Cronkite School building wins an architecture prize
The Chicago Athenaeum, an architecture and design museum in Chicago, gives out international design awards each year. The Cronkite School, designed by Southern California’s Steven Erlich and opened in 2007, is one of 100 or so buildings cited for best new global design.
Full list of winners here.
A release from the Cronkite school below.
ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY News
Cronkite School Wins International Architecture Award
PHOENIX (July 21, 2010) – The Cronkite School building has been awarded an International Architecture Award, Arizona State University announced.
The International Architecture Awards are conferred on the world’s most significant new buildings and urban or landscape developments by The Chicago Athenaeum: Museum of Architecture and Design in conjunction with The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies.
The Cronkite building was one of 95 buildings and urban planning projects from 38 nations, and one of three buildings affiliated with U.S. institutions of higher education, to be recognized in the 2010 awards. The building houses the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication and Eight/KAET, the ASU-operated PBS station.
The contest honored a range of building types, including corporate offices, cultural sites, universities, industrial facilities and private homes.
Building architect Steven Ehrlich of Ehrlich Architects said it was an honor for the Cronkite building to be among those recognized.
“This is a very prestigious awards program because it’s really global,” Ehrlich said. “It’s always nice to see how a group of international jurors perceives our building.”
Ehrlich said the building fits into the urban fabric of downtown Phoenix.
“It’s not an isolated building on a campus that is sort of its own enclave,” Ehrlich said. “The building actually has a global viewpoint itself.”
Ehrlich said the contemporary, LEED-silver-certified Cronkite School building was designed to reinforce how communication is celebrated, in all its forms.
Inside, the space’s flexible, three-dimensional spatial environment allows connectivity in multiple forms, both through its technology capabilities and in the interpersonal space created by the First Amendment Forum at the building’s core.
“I think that becomes in a way the heart of the building, and it’s where, although there’s all this technological connectivity, there’s still the connectivity of people with each other,” Ehrlich said.
Christopher Callahan, dean of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication, said the school was proud to be housed in an exemplar of contemporary urban design and planning.
“Steven Ehrlich is known globally for bold designs that are striking and compelling, but also amazingly functional,” Callahan said. “This is yet another recognition of the magnificent design gifts of Steven, his colleague Mathew Chaney and the entire Ehrlich team. We were so fortunate to have Ehrlich Architects bring our vision of the 21st century digital media complex to life.”
A jury of Mexican architects affiliated with the Colegio de Arquitectos de la Ciudad de Mexico, Sociedad de Arquitectos Mexicanos chose the winners from hundreds of entries.
The awards will be presented and exhibited at The City and The World conference to be held in Spain, Nov. 4-7, 2010. Following that, the awards exhibition will tour Europe and the United States.
Related Links
The International Architecture Awards http://www.chi-athenaeum.org/intarch/index.html The Chicago Athenaeum Museum of Architecture and Design http://www.chi-athenaeum.org/ The European Centre for Architecture Art Design and Urban Studies http://www.europeanarch.eu/ Cronkite Building Fact Sheet http://cronkite.asu.edu/news/newBuilding-022107.php Downtown Phoenix Campus http://cronkite.asu.edu/about/downtown.php Cronkite Building Slideshow http://cronkite.asu.edu/about/building.php
12:58 PM
Cronkite School students rake in awards
From the Cronkite School, a release detailing a number of awards won by this year’s student body. Congrats to all the winners!
Carnegie-Knight News21 Schools Honored in Contests
June 4, 2010
Journalism students in the national Carnegie-Knight News21 program have been recognized with more than 40 awards for reporting, design, multimedia and photojournalism.
The students from 12 of the nation’s top journalism schools spent 10 weeks last summer reporting in-depth stories around the country and presenting them in innovative ways on the Web.
Students produced work that won the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award as well as awards from the Society for News Design, the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, and the Society of Professional Journalists, among others.
The RFK collegiate journalism award went to David Kempa of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University for a project about one man’s mission to help impoverished farmers in Mexico.
The University of North Carolina won seven awards in the Society for News Design quarterly competitions. The winning projects will go on to the national competition, to be judged in August.
