Petty journalism

I got home from college for the summer about a week ago and was very disappointed in a newspaper article that I read in my hometown paper. It seems that the paper hadn't been the first to release some information about the local school district that they had assumed they would have the jump on. As "revenge" the paper printed an article listing the salaries of certain district employees, including the superintendent, principles, and teachers, with the headline "They make HOW much". Now along with the long list of numbers and employees, and the obviously biased headline, there was essentially no article to accompany it. There were no statistics to compare the salaries to those of similar sized schools. The readers only have the headline to process the meaning of the numbers. Now this makes me mad for several reasons. First, that is a blatant abuse of the power a newspaper has on the opinions of their readers. The article gave no comparisons or counterarguments only: this is what we think, that's what there is. Now, a lot of people are just going to trust the newspaper because the community trusts that the writers are going to supply correct, unbiased information. In this case, that obviously didn't happen. They could have simply changed the headline to: "They make ONLY how much" and the article would have been read in a completely different way because there was no other information. Second, these are educators for God's sake! If anyone deserves peak salaries it's doctors, police, and teachers! And the numbers that were being printed were far from peak salaries. Shame on this publication for suggesting that out taxpayer's money is wasted on these people that, often, spend more time with the younger generation than their own parents. They more than teach, they advise on personal problems, they comfort in difficult situations, and they encourage and inspire growth. I'm not saying the newspaper was wrong for printing the salaries, it is the public's money and we have the right to know where it's going. However, the way the information was presented cast a giant negative glare on the district with nothing to back that up. Anyway, I know this rant may seem out of the blue but as a journalism major this is something that I feel very strongly about and it makes me sick to see. Carry on with your day!

Stay beautiful,
Toto