I’ve spent the last week trying to figure out how to write this column. Every time I got a few hundred words written, I would realize I wasn’t saying what I wanted to, hit ‘Select All,’ then delete everything. So instead of writing delicately at the start, building to my main point, I’m just going to get right to it.
I’m quite mad at Provost Stephen Director.
At the last Faculty Senate meeting, Director dissed me, and most of my friends. He said something to the extent of, ‘If you need real information about what’s going on at the university, come to me. Don’t bother reading The Huntington News.’
I wasn’t there, so I don’t know the exact quote. (However, The News’ managing editor was there, and I talked to him right after the meeting.) I know what Director was addressing:’ a story that had run in The News the day before, saying that the university was considering restructuring the colleges of Arts and Sciences and Criminal Justice. After last semester ended, Director sent an e-mail to faculty and staff explaining that a committee had been formed to reexamine the colleges and will announce their decision May 15.
I read the article, and I read Director’s e-mail; the facts were right. It seems more like the story was inconvenient to the powers that be ‘- you don’t want to get a huge chunk of students riled up because you’re trying to change something that seems to work just fine for them. (Remember what happened when the athletic training majors tried to save their major, even after being shut out for much of the process? They put up quite a fight.)
The administration ‘- specifically the university’s top public relations flack ‘- expressed concern that it was apparently inaccurate to use the word ‘dissolve’ to describe possible restructuring, and the phrase ‘elimination of the colleges in their current form’ was allegedly misleading, and maybe even irresponsible. If this is legitimate, it fits into the molehill category of a grievance rather than the mountain category.
Despite criticism, we stood by our story, and that’s why you didn’t see a correction or clarification in our newspaper. We ran a follow-up instead.
But back to why I’m mad at Director. The facts of our story were right. He might have had an issue with our diction, and he could have used the Faculty Senate meeting to clarify what he thought we got wrong. Instead, he trashed The News.
Immature? Maybe. Inappropriate? Certainly.
The News is staffed entirely by students. Most of us don’t get paid, and for the ones who do, the paycheck is more symbolic than anything else. (When I was editor of the Editorial page, I made something like $15 a week, which barely financed the Diet Coke I used to stay awake on production nights.) Reporters and editors spend hours outside of class or co-op in our newsroom. And because it takes so long to put stories and photos onto the page and get them edited, some editors regularly see the sun come up on Monday and Thursday mornings.
And it’s disheartening for Director to discredit that work.

‘- Matt Collette can be reached at [email protected].