UNC also won eight awards in the National Press Photographers Association competition, three College Photographer of the Year honors and two awards in the Pictures of the Year International competition, which honors the best photography around the world. The school’s “Powering a Nation” project earned the Pictures of the Year International Award of Excellence, coming in behind only Reuters, MediaStorm and The Associated Press in the Documentary Project of the Year category.
UNC, ASU, Syracuse University and the University of Maryland all placed in the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication Best of the Web contest and took top awards in their regional Society of Professional Journalists Mark of Excellence Awards contests. The University of California at Berkeley also placed in the AEJMC contest.
Students in the News21 program come from the nation’s leading journalism schools. They spend a semester studying critical national issues, followed by a summer traveling the country to produce in-depth news coverage and experimenting with innovative digital methods to tell their stories. Nearly 100 students participated last summer.
In addition to ASU, UNC, Maryland and Berkeley, other schools in the alliance are Columbia University, Northwestern University, the University of Southern California and Syracuse University. Students from four other schools – Harvard University, the University of Missouri, the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Nebraska – also contribute.
News21, headquartered at the Cronkite School in Phoenix, is part of the Initiative on the Future of Journalism Education, sponsored by the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
The complete list of 2010 awards:
Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, Best of the Web
• “Latinos & Hispanics in America,” 1st place (tie), Team Innovation
• “The Young and the Wireless,” 2nd place, Team Journalism
• “Powering a Nation,” 3rd place (tie), Team Journalism
• “The New Voters,” 3rd place (tie), Team Journalism
• “BARThood,” Honorable Mention, Team Journalism
Additionally, 2010 News21 fellow Tracy Boyer of UNC won first place in the individual journalism category for her 2009 student project Honduras and the Hidden Hunger.
42nd Annual Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award
• “Crossing Borders,” Sole Collegiate Winner, College Print or Online Division
International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences Webby Award
• “Powering a Nation,” Finalist, Student Sites
NPPA’s Best of Photojournalism 2010
• “Powering a Nation,” Overall Best Use of the Web
• “Powering a Nation,” 1st place, News or Feature Multimedia Package
• “Mining the Mountains,” 2nd place, Documentary Video
• “Roping the Wind,” 2nd place, Feature Video
67th Pictures of the Year International
• “Powering a Nation,” Award of Excellence, Documentary Project of the Year
• “Mining the Mountains,” Award of Excellence, Issue Reporting – Multimedia
College Photographer of the Year 2009
• “Powering a Nation,” Gold, Large Group Multimedia Project
• “Roping the Wind,” Gold, Individual Multimedia Story or Essay
• “Battle for the Mountains,” Bronze, Multimedia Project
National Press Photographers Association, Monthly Multimedia Contests
• “Debating Coal’s Future,” 1st place, Team Video
• “Religion Rejuvenates Environmentalism,” 1st place, Team Video
• “Down the Lines,” 1st place, Team Video
• “Roping the Wind,”1st place, Individual Video
• “Battle for the Mountains,” 2nd place, Team Video
• “Moving to Higher Ground,” 2nd place, Team Video
• “Powering a Nation,” 2nd place, Multimedia Project
• “Voices of Roscoe,” 3rd place, Team Video
Society for News Design Best of Multimedia Quarterly Contests
The following are winners in the Student News category and qualify for the national contest in August.
• “Fighting Battles”
• “Powering a Nation”
• “Roping the Wind”
• “Climate Refugees”
• “Down the Lines”
• “Energy Portraits”
• “The High-Energy Diet”
• “Reclaiming Creation”
Society of Professional Journalists Mark of Excellence Regional Awards
First-place regional winners qualify for national SPJ awards, to be announced this fall.
Mid-Atlantic Region
• “Debating Coal’s Future,” 1st place, Online In-Depth Reporting
• “Reclaiming Creation,” 1st place, Online Feature Reporting
• “Down the Lines,” 2nd place, Online In-Depth Reporting
• “Powering a Nation,” 2nd place, Best Independent Online Student Publication
• “The New Voters,” 3rd place, Best Independent Online Student Publication
• “Roping the Wind,” 3rd place, Online Feature Reporting
Western Region
• “Building Success,” 2nd place, Online Feature Reporting
Student Society for News Design
• “Powering a Nation,” 1st place, Best Overall College News Website
• “Powering Down,” 1st place, Best Display for Multimedia
• “Powering a Nation,” 1st place, Best Interactive or Animated Graphic
• “Debating Coal’s Future,” 1st place, Best One-Subject Stand-alone Mini-site or Special Section/Special Package of a Larger Website
3:01 PM
Dan Gillmor to start contributing to Salon
The Cronkite school prof, who does the blog Mediactive and specializes in new media, will be writing for the online magazine.
