know of any emergency putting the campus at risk.
In January 2018, nearly an hour passed before students received text alerts warning them of the shooting. Josh Collison lives in Greek housing behind Mercer Village, and he said the incident showed that Mercer needed to work to improve communication on campus.
“The issue isn’t the fact that they need more surveillance, it is the problem of response times and the lack of communication with students,” Collison said.
Collison, a sophomore history major, said he wasn’t informed about most of the new security measures that have been implemented until a Cluster reporter approached him for this story. He said he doesn’t think the changes go far enough.
“Quite honestly, it doesn’t make me feel any safer,” he said.
When Mercer began increasing security on campus, resolving issues with response times was a priority, according to Chief of Police Gary Collins. He said the text-alert process is now streamlined and should take just a few minutes.
“Previously the alert system had to go through levels of supervisors before being sent,” Collins said. “An officer responding to a situation that threatens our students (now) only has to alert his supervisor.”
Collins said one of the additional changes involved an upgrade to Mercer Police’s radio system. Officers can now communicate with one another more efficiently, but Collins said that the major benefit is quicker contact with the Bibb County Sheriff’s Office in case of a serious crime.
“The previous radio system did not allow for radio communication with Bibb County. This is a new process,” Collins said. “We would want Bibb County’s support on a situation such as the shooting in Mercer Village in January of 2018.”
Additional security measures include increased lighting and new signs notifying pedestrians of video surveillance in Mercer Village as well as an external evaluation of Mercer Police staff, which Collins said confirmed is appropriately staffed for a campus of its size.
He said improvements were also made following students’ suggestions during the annual Fall Safety Walk, such as the installation of peepholes to external doors in the Garden Apartments.
Collins said in a previous Cluster article that the main focus of the safety walk is to check the emergency lights around campus that can alert Mercer Police. Students have the opportunity to take part in the walk and show the administration any other concerns they may have.
Brumley said there may be a good reason as to why students don’t always see the extent of campus security: potential criminals aren’t aware, either, and are less likely to evade detection.
“Sometimes, the private security guards are visible, and sometimes they are strategically positioned where they are not as visible, so as to effectively monitor activity around campus,” he said. “Just because students don’t see a security guard standing on the sidewalk does not mean that they’re not in the vicinity monitoring activity. Most of the time they are visible, but sometimes they move to other vantage points that are not as evident.”
(03/02/19 4:15pm)
Mercer Police have responded to 16 crimes on Mercer’s campus so far in 2019, according to reports provided to The Cluster on Feb. 25. Car break-ins constituted the majority of crimes.
Entering auto: Adams St.
The first car break-in of 2019 occurred in the Adams St. parking lot Jan. 11.
“I was flagged down by (the student) concerning a purse found under a vehicle. The purse’s contents appeared to have been emptied onto the pavement. There were various articles of clothing with hangers strown (sic) around different vehicles on the same row,” according to the police report by Officer Michael Kondorf.
The report said another vehicle in the lot had been left unlocked and also rummaged through, although nothing was taken.
“At the police station, I reviewed video of the Adams St. parking lot, but the camera did not cover the area where the vehicle was parked,” Kondorf wrote in the report.
Entering auto and license plate theft: Legacy Hall
Two of the break-ins occurred in the parking lot behind Legacy Hall. Reporting Officer Charlie Platt responded to a case Feb. 13 and reported that a student had left their car locked overnight and returned to find a pair of sunglasses and $5 in coins missing.
Officer Matt McCranie responded to another case in the Legacy lot that afternoon. A student “stopped by the Mercer Police office to report an entering auto” and said $9 had been stolen, but while the report also indicated 35 “other” objects had been stolen, no further details were provided.
A student called the Mercer Police office Jan. 4 to report the license plate had been stolen off their car while parked in the Legacy Hall lot, according to another report by Platt.
Entering auto: Campus apartments
Platt wrote in a Feb. 12 report that he responded to a break-in behind the Lofts at Mercer Village that had occurred overnight, but the report did not specify whether or not the car belonged to a student. Eighty dollars, a credit card and cologne were reported as stolen from the vehicle.
Platt responded to another break-in Feb. 21 to a call from a student who had parked his car
near the Garden Apartments over the weekend.
“He noticed that someone had entered his auto on the passenger side and damaged the passenger door handle and also the backseat wiring cover. No items were taken from the vehicle,” Platt wrote in the report.
Another student’s car was broken into near on-campus apartments on Jan. 18, but Responding Officer Wesley Hillard did not specify which building in the report provided to The Cluster.
