Why Cav Daily?
When I became executive editor of The Cavalier Daily in January 2024, this was the question that I asked every new opinion, humor, cartoon and puzzles staffer. They wrote their answers on colorful pieces of paper which I hung around the newspaper's office . A year later, as I started my term as editor-in-chief, it felt very natural to continue this activity for my dozens of new editors.
This somewhat silly exercise might have seemed more natural in an elementary school classroom, but for me, it was absolutely integral to building the sort of newsroom which would center The Cavalier Daily’s twofold mission — producing impactful, timely and insightful journalism, while also serving as a practicum and educational space for aspiring journalists.
And yet, I am realizing now, that over the course of two years during which I asked this question of my staff, I never wrote down my “why.” So, as I prepare to leave this university, I want to remedy that and try to capture how much The Cavalier Daily community has meant to me.
I first joined the paper as an opinion columnist for a very simple reason — my mom thought I would like it. I quickly learned that I loved writing columns, taking a national issue and seeing it reflected and inflected at a local level. And I loved that every opinion piece opened new windows, platformed new questions and provoked new debates.
Most of all, I came to love thinking about the systems which support subjective journalism as a vital part of newspapers. Yet, in recent years, it has often been perceived more as a liability to be mitigated than as an integrated and integral part of a newspaper’s attempts to showcase, host and platform debates. This is, in part, a product of an increasingly polarized society that is quick to judge and dismiss instead of engage and question. But it is also the fault of subjective journalists who stopped articulating their value.
So, as executive editor, my editors and I worked to articulate this value. We wrote editorials to unmask the functioning of the Editorial Board. We encouraged opinion writers to interview stakeholders. We platformed satire to reflect the idiosyncrasies of student life. And we thought critically about how puzzles and cartoons uplift the multitude of fun, funky and colorful ways that one can engage journalism.
To my subjective editors — Dan, Isabelle, Quinn, Sarah, Songhan and Wardah — you all were the best conversation partners, the people who challenged me to uphold my values and encouraged me to embrace subjective journalism’s unique potential to engage audiences.
As I stepped into the editor-in-chief role, I carried these “whys” with me. I began my term as EIC just as President Donald Trump began his second term, and just as he and his administration began to fundamentally reshape and demolish taken-for-granted assumptions about both journalism and higher education.
Perhaps this timing should have been at the forefront of my mind in spring 2025, but I was instead deeply invested in the question of internal sustainability. I was focused on building processes that were sustainable from a literary, financial and operational perspective and which foregrounded training staffers, investing in multimedia projects and raising an endowment.
And then at the end of June 2025, former University President Jim Ryan resigned in the face of intense pressure from federal officials. It was a moment which brought together all my “whys” and demanded extensive, nuanced and continual coverage, not just from the news desk but from every desk on the paper. And it required not losing sight of The Cavalier Daily’s twofold mission as the paper of record and an educational institution.
With editors and staffers scattered across the world, embracing both goals in the midst of a crisis was not easy, but the results speak for themselves — we wrote dozens of insightful articles across the paper’s desks, developed precious trust with community members, dramatically increased our readership, raised over $400,000 for an endowment, and had 31 staffers win awards from the Virginia Press Association.
We asked and then worked to answer the questions which were most critical to local audiences — what role had local governing institutions played in Ryan’s resignation, how did state politics inflect questions of federal education policy, what would the lived impact of these decisions be on community stakeholders and above all else, why U.Va.?
And it is this relentless commitment to a local, service-oriented lens that makes me most proud of the work staffers and editors did. We did not try to become a national outlet. Rather, we embraced the local particularity of this story, a particularity which often went underemphasized in national outlets and to which we had unique access. In doing so, we served our community while also adding critical nuance to a national story.
And like anything that is worthwhile, this work took a village. To my Managing Board — Hailey, Leigh, Scarlett and Will — you were my rocks, the people who kept me grounded and who never failed to meet the moments we encountered, no matter how large. To my Junior Board, I know that what you all did on a daily basis, from the small act of responding to a staffer’s questions to the big acts of changing desk-wide cultures, was not easy and not always visible. Each of you is brilliant, and your passion, your attention to detail and your dedication make this paper special.
In short, my “why” came to be equal parts about the people and the issues we tackled. I think that I never wanted to write down my “why” because it is constantly evolving. It changes with each space I enter into and each person I encounter. I never wanted to write down my “why” because journalism has never felt like an active choice that I made, but rather something which slowly became a natural part of how I learn about and participate in the communities that surround me. My “why” is many things, comprised of questions that I have asked and been asked, people who have supported me, and above all else, my deep belief in the ability of local journalism to impact and be impacted by the communities it serves.
Naima Sawaya was the editor-in-chief of the 136th term, the executive editor of the 135th term and an opinion columnist and senior associate opinion editor for the 134th term.
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