His first column, about Steve Jobs “control-freakery,” is here:
The control-freakery extends to the content, as we’ve seen again and again. Apple’s idea of acceptable content is roughly what you’ll find at Disneyland. The company reserves the right to bar or later remove apps that contain information for any reason it chooses. This is how the brilliant Mark Fiore found his iPhone cartoon app disallowed due to its political content — until he won a Pulitzer Prize in April, at which point Apple decided to allow it.
(Jobs says the rules changed after Fiore’s original rejection, by which time Apple realized it was making a mistake with political content, but the cartoonist didn’t realize this.)
I’m disappointed beyond words, meanwhile, that journalism organizations are racing to create apps for the iPad, even though they’re putting the final say over whether their journalism is acceptable into Apple’s hands. What does it say about their journalistic principles that they’d do this? Most won’t even respond to the question, and I’ve asked many. National Public Radio’s Kinsey Wilson, who heads up NPR’s online development, is one of the few to admit discomfort with the situation, saying that Apple holds the leverage at this point; he, and other news executives, are basically hoping Apple won’t jerk them around the way it’s done with others.
On his blog Gillmor says he gives Salon a one-week exclusivity for the columns, after which they will appear on his Mediactive site.
4:54 PM
Cronkite student wins an RFK journalism award
It was in the college category. The awards, given by the the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights, are fairly respected.
The story, by David Kempa, was called “Crossing Borders”, and was about a guy who helps Mexican farmers.
The piece was presented online in an innovative way; as you scroll through it, photos, video and maps appear in a field above.
Kempa graduated last year and now works for Reuters in NYC.
Full press release from the school below.
ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY News
Cronkite Student Wins International RFK Award
PHOENIX (April 22, 2010) – A Carnegie-Knight News21 reporter from Arizona State University won a prestigious Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, the Robert F. Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights announced today.
David Kempa’s story “Crossing Lines,” about one man’s mission to help impoverished Mexican farmers, won the RFK Award in the college print category. It is the second consecutive year a student at ASU’s Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication won the award.
Kempa, who earned his master’s degree from Cronkite in December, was part of a team of Cronkite students who participated last summer in News21, a national journalism education initiative funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and the Carnegie Corporation. As part of the program, students from 12 universities around the country take part in topic seminars and summer-long reporting projects. The program has been headquartered at the Cronkite School since 2008.
Kempa, 26, of Pulaski, Wis., traveled to the U.S.-Mexico border and deep into Mexico to tell the story of Jesus Hernandez Arias, a Mexican native who almost died while trying to cross the desert. Hernandez, convinced that no one should have to take such chances to earn a decent living, decided to devote himself to helping farmers in a small Mexican town develop markets for their produce.
The story is presented in an innovative way on the News21 website with photos, maps and video interspersed. Text versions of the story appeared in a number of newspapers as well, including the Taiwan News and the Sacramento Bee.
The RFK Journalism Awards program honors outstanding reporting on issues that reflect Robert F. Kennedy’s concerns, including human rights, social justice and the power of individual action in the United States and around the world. The awards were established after the U.S senator’s assassination by journalists who covered his history-making presidential campaign in 1968.
This year’s winners in the professional categories included The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and ABC News’ 20/20 program.
The awards will be presented by RFK’s widow, Ethel Kennedy, and Committee Chair Margaret Engel at a ceremony May 26 at The George Washington University in Washington. Winners receive a bust of Robert Kennedy created by sculptor Robert Berks.
Last year, Cronkite students also won the college RFK award for a project on families divided by the U.S.-Mexico border.
In honoring Kempa’s work, judges said that he addressed the complicated issue of immigration “in a fresh way that contributes to efforts to solve the problem. The reporter found engaging characters and compelling situations. He connected their stories seamlessly, capturing readers’ attention on a vital and heart-rending social issue.”