Entering auto: Connell Student Center
Responding Officer Randy Wilkes wrote in a Feb. 12 report that he was waved down in the Connell Student Center parking lot by the complainant who said their car had been broken into. The report indicated the victim was not a student, but no further details were provided.
Entering auto: University Center
A student reported a car break-in and the theft of a pair of headphones valued at $110, according to a report by Officer Wilkes Jan. 10. The report said that the student’s vehicle had been “unsecured.”
Entering auto: Mercer Law School
Officer Sandra Bryant reported Feb. 15 that she observed a car had been broken into. The car did not belong to a student, according to the report.
“While patrolling at the law school, I ... noticed the driver side door not properly (closed),” Bryant wrote in the report. The report indicated 200 “other” objects stolen, but no further information was provided.
Entering auto: Businesses on Mercer University Drive
A vehicle belonging to Budget Auto Rental was broken into while parked outside the Hilton Garden Inn on Mercer’s campus Jan. 17, according to a report by Platt.
“The driver door window was shattered and the center console was entered,” the report said. “There was nothing in the vehicle missing.”
Officer Tim Trevillion responded to an entering auto call from the TownePlace Suites Marriott Hotel across from campus Feb. 10.
The passenger side window was broken, and “one small black canvas bag containing receipts, checkbook and (miscellaneous) papers valued at $50 had been taken,” according to the report.
The car did not belong to a student, but the report did not indicate who it belonged to.
Theft by taking
A student reported to Officer Gus Moore Jan. 11 that someone had stolen $150 cash from their backpack while they were playing an intramural game in the University Center courts.
Another student said Jan. 12 that $60 cash, a $50 Visa gift card, a Synovus credit card and
their social security card had been stolen from them in Hawkins Arena, along with 3 rings
and a watch totaling $500 in value and clothing amounting to $300, according to a report
by Wilkes.
Mercer Police also responded to a case of credit card fraud on campus Feb. 6 involving $2,150 and a case of sexual battery in one of the Lofts Feb. 11, both affecting students. No further information was provided for either incident.
(03/02/19 4:10pm)
Mercer University’s Student Government Association (SGA) voted Feb. 25 to adopt an amendment to their Constitution that would set up a seed money fund for new campus organizations recognized during the spring semesters, once the regular SGA funding they could normally access has run out.
Harrison Ivins, freshman senator and fiscal affairs committee chair, proposed the update to Title 3, Article 3 of the Constitution.
“Ultimately, this is mainly just to introduce the leaders of new organizations to the funding process so they understand it straight up out of the gate,” Ivins said.
He said that since new organizations are not eligible to request other types of funding from SGA -- special funds or conference and lodging funds -- they sometimes must postpone club operations until the Bear Grant budget is replenished, which often means waiting until the next semester.
Seed money will enable new organizations to establish themselves on campus as soon as they are recognized, he said.
SGA President Adam Penland, former fiscal affairs committee chair, said the original bylaws made it difficult for emerging clubs to get off the ground. He said Ivins’ amendment would streamline the process.
“For the two new organizations we just approved today, they would have to wait to receive any kind of funding until the fall because we cut off Bear Grants … and they couldn’t do special funding or conference and lodging,” he said. “It’s just so new organizations could basically get a little bit of Bear Grant funding any time of the year.”
The amendment limits seed funding per club to $250, an amount Ivins said would not be a devastating loss to the club or the fiscal affairs committee should the club mismanage it, but is sufficient to help them become active and learn to work with SGA.
Senators approved the amendment unanimously.
Prior to reviewing the bylaws, SGA formally recognized two new student organizations -- Hack MU and Off the Hook -- which Ivins said demonstrated the need for new funding legislation.
“One of the two organizations we have tonight is Hack MU, which is a very unique and I think exciting organization to bring to our campus,” said Junior Senator Emily Harvey, chair of the Student Life and Organizational Affairs Committee.
Hack MU representative Nolan Donley said the club will bring students interested in programming, design and computer science together to compete in Hack-a-Thons, weekend-long “hacking marathons” that task collegiate teams with solving real-world problems through technology.
He said Hack MU would fit a need that Mercer’s existing computer engineering club, the Cyber Defense Team, doesn’t cover.
“That is more of a learning, cyber defense-only team, where we are more specific to Hack-a-Thons and growing the computer science community here at Mercer,” Donley said.
