STUDENT elections rarely offer enough substantive debate. That's especially bad at this University because of the substantial powers elected student leaders wield. The Cavalier Daily made a potentially valuable contribution to reducing this problem this year by publishing an election supplement in which candidates were given space to address the voters. This was the first year, Managing Editor Kristin Hawkins said, that she knows of such a supplement being published; I applaud the innovation. Still, I'd like to offer a few suggestions for improvement for next year.
The questions The Cavalier Daily posed to the candidates, Hawkins and Editor-in-Chief Elizabeth Mills both said, produced better statements from the candidates than the University Board of Elections got for its voter guide. I should hope so: Journalists should be expected to ask good questions.
But the broad questions the newspaper asked did not ensure that key topics were addressed. For example, the student body remains divided over the single sanction, and the question of the single sanction affects other debates about honor. It would be valuable to know every Honor Committee candidate's view of the sanction. And that's true? whether you favor preserving or replacing, strengthening or undermining the single sanction.
Mills argued that the broad questions enabled the candidates to pick the issues most important to them. There is value in that. But there is also value in making sure that key issues are covered, and it is well within the realm of journalistic judgment to determine which issues are most worth discussing. And asking, as the supplement did, the most pressing issue that a candidate would like to address, calls more for an answer about change than for an answer about resisting changes regarded as undesirable -- which makes it more helpful to voters who support a proposed change than to those who oppose it. So a mix of broad questions and more specific ones would have been better than the set of broad questions actually used.
Among the virtues of the journalist is the ability to ask tough questions, including tough follow-up questions. While the supplement already involved a lot of effort--"dozens of hours of extra work for quite a number of us," Hawkins said -- it might have been valuable to put some follow-up questions to the candidates at least in the most important elections. It might have put readers in a better position to judge the candidates' prospects of achieving their goals if elected--or to identify problems with the candidates' priorities.
To the opinion section: The Managing Board, which is comprised entirely of College students and is responsible for the newspaper's editorials, chose to endorse candidates only in University-wide and Collegeelections. Four schools this year had contested elections for the Honor Committee, and four for the University Judiciary Committee. The paper endorsed candidates to represent the College on both committees, but did not endorse anyone to represent the Commerce School and the Law School on either committee, the Darden School on the UJC, or the Engineering School on honor.
Did these omissions reflect a sense that races outside the College are less important than races within that school? "Absolutely not," said Mills. She pointed out that the newspaper had chosen to follow the UBE rules for endorsements, under which candidates who join elections late in the process may not be endorsed.
Mills argued that complying with the UBE endorsement system allowed the paper's endorsements to be listed on the voter guide displayed on the voting Web site. But the voter guide only indicates whom an endorsing organization backs; it does not present the organization's arguments. And it is the arguments that ought to supply the weight of the newspaper's endorsement.
Mills also argued that there would be practical difficulties to adding endorsements up to the last minute. The board might have to interview many candidates in little time. But journalists are specialists in deadlines, and the newspaper would not have to endorse in every single race that becomes competitive at the last minute.
What would be the benefit of adopting a more flexible system? First of all, it would allow the newspaper to weigh in on more elections. But there is a subtler issue: According to Mills herself, College candidates are more likely to meet the UBE's early deadline and be eligible for endorsements than are candidates from the other schools. So, although I don't think the Managing Board was acting out of disdain for non-College students, its decision to follow the UBE's rules produced the same unhelpful effect and unconcerned appearance such disdain would have produced.
Alexander R. Cohen is The Cavalier Daily's ombudsman. He can be reached at ombud@cavalierdaily.com.
Editor's note: Editor-in-Chief Elizabeth Mills did not edit this column because it quotes her statement.
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