Kempa said Ethel Kennedy called him personally to tell him he had won the award. “She was very earnest and friendly,” he said. “I felt like I was speaking with a family member, but the thought kept bouncing around in my head: ‘I’m talking to an American icon!’”
Kempa, who now works in New York City writing the global markets and equities newsletter for Thomson Reuters, said he hopes to have more chances to write in-depth about topics like immigration. “I was able to talk to families of Mayan descendents who were telling me that a large proportion of their town … had risked their lives to earn a living,” he said. “Winning this award … makes me feel like I was writing about the right thing.”
Kempa worked under the direction of Rick Rodriguez, the Cronkite School’s Carnegie Professor of Journalism, and Jason Manning, ASU’s director of Student Media, who served as managing editor of the ASU project.
Manning described Kempa as a talented reporter and writer “whose work ethic and dedication to good journalism shine through in this story, which challenges the easy assumptions that are so often made about immigration.”
“The students participating in this project are being given a rare opportunity – the time and means to do thoughtful, in-depth and challenging journalism,” Manning said. “We knew from the beginning that this story would be important, compelling and difficult to do. The News21 project provided the necessary support and resources, and David provided outstanding effort.”
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12:17 PM
A "Joe Arpaio Meets the Press" post-mortem
PHXated was working on another project today and is just getting caught up to the coverage of the aborted Joe Arpaio appearance at the Cronkite School last night.
PHXated’s live blogging of the event is here.
Stephen Lemons, of New Times, and I argued about the disruption afterward; he makes his case in favor of it here:
I spoke briefly to Cronkite School Dean Christopher Callahan about the disruption, which he naturally abhorred. But, I wondered, wasn’t it to be expected? What if ASU had invited President Lyndon Johnson’s Defense Secretary Robert McNamara to speak during the height of the Vietnam War? Wouldn’t he have anticipated civil disobedience, and far more upheaval?
“Quite frankly,” he said, “if the Defense Secretary came in to give a speech during the Vietnam War, I think it would be protested intensely. Do I think that if you had a group of journalists grilling Secretary McNamara on Vietnam policies, do I think that would be protested? Honestly, no.”
I’ll admit, as I’m sure many will point out to me, the analogy is by no means precise. The carnage of Vietnam is not parallel to the sufferings of the undocumented here in Ari-bama. But the treatment of the undocumented is a moral issue that requires a response, and civil disobedience is a response, a disobedient response.
I’m Lemons’ biggest fan, but he is off his rocker here. Callahan’s right: This wasn’t in any way a speech or a soap box for Arpaio. It was the opposite. Not only were the protesters wrong to disrupt the event, they were being dumb, which is worse.
But of course, they are students; they are allowed to be dumb. Defending them, however, is morally reckless.
In fact, I disagree with Callahan and the school’s handing of the disruption; I heard afterward that the school didn’t want to be in the position of dragging students exercising free speech rights out of a venue called the First Amendment Forum.
But that’s the point: At a First Amendment Forum, goons shouldn’t be allowed to shut down a public event. As a matter of first principles, they should have been removed and the event allowed to go on.
Indeed, absent some clearly amusing or exacerbating circumstance (like, say, if Arpaio were speaking to a bunch of ASU fat-cat donors at an exclusive luncheon, or if student money were used to pay someone as compromised as Arpaio to appear), it would have been wrong for the students to disrupt things even if it had been a regular speech.
I was in the crowd and everyone around me was yelling shut up at the people who disrupted the event. And as Callahan pointed out when he was trying to calm the students up, they had disrupted the questioning just when the professors had gotten around to asking Arpaio about his Civil Rights violations.
All in all, it wasn’t a good night for any of the parties involved.
12:00 AM
Joe Arpaio at the Cronkite School: The zoo approacheth
The Arizona Republic and KPHO have both posted stories about Monday’s live “Meet the Press”-style interview of Joe Arpaio at ASU’s Cronkite School of journalism.
Arpaio’s going to be questioned by three profs from the school at 7 p.m.
Both stories are pretty incompetent. The Republic story says that interest in the event will surely swamp the smallish school atrium where the interview will be held, so the school’s going to show it on a large video screen and stream it over the internet.
The paper doesn’t bother to tell readers where the screen will be, or what the web address for the stream is.