Donley, a computer science and computer engineering double-major, said Hack MU will teach basic skills to members with less experience to prepare them for Hack-a-Thon competitions. He said all Mercer students will be eligible for membership in the organization, regardless of major or level of familiarity with programming.
The other new organization, Off the Hook, is a more conventional service club on Mercer’s campus. It’s a “fiber arts enthusiast club” led by President Sarah Tuttle, a double major in biology and women’s and gender studies.
Tuttle said the organization will bring students together over interest in knitting, crocheting and weaving for the good of the Macon community.
“It’s primarily a service and education-based group, so we make items for donation places,” she said. “We would go into hospitals, nursing homes maybe, and try to teach some people how to knit and crochet because that can be very, very therapeutic for people.”
The club will meet weekly to learn fiber art techniques and hold service projects monthly, Tuttle said.
Two other student groups received funding from SGA to provide networking opportunities for their members. The National Society of Black Engineers was awarded money for participation in a national convention in Michigan, while the Sociology and Criminal Justice Club received money to travel to an annual meeting of regional college chapters.
SGA will hold their next open meeting March 11 at 6:30 p.m. on the second floor of the Connell Student Center.
Looking ahead: The SGA 2019-2020 elections process
President & Vice President
Qualifications Meeting: March 13
Elections: March 26-27
Results announced March 27
Class Senators & Senators-at-Large
Qualifications Meeting: April 3
Elections: April 9-10
Results announced April 10
(02/28/19 7:12pm)
The Office of Student Affairs at Mercer University distributed a survey to the student body to gauge perspectives on the school’s Campus Life programs, athletic events and campus culture for the month of February.
Vice President and Dean of Students Doug Pearson, who oversees the Office of Student Affairs, said his division releases such a survey every two years.
“This information is critical in evaluating just how well we are providing student services,” Pearson said in an email to The Cluster on Feb. 20. “But it also tells how our students spend their time and what we can do to improve safety and the campus culture. So this survey is important, and I encourage every student to fill it out.”
Pearson said the data gathered through student responses will inspire change on campus.
“My staff and I will dig into this data this summer, and from that we will create an action plan to improve our programs and services over the next two years,” he said.
The questions range from whether students feel Mercer programs have supported them in leadership development, how satisfied students are with events offered around campus and whether students feel supported at school.
Questions also asked students to rate their experiences with Minority Affairs, Housing and Residence Life and ACCESS and Accommodations.
A category of questions about mental health asks whether respondents had, or knew a peer who had, thoughts of self-injury or suicide. It also asks them to measure their familiarity with Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS) and rate their perceptions of staff as well as indicate how long they had waited for their first appointment.
Other questions in the survey ask whether “the Mercer campus is supportive of diversity and inclusion (related to) gender, cultural and racial diversity” and whether respondents have experienced or observed a racist or culturally insensitive act on campus.
The survey’s emphasis on students’ personal experiences with sensitive issues resonated with members of Mercer’s LGBT advocacy organization Common Ground.
Secretary Faith McColl posted in the club’s Facebook group to say that President McPherson Newell encouraged members to take the survey.
“It took (five to) 10 minutes, and they had some important questions about whether you’ve experienced or witnessed a racist act on campus (and) whether you feel that campus is safe for gender, sexuality, religious and racial minorities,” McColl said.
Pearson said the data gathered in the survey will be collected and analyzed by his staff over the summer. The Cluster requested to receive the data once compiled for follow-up reporting.
“I can not think of a reason why we wouldn’t share it eventually, but am not sure I want to share it before my staff has thoroughly reviewed and digested the data,” Pearson said.
(02/13/19 1:43am)
Various student groups have planned events throughout February to honor Black History Month and support black students on Mercer University’s campus.
QuadWorks, the student programming board at Mercer, hosted a Black History Month panel Feb. 7. Student speakers discussed “topics surrounding various aspects of African-American culture, colorism, internal and external oppression and political efficacy within the black community,” according to an email to The Cluster from QuadWorks.
The speakers addressed their experiences as black students at a predominantly white institution (PWI). Mercer has an African-American population of just under 30 percent and a white population of 48 percent, according to enrollment data.
Ladan Mowlid, a Somali-Ethiopian graduate student from Canada, said on the panel that PWIs don’t provide the support black students need to handle potential racism from white peers.
As one of just a handful of black students in her program, Mowlid said that a white student made a “joke” about lynching her last semester, telling her, “be careful before you get lynched.”
She said that because she is often stereotyped as an “angry black woman,” she felt the need to be very careful with her response to racism.
“These are the kind of moments where I feel like I have to stop and say, ‘okay girl, you’re in school, you’re a grad student. You need to tone it down, but also check them, but also not code-switch,’” she said. “I feel like at PWIs, they don’t prepare you for that.”
In this context, code-switching refers to a conscious change from “African-American vernacular to a ‘white voice,’” according to an article by The Guardian.
The article said some black people have found that adopting a “white” tone of voice grants them more freedom from certain stereotypes -- at the cost of sacrificing racial-ethnic identity.
Donald Williams, a junior business and economics double-major, said code-switching can be key to survival for black people in predominantly white spaces.
“Code-switching is definitely something that we do without thinking about it,” he said. “It’s a natural thing that we do to adapt, to survive, you know, to make sure that we are getting what we deserve.”
Williams said that despite the challenges, he has been thankful for the support of Minority Mentors, a program that matches incoming freshmen of color with older minority students to help them transition to college.
“I didn’t feel alone because I had Minority Mentors,” he said. “There’s a lot of help and love here, and I do think that is being cultivated. Of course, things can improve, but overall, I think we are a community where we can love and improve upon and trust each other.”
Shola Ogunde, a junior studying Christianity, said on the panel that he’s struggled with the common perception that black males attend college for athletics rather than academics, but that his religious faith helps him stay positive.
“You know, at the end of the day I know I’m the son of the most high God,” Ogunde said. “What people say to me or whatever oppression they do, you know, I don’t let it get to me because I know everything works together for the good of those who love God.”
Panelist Georgina Ajorgbor said she focuses on her future to avoid internalizing the layers of oppression she’s experienced as a Nigerian growing up in England and studying in the U.S.
“The way I don’t internalize oppression like that, faced on a day-to-day basis or whenever I face it, is just, ‘this little thing that someone has said to me or this way that a person has acted toward me for whichever reason is not going to affect me two days from now, three days from now, next week, next year,’” Ajorgbor said. “If it’s not going to affect me in the long run, I’m not going to pay it any type of attention.”
(02/12/19 1:01am)
A 2019 report from the Princeton Review named Mercer the 11th-most politically conservative college in the United States. The data was based on students’ responses when asked to rate themselves “far-left, Democrat, non-partisan, Republican or far-right.”
The ranking makes Mercer the most conservative school in the state and one of only two Georgia schools on the list. The other, Berry College in Rome, placed No. 20.
Vice President of Young Democrats Ana Muntean said she wasn’t surprised by Mercer’s rank.
“The majority of students who go to Mercer do identify as conservative from what I’ve observed,” she said. “Most of the liberals that we do have on campus aren’t even close to being radical liberals. They’re liberal centrists, but people on the right on campus are so reactionary that they mistake the mild progressivism of centrists, such as supporting LGBT rights, as radical views.”
Muntean, a junior, said the campus political climate has been “divisive” throughout her years as a student.
“There are many instances I’ve observed during my time at Mercer which lead me to believe that many people are on polar opposites, which tends to cause tension on campus,” she said.
Muntean said she first realized the political tension during her freshman year when she saw students chalk phrases such as “Build the Wall” across campus leading up to the 2016 elections. She said some in the Mercer community felt targeted and hurt by these messages.
However, she said the greatest example of political division occurred during Founders’ Day 2018, when some students felt marginalized by the selection of Trump attorney Jay Sekulow as the speaker.
Muntean helped organize a symbolic protest against Sekulow as a part of student group Fighting for Our Rights and Gender Equality (FORGE). She said the administration’s choice of speaker and response to community concerns indicated that Mercer’s overarching conservatism extends beyond the student body.
“Clubs on campus were allowed to have a form of silent protest in response to the divisive speaker, but we were very limited in what we could do, and I feel that limitations such as those imposed upon us during that protest are too common with typically liberal-leaning clubs,” Muntean said.
While Muntean agreed with The Princeton Review’s ranking, John Longshore, president of the university’s chapter of College Republicans, questioned it.
He said there might be “a slight tilt to the liberal people” over conservatives at Mercer, but that the school overall has a more neutral -- and muted -- political climate.
“In terms of the tone of politics on campus, I think even though there are liberals and there are conservatives, it’s not loud,” he said.
Longshore said that some colleges attract students who generally hold the same political convictions, which can create a politically engaged, but unnecessarily polarized, environment that Mercer doesn’t have. He cited The University of California-Berkeley, where overwhelming campus outrage over conservative commentator Ann Coulter’s invitation to speak at the school caused some right-leaning students to feel shamed for their views.