For the record, the video will be shown in the public mall just south of the Cronkite building, which is on the east side of Central Avenue between Polk and Fillmore.
The video stream will be here, according to the school.
The KPHO story is equally unhelpful; worse, it lets the sheriff natter on about how good he is with the press:
“There have been blips about some weekly newspaper — we didn’t give an answer to a request — but that’s been straightened out. But I think it’s great. If there’s anyone who has an open door policy, I think it’s the sheriff,” said Arpaio.
As anyone who reads the New Times knows, there are three inaccuracies in merely the first sentence alone. The KPHO reporter doesn’t bother to ask him about them.
The Republic story doesn’t mention that some students plan to protest the event; the KPHO story does, but neither note that local Tea Party activists are showing up as well.
PHXated’s background on the event is here and here.
12:00 AM
Live, from the Cronkite School!
Live-blogging as Joe Arpaio meets the press.
* PHXated is live-blogging the event as it happens. Refresh for updates *
Thus endeth the live-blogging.
In the end, a little anti-climactic. The professors did a good job, but Arpaio just blandly deflected the inquiries.
The students who disrupted the event are still milling around upstairs. Seems odd that the school had no way to shut them up or hustle them out. It’s a bad precedent that ten or twenty people—I’m guessing—can disrupt the desires of hundreds of others.
They seem to be ending it.
This is wrong. The event is over. Callahan is trying to lecture the disruptive students. He points out they’ve lost twelve minutes of questioning. And that they’ve effectively left Arpaio to have his views unfiltered in other media venues.
Wide applause from those left here.
A disruption. Protesters are singing a parody song to the tune of Bohemian Rhapsody. Arpaio puts a funny hat on, but then took it off.
Callahan is trying to quiet the crowd.
This is embarrassing for the school. It’s wrong to disrupt an event in a venue called a “First Amendment Forum.”
Callahan can’t be heard from the dais. Some students are yelling “Shut up” to the idiotic protesters.
RR is asking him about racial profiling and targeting political opponents. Are you above the law?
Why have there been so many officials saying they were targeted?
A: Implies he got his question from someone else. RR: My words came from me.
A: I don’t know about police chiefs who don’t like me. I don’t know about mayors. RR: Phil Gordon. A: Well him.
He’s getting pressed on making records available—another thing he’s been getting dinged on. He says they are getting better.
SG presses him on releases video of a certain inmate. “I’m not too familiar with that one. I”m sure they got the information."
What do you consider a reasonable amount of time? There’s been an unwritten law of ten days, but when they ask for thousands of pieces of information it takes time.
Steve Elliott: Presses him on his home address being publicized. I found your address in public document in five minutes.
A: There might be some slipperage but it’s still a violation. I have a lot of threats on me.
A: What’s the saying? “The buck stops here? There?” I feel comfortable when I go home at night. Blustering: “I will continue to deal with the media!”
A: “I have nothing to hide. I want to thank you students. You are the future of journalism. I love this Cronkite.”
SG: Have you rethought that? A: No, there are times you might re-evaluate.
SG: Do you stand by what was done? A: I’m saying it was a learning process.
“Everyone’s afraid to drink with me. The media is not my enemy.” He’s getting a little unhinged.
Would a normal politician agree to this? Green: Absolutely.
A: “I kinda like the media!”
Green bring up his subpoena of all New Times’ information from its web site, including IP addresses of visitors for three years.
A: Not going to go into all the reasons things were done.
He pleads litigation again. But concedes he’s “learning.”
No one’s laid a glove on him yet.
RR brings up New Times. They do hard-hitting reporting. They published your home address. In Oct. 2007, you arrested the editor and publisher of the paper i the middle of the night, on a misdemeanor. I was an executive editor of a paper. We often reported on grand jury testimony. I was never threatened with arrest. Were the arrests appropriate? Was it a mistake?
A: They increased my popularity.“By the way, it’s a free weekly paper.” (Groans from the crowd. A deputy, he said, made the decision to arrest the pair. Most arrests are for misdemeanor. Can’t talk more—litigation.
RR: Is publishing grand jury testimony automatically grounds for arrest in AZ now?
A: It all depends.
Steve Elliott asks him about not sending press releases to the EVT. The scrape wound up in court and the paper won. The judge said you were petty. Did you act properly?