At Mercer, he said it’s a different story.
“As a conservative, and then as a conservative who’s in the political science department, I definitely haven’t been discriminated against,” Longshore said.
He said that both students and faculty appreciate diverse ideas, especially in his political science classes.
“I’ve found that the professors are liberal, but they’re not far, far left, and in addition to that, they definitely value a lot more intellectual conversations,” he said. “It seems like they would almost value a smart conservative person over a dumb liberal person.”
Will Jordan, associate professor of political science and faculty sponsor of Mercer’s chapter of College Republicans, said it’s hard to tell whether students really lean more one way or the other because the majority of students aren’t engaged in politics -- although he said that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
“It might be the case that students at Mercer are a little less politically energized,” he said. “I think that probably our political climate is a little less heated than it is lots of places across the country.”
Jordan said one reason Mercerians may be less motivated by politics is because the school enrolls a number of academic high-achievers, especially first-generation college students, for whom classes are the priority and extracurricular or political involvement could seem less important.
“Our students are pretty pragmatic,” Jordan said. “That might explain it a little bit, I don’t know. I think partly it’s probably location, too.”
He said that because Mercer is located in a majority-Republican state, conservative students may have felt more comfortable identifying themselves that way in the surveys used to rank campus political climates.
The self-reporting method of data collection may have led to skewed results, he said, since students at more politically-involved schools don’t always feel empowered to label themselves one way or another.
“I’m kind of surprised that we’re that high (on the list), because I do think we’re a pretty diverse place,” Jordan said. “I don’t think Mercer is a place where conservative is the dominant voice on campus, among students or faculty … I kind of doubt that there are very many students on campus who feel, either left or right, too constrained.”
(01/30/19 2:15am)
Wells Fargo, the bank that provides optional financial services to Mercer students through a partnership bringing the university nearly $40,000 each year, may charge students higher fees than other banks with similar college programs. The information was released in a report by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) in late 2018.
U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) sent the details of the report in a letter to 31 college presidents involved in such programs, including Mercer President Bill Underwood, on Jan. 15.
She asked that the presidents refer to the report “as your institution considers future agreements with banks to provide services to your students.”
In the current agreement between Mercer and the bank, students can link their Bear Card with a Wells Fargo checking account and are allowed to waive the $10 monthly service fee that usually applies. Between July 2017 and June 2018, there were 425 students with linked accounts, according to Auxiliary Services.
Warren’s letter stated that the report revealed Wells Fargo charged students an average of $46.99 annually, while the largest provider of student accounts in the U.S., BankMobile, charged just $12.12.
The 425 Mercer students in the program paid an average of $50.44 in fees to Wells Fargo between June 2017 and July 2018, according to Auxiliary Services -- exceeding the average amount that students paid Wells Fargo nationally.
Director of Media Relations Kyle Sears confirmed Jan. 21 that Underwood received Warren’s letter. In a later statement on Jan. 29, he said the University would need to evaluate the situation further.
Sears said that “this is going to take some more looking into.” Further information was not available at press time.
Students who link their Bear Cards to Wells Fargo accounts have 45 days to waive the monthly fee that would otherwise apply, according to the checking account disclosure available online through Auxiliary Services. However, the bank warns that it “charges 14 other types of fees” in the disclosure.
Wells Fargo “may provide financial support to Mercer University for services associated with the Mercer Bear Card,” according to the disclosure form.
Auxiliary Services reported that Mercer received a total of $39,608 from Wells Fargo as a result of the partnership between 2017 and 2018, with the bulk ($30,000) in royalties and the remainder in “operational support” and marketing ($2,608 and $7,000 respectively).
Warren Spokesperson Ashley Woolheater said in an email to The Cluster that while it wasn’t unusual for involvement in these programs to result in fees, students at schools that partnered with Wells Fargo paid more than their fair share.
“Fees charged to college students by Wells Fargo for debit cards and other financial products were more than three times higher than the average charged by other financial institutions and the highest of the banks examined,” Woolheater said.
Ken Boyer, associate vice president of Auxiliary Services, said Warren’s letter doesn’t tell the whole the story.
He told The Cluster that because banks’ college programs differ in what they provide, there were limits to how accurate comparisons between them could be.
“We believe there are relevant differences in the range of services provided by reporting financial institutions, as well as variation in data submission methodologies, which can make program comparisons challenging,” he said.
Boyer said no Mercer student has ever been obligated to create an account with Wells Fargo or any bank.
“Our banking relationship began back in 1997 with Wachovia Bank, which was later acquired by Wells Fargo. Twenty plus years ago, students and campuses were looking for options to manage their money and help pay for everyday expenses without the need for carrying cash,” Boyer said. “I again must stress Wells Fargo accounts are optional and are in no way required.”
(12/01/18 3:24am)
Breaking Barriers is a series that will attempt to shed light on the process, ethics and intentions of the journalism industry with special attention to the issues that exist within the field today as a way to help make journalism more transparent to consumers.
Most people know that journalism is changing. The way it’s delivered has jumped from the printed page to the computer screen and to iPhone apps from there. But even in the online sphere, our preferred methods are changing; we prefer videos to the written word and interactive data to longform pieces. It makes sense that the way news is curated is changing too.
Media historian David Copeland is a communications professor and director of the Interactive Media graduate program at Elon University. He said news-gathering processes have developed as technology has evolved, and the intentions of reporting have changed.
“When newspapers became a regular feature of American society in the 1700s, the idea of reporters did not exist,” he said. “News was gathered from a variety of sources: government documents, letters sent from one person to another that contained useful information, shipping manifests and the like.”
Citizens could submit information to the printers, he said, who then decided what to run. They often prioritized information they were paid to publish, especially in the cold months when not as many people traveled and brought news from place to place.
News values were different then, too. Timeliness, a major news value today, didn’t exist in the same way for much of American journalism history.
“If you look at colonial papers, you might think that the news was old, stale and not relevant to the audience,” Copeland said. “There may be a little truth to that, but the curation process did not depend upon information moving at the speed of light or digitally. Information moved as quickly as humans could move, meaning by ship or by horse or by carrier pigeon sometimes.”
As the 1800s emerged, the idea of reporters finding out information for a newspaper to print began to develop. Copeland said that during the penny press era, “people would tend to subscribe to and read the papers with the most news that was of value to them. That, of course, created rivalries among papers for which could have the best, most and even quickest news.”
As the timeliness news value became important for papers that wanted to stay competitive, their curation methods had to change again, too.
Civil War reporters began traveling with telegraphers who could send stories back to the paper at home. Wire services, collectives of reporters who find and give stories to newspapers that pay to be a part of an association, grew out of that need for speed and became a major tool that news organizations still use today.
The Associated Press (AP) is a prominent wire service that contributes articles to publications from The New York Times, which has an entire section on its website dedicated to the AP’s stories, to The Telegraph here in Macon.
1967 marked another shift in news-gathering. The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) of that year granted the public the right to request access to any federal agency’s records and required agencies to disclose most information requested under FOIA within three business days, unless it was a matter of personal privacy, national security or law enforcement, according to the FOIA website.
Journalists have no more or fewer rights to submit FOIA requests than anyone else, although they may have some rights to reduced fees and faster service, according to the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press (RCFP), a nonprofit that helps journalists access resources.
Information obtained through FOIA requests have helped American journalists discover and warn the public about health and safety issues, wasteful government spending, terrorist activities, the FBI harassment of civil rights leaders, government surveillance of prominent authors and more, according to the RCFP website.
“With the rise of media outlets, the explosion of journalists, the power of the wire services and the development of multiple media platforms, the idea of gatekeeping rose in our consciousness,” Copeland said. “It became the job of editors to decide what information would flow to readers and viewers.”
Today, these editors use contemporary news values to decide what is news. Reporters use content curation skills to find out enough information to explain what’s important based on the editors’ direction.
The next Breaking Barriers article will address the question, “Who or what holds journalists accountable?”
(11/28/18 2:08am)
Mercer University selected a new Title IX Coordinator in November to replace Interim Coordinators Doug Pearson and Rhonda Lidstone. Sharon Stellato, former senior investigator at West Virginia University (WVU), plans to bring her experience with innocence claims to the Title IX process at Mercer.
She said she was specifically attracted to Mercer due to its small size and the welcoming environment she said that creates.
“I was looking for a smaller school where I could make connections with students, faculty and staff, so this gave me the opportunity to do that,” she said. “It has that small-town feel.”
Now, she’s interested in helping victims of crimes access the resources they need while they navigate what could be a stressful or even traumatic situation.
“Another thing that interests me, with my background in law, is due process,” she said. “I want to make sure that we’re doing it right, that we’re getting all the information out there, both on the complainant’s side and the respondent’s side, and that we’re treating everyone fairly.”