A: Two issues. The judge never ruled against us. “You have to improve,” he said. They had a way to get press releases. They could drive downtown. (!) He said the problems were fixed. We did improve. The releases are now on the web.
Susan Green asks what about those not allowed to a press conference?
A: I average 200 interviews a month with media.
SG: People have shown up and been denied access to press conference.
A: One or two out of thousands. Security reasons. They use the press conference to sandbag me, or disrupt it.
She presses him: They are doing the stories that aren’t so favorable. Are you using access as a weapon?
A: I’m not afraid to face the media. They ask questions that are off the subject of a press conference.
This is a specious point. He has a crazy idea of what a press conference is. She should be pressing him on the fact that he doesn’t allow himself to be questioned on hard topics.
Rick Rodriquez starts off the questioning. “It’s going to be a learning experience for students.”
Q: Media relationships—he got great press coverage for being tough. Your son in law works for Republic. Other side: Journos who do critical stories get frozen, even arrested. Deputies have threatened to arrest a report. Is media a tool or the enemy?
There’s protest noise from outside
A: I have to get to people I serve. I have an open door policy. You can come to the tents. I don’t have to have handlers. [I’m paraphrasing] Sometimes there are problems with media. I’m human. I’m still going to deal with the media.
I’m still here, will continue to do my job. I report to the people directly. I have nothing to hide and I do my job.
RR presses him. What about threatening to arrest a reporter asking for public records? A says he’ll arrest anyone who breaks the law.
Callahan asks for “respect” from the audience and says he’ll stay after and answer questions. His mike is going in and out.
Callahan is explaining the format—he notes there’s been some "misunderstanding"about the “Meet the Press”-style format. He’s referring to the rabble-rousing by Stephen Lemons and some student activists. He’s making the case that it’s appropriate to have profs question Arpaio without letting the audience at him. It’s sad he has to do it, but whatever.
Then he amps it up to “misreporting.” He’s not paying Arpaio. It’s not “a speech, an interview or a debate.” It’s journalists asking questions of a political leader.
See below for background on the three interviewers.
About to begin. The session will last one hour, Dean Callahan just said. Arpaio just walked in, to smatterings of applause.
Some early photos from the event.
The live internet stream of tonight’s event will be here, the school says.
The event will also be shown on video on the pedestrian mall just south of the school. It’s on Central Avenue between Fillmore and Van Buren.
One of the benefits of the event tonight is that I will be able to indulge my fondness for the word interlocutor. Our interlocutors this evening, as described on the school’s website:
The interviewers are three Cronkite professors and veteran journalists: Steve Elliott, digital news director of Cronkite News Service and former Associated Press Phoenix bureau chief; Sue Green, broadcast news director of Cronkite News Service and former managing editor of ABC15; and Rick Rodriguez, the school’s Carnegie Professor of Journalism and former executive editor of the Sacramento Bee.Meanwhile, Nick Martin, at Heat City, is tracking one of the many ongoing Arpaio legal sideshows:
An all-out showdown could be in the works today over whether one of Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s officers will apologize for taking an attorney’s confidential files. It all goes back to an Oct. 19 incident in which Maricopa County detention officer Adam Stoddard was caught on a courtroom security video swiping a document from the files of a defense attorney while her back was turned. Superior Court Judget Gary Donahoe has since ordered the detention officer to hold a news conference to apologize for taking the document. If he refuses to do so by the deadline – set for today – Donahoe said he would throw the officer in jail for contempt of court.Stephen Lemons, at New Times, continues to be skeptical that the Cronkite School profs will be hard-hitting enough tonight:
Arpaio and his PR staff are practiced media manipulators. I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see Arpaio play the profs like a flute tonight. Though out of pride, if nothing else, you would hope these J-school teachers would not wish to be bested like that.
The site tonight is the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication. It’s a key part of ASU’s move into downtown Phoenix; the school sits in a distinctive orange building on Central Avenue, just across the street from the new Civic Space Park and a massive piece of public sculpture, Janet Echelman’s “Her Name Is Patience.”
The school’s Monday evening events are held in its second-story atrium, which allows room for several hundred students to sit in front of the stage and on steps and balconies above it.
Arpaio’s relationship with the press can be said to be dismal. The East Valley Tribune won a Pulitzer Prize this year for its investigation into his various managerial and legal deficiencies.
The series, “Reasonable Doubt,” can be read here.
The Phoenix New Times has spent untold resources over the last few years investigating Arpaio’s practices as well. There’s a fairly complete rundown of its work here.
During the course of one of these series, County Attorney Andrew Thomas and Arpaio actually sent deputies to arrest the editor and publisher of the New Times chain, Michael Lacey and Jim Larkin, in the middle of the night.
While the arrests drew national attention (New York Times story here?) the reaction against Arpaio in Arizona was something less than wholesale outrage, suggesting either that the image of the press is much worse than one might expect … or that Arizonans, being Arizonans, haven’t thought too hard about the implications of mass arrests of journalists.
For the convenience of readers, I’m inserting my previous coverage of this event below.
Live, from the Cronkite School: Joe Arpaio meets the press.
If you’re just coming to the story of Joe Arpaio’s appearance at the ASU journalism school tonight, here’s a precis of developments thus far:
Many months ago the school got Arpaio to agree to a “Meet the Press”-style grilling at the school. The interlocutors will be three professors: Rick Rodriguez, Susan Green and Steve Elliott. The event is at 7 p.m. Monday, that’s tonight, in the second floor atrium of the Cronkite School, which is the east side of Central Avenue downtown, between Van Buren and Fillmore.
(The session itself is open only to students; the school’s going to show the event on video on the mall just south of the building, and will stream it live here.)
Arpaio’s talks a lot—blusters, really—in public, of course, but he’s a slippery figure; who wouldn’t want to see him in an enclosed space questioned closely by three journalists?
Besides the obvious—the extraordinary number of inmate deaths in Arpaio’s jails, the myriad documented cases of mismanagement, his excessive use of his police powers against rival elected officials, and any number of other abuses of power—it will be interesting, given the setting, to hear Arpaio talk about the decision-making processes that lead to the 2007 early-morning-hours arrests of the editor and publisher of the Phoenix New Times alternative newspaper.
Well, this is Arizona, and things don’t always make sense. Some students, misapprehending the nature of the event, have said they will protest, saying they were “outraged” that there won’t be questions from the audience.
PHXated went to Berkeley and is, uh, not unsympathetic to the idea of student protest. In this case, it’s dumb. It’s a rare chance to see a public figure as brittle and indefensible as Arpaio in a controlled situation. Why not see how it plays out?
As PHXated has written before: It’s uncool to say it in this Age of Everyone’s a Journalist, but this serves the public a lot better than having a bunch of Arpaio’s opponents declaiming at him from a microphone. The students should shut up and come watch the session. If it turns out to be filled with lobbed softballs, then they can protest.
And speaking of dumb, now the local tea party folks are riding to Arpaio’s defense. Again, this being Arizona, they’ve managed to trump even the misguided students. Here’s a press release I got the other day:
American Citizens United is organizing a rally in front of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism. There is a great push from the Hispanic students of Journalism (some of them children of illegals and others illegals themselves). They have been encouraged by “La Raza” and other local pro-amnesty organizations to go into journalism so they can have an influence on public opinion. And you can guess what opinion they want to change to get amnesty.Again, it’s tonight at 7 p.m. MST. Let the zoo begin!
Arpaio at the Cronkite School: The zoo approacheth
The Arizona Republic and KPHO have both posted stories about Monday’s live “Meet the Press”-style interview of Joe Arpaio at ASU’s Cronkite School of journalism.
Arpaio’s going to be questioned by three profs from the school at 7 p.m.
Both stories are pretty incompetent. The Republic story says that interest in the event will surely swamp the smallish school atrium where the interview will be held, so the school’s going to show it on a large video screen and stream it over the internet.
The paper doesn’t bother to tell readers where the screen will be, or what the web address for the stream is.
For the record, the video will be shown in the public mall just south of the Cronkite building, which is on the east side of Central Avenue between Polk and Fillmore.
The video stream will be here, according to the school.
The KPHO story is equally unhelpful; worse, it lets the sheriff natter on about how good he is with the press:
“There have been blips about some weekly newspaper — we didn’t give an answer to a request — but that’s been straightened out. But I think it’s great. If there’s anyone who has an open door policy, I think it’s the sheriff,” said Arpaio.There are three inaccuracies in merely the first sentence alone. The KPHO reporter doesn’t bother to ask him about them.
The Republic story doesn’t mention that some students plan to protest the event; the KPHO story does, but neither note that local Tea Party activists are showing up as well.
PHXated’s background on the event is here and here.
Is the Cronkite School’s “Meet the Press” night with Joe Arpaio going to be a zoo?
As you might know, Sheriff Joe Arpaio is going to be interviewed by three journalism professors onstage at the Cronkite School on Central at 7 p.m. Monday. The event is looking more and more like it’s going to be a spectacle.
First, a bunch of misinformed ASU students have decided that, since audience members don’t get to question Arpaio at the panel, the school is somehow giving him a platform to spread his views unchallenged.
The students are planning a protest outside the event.
But as the title of the session—”Meet the Press”—makes clear, the point is to have the sheriff questioned closely by some informed professionals.
It’s uncool to say it in this Age of Everyone’s a Journalist, but this serves the public a lot better than having a bunch of Arpaio’s opponents declaiming at him from a microphone. The students should shut up and come watch the session. If it turns out to be filled with lobbed softballs, then they can protest.
(By the way—Stephen Lemons notes here that CBS 5 has a new investigative report on Arpaio scheduled to run tonight at 10 p.m.)
Now the Sheriff Joe contingent is getting into the act, too. Below is a press release I just got from the Phoenix Area Tea Partyers. (Note the slur on the students half-way down.)
Looks like Monday is going to be quite a scene:
SUPPORT SHERIFF JOE
Time: November 30, 2009 from 7pm to 7pm
Location: First Amendment Room-Second Floor
Organized By: American Citizens United
Event Description:
This is an event I saw posted on Resistnet and thought our group may be interested.American Citizens United is organizing a rally in front of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism.
There is a great push from the Hispanic students of Journalism (some of them children of illegals and others illegals themselves).
They have been encouraged by “La Raza” and other local pro-amnesty organizations to go into journalism so they can have an influence on public opinion. And you can guess what opinion they want to change to get amnesty.
Please keep it orderly, no yelling or name calling. Resist the anger we all feel when our country and those who protect it get attacked. We must remain civilized to be credible.
Will Joe Arpaio really “meet the press” at the Cronkite School?
It’s been an unobtrusive line at the bottom of the this semester’s ASU j-school event calendar:
Meet the Press: Sheriff Joe ArpaioThe title at once says it all and nothing; but the idea, if it works, will be an unusual opportunity for a few serious journalists to question Arpaio about his record and methods live on a stage.
Those scheduled to be asking the questions are three profs from the school: Rick Rodriguez, Susan Green and Steve Elliott. The event will be held at 7 p.m. Monday in the second floor atrium of the Cronkite School, which is on the corner of Taylor and Central downtown, just two blocks north of Van Buren.
Already, the event has been misinterpreted; Stephen Lemons of New Times is, unusually for him, off the mark on this issue today in his blog:
As mind-numbingly impossible as it is to imagine, Sheriff Joe, avowed enemy of a free press and brown people everywhere, will be the guest speaker at the ASU Cronkite School of Journalism’s “First Amendment Forum” this Monday, November 30. Talk about eating turkey after Thanksgiving. Arpaio lecturing at a First Amendment Forum? Too bad Idi Amin’s not around anymore. ASU could have him come chat about human rights.From the start, the idea was exactly the opposite; Arpaio will not be lecturing, he will be being questioned by three journalists.
That’s why the student activist Lemons cites, who says she’ll be protesting the event because the audience won’t be allowed to question the sheriff, is off the mark as well.
Sure, it’s an old media model—but in this case, it could be revelatory. Arpaio’s a slippery figure, and it will be interesting to see if the three interlocutors, if they’re prepared, can pin him down on the facts he’s so casual with.
And let me just say this about that dull old Old Media format: There’s no substitute from questioning by smart and prepared people; the idea to sacrifice that so that a bunch of political opponents of Arpaio declaim at him from a mike on the floor is not a smart one.
Arpaio could as yet back out, the questioning could turn out to be pallid—but it’s wrong to criticize the school for giving Arpaio free rein