She decided to pursue Title IX as a career after working with a neutral fact-finding agency that reviewed post-conviction felonies, The North Carolina Inquiry Commission Agency. She was lead investigator in the exonerations of high-profile cases such as Dwayne Dail, who served 18 years for a rape he didn’t commit, and Greg Taylor, who was sentenced to life in prison for murder without evidence.
“It translated because we were looking for the truth, and we didn’t really have an objective in the case other than the truth,” Stellato said.
She then entered higher education by taking her job at WVU, and a few years later decided to relocate back to the South to be closer to her mother in Florida.
Stellato’s appointment comes at a time when U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos is set to roll out changes to Title IX to combat potential cases of false reports of rape and assault. Critics such as CNN’s Anurima Bhargava said these protections will make it harder for victims to prove they have been assaulted and easier for schools to avoid responsibility.
“Schools may not be responsible for responding to incidents of assault or harassment that take place online or at bars, fraternities, off-campus apartments or away games,” according to Bhargava.
The definition of sexual harassment would also change from "unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature" to only "severe, pervasive and objectively offensive” behavior, and schools may be required to conduct live hearings and cross-examinations.
Stellato said she couldn’t speak to the impact these new guidelines would have on the culture surrounding Title IX at Mercer, but that the school would ensure that all parties would be treated fairly, in any case, no matter what.
“You always need to follow the guidelines and the law, of course,” she said, “But at the same time, Mercer has a policy in place where whatever happens, we’ll make additions to that and make sure that the process is streamlined.”
Stellato’s office is located in Room 315 on the third floor of Newton Hall, which is next to Willingham Auditorium on the historic quad in the center of campus. She can be contacted at stellato_s@mercer.edu.
“I want (students) to know me and feel comfortable with me, again, no matter what role they’re in,” she said. “That they kind of recognize me as being someone they can talk to.”
(11/16/18 2:42am)
In 2018, just 35 percent of Democrats and 12 percent of Republicans surveyed by the Pew Research Center agreed with the statement, “information from national news organizations is very trustworthy.” Similarly, only 27 percent of Democrats and 11 percent of Republicans said that, “national news media do very well at keeping them informed.”
Many journalists assign the blame to the consumers and believe that learning “news literacy” -- a critical review of news that involves analyzing different aspects for credibility and potential bias -- is up to readers, according to the American Press Institute.
The Institute argues that rather, it is up to journalists themselves to first recognize their own failures in presenting news and then to help consumers understand the process.
Breaking Barriers is a series that will attempt to shed light on the process, ethics and intentions of the journalism industry with special attention to the issues that exist within the field today as a way to engage these efforts.
How do journalists decide what is news?
While story ideas can come from anywhere -- questions about the community, press releases, direct requests for coverage from people or organizations, political topics and more -- every idea a journalist pursues will reflect one or more news values, qualities that make an event or issue worthy of being shared with the intended audience.
A 2016 report by media researchers Tony Harcup and Deirdre O’Neill found that most journalists considered the same 15 news values across platforms and around the world.
Some are fairly intuitive: most consumers will continue reading a story about something that could have a potential impact on them or their community, whether the article is about local crime, a tax raise or a bill on the governor’s desk. Conflict, drama and entertainment also appear frequently in media and are pretty easy to identify.
Harder-hitting stories contain news values such as the power elite, meaning they “concern powerful individuals, organizations, institutions or corporations,” or what Harcup and O’Neill simply call bad news, defined as “stories with particularly negative overtones such as death, injury, defeat and loss.”
Other common news values in today’s media may reflect negative intentions. However, Harcup and O’Neill reported that the final news value is an organization’s own agenda, “whether ideological, commercial or as part of a specific campaign.”
This news value is one of several that may contribute to public distrust in media. In a 2015 study, the Pew Research Center found that 75 percent of survey respondents internationally said it was “never acceptable” for the news media to favor one political position over another, compared to 25 percent who said it was “sometimes acceptable.”
Perceived agenda-setting may be one reason why some in the media industry feel that traditional news values are no longer the best way to decide what constitutes news. Critics argue that news values often reflect more of an organization’s own interests than those of the community.
For example, Harcup and O’Neill found that the rise in social media has made shareability its own news value. Journalists increasingly consider how likely a story is to go viral online or on social media when deciding whether to cover it, according to the study. The emphasis on shareability in the media world can lead to sensationalism and clickbait, alluring and dramatic headlines that link to mundane or incomplete stories.
Since the late 1990s, but more intensely in recent years, journalists have experimented with civic or public journalism to engage with audiences, serve the community and help restore public trust in media. Also called community journalism, it involves working directly with communities to produce content tailored to their experiences, questions and needs.
Former broadcast networks news executive Ed Fouhy told Poynter, an international leader in journalism education, that community journalism is “a fundamental change in the way we do our business” and in “how we define what news is and how we serve our viewers.”
At its core, it is “reporting the issues on the people’s agenda, even though they may not necessarily be on the journalist’s agenda,” Fouhy said.
So how does community journalism work in practice? This year here in Macon, The Center for Collaborative Journalism (CCJ) partnered with The Telegraph, Georgia Public Broadcasting and 13WMAZ to launch an engagement project called the Macon Food Story.
The Macon Food Story documents life in Macon by asking participants, “If you had to describe your family traditions through a recipe, what would it be and why?” while highlighting important issues such as poverty, food insecurity, health, the plight of migrant workers, meat processing and more.
Reporters get information by personally engaging with participants and the audience.
“Community members are invited to join our Facebook group, Macon Food Story, where we keep the conversation going about many of the topics you’ll read, hear and see. You can also start new topics and share recipes and ideas,” said CCJ Engagement Reporter Sonya Green, who is helping lead the project.
Other methods of civic journalism allow the audience even more influence over the content. For example, Engage CCJ invites the community to submit their questions about Macon directly to reporters working on their project, Macon Me Curious. Contributors tasked with answering these questions have found out how much the mayor pays for his loft, where funding for Macon-Bibb employees comes from, the history of the Underground Railroad in Macon and more.
“We want to know your serious questions as well as the bizarre ones,” Green wrote in an article introducing the project. “We’ll attempt to find you an answer and maybe invite you along to help solve the mystery.”
The next Breaking Barriers article will address the question, “How do journalists gather information?”
(11/16/18 2:11am)
Entering auto by Orange Street apartment
Reporting Officer Gary Mills responded Oct. 3 to a complaint from a student living in the Orange Street apartments that his car had been broken into overnight.
The police report provided to The Cluster contained no further details.
Bike theft in Plunkett Hall
A student reported on Oct. 4 that someone had stolen her 10-speed mountain bike off the bike rack where it was locked outside Plunkett Hall.
The incident was marked as ending Oct. 7 at 7 p.m. on the police report, but the report does not mention if the bike was found.
Entering auto by Mercer Law
A student at the Walter F. George School of Law reported to Mercer Police that someone had broken into his SUV in the Woodruff House parking lot Oct. 5 at 1 p.m.
“The inside of the vehicle had been ransacked and items thrown around the cab,” according to the police report made by Reporting Officer Gus Moore.
Entering auto in the upper law school parking lot
Another police report was filed Oct 5 at 1:30 p.m for a car break-in on the main law school campus by the upper parking lot at 1021 Georgia Ave.
The police report provided to The Cluster did not name a reporting officer or provide any further details.
Entering auto in the Orange Street apartments
A non-student reported that someone had entered their vehicle on Mercer’s campus and stole $500 worth of office equipment Oct. 7 at midnight.
The police report provided to The Cluster contained no further details.
Entering auto by the Connell Student Center
Reporting Officer Wesley Hillard responded to a complaint that someone had broken into a non-student’s vehicle and taken her purse worth $300.
Her car had been parked in the CSC parking lot from 11:45 a.m. to 10:25 p.m Oct. 13, but she was unable to lock it because “her automatic key lock was not working,” according to a police report provided to The Cluster.
“The intruders rummaged through her vehicle and consequently stole her purse,” the report said. “She said that the purse contained some of her miscellaneous jewelry and that her wallet and IDs were not inside of the purse at that time.”
Mercer police have no suspects, according to the report.
Backpack stolen from car
A Mercer student reported that “his vehicle was entered and a backpack with his computer ($560.00) and headphones ($120.00) were taken” Oct. 18 at 6:30 p.m., according to the police report by Reporting Officer Matthew Graham.
The report did not give a location or offer further detail.
Backpack stolen from car in Adams-Winship parking lot
Reporting Officer Clay Maddox responded to a Mercer student’s report that “his backpack was missing and presumed stolen from his vehicle.” The student said the last time he remembered having the backpack was when he parked his car in the Adams-Winship parking lot, according to the police report.
The stolen backpack is black with orange trim and a Mercer bear emblem and contains the student’s name and campus address. At the time it was stolen, it held the student’s iPad, worth $300, and grey HP laptop valued at $1000.
The student “believed the doors were locked on his vehicle the night in question and he found no damage to his vehicle,” according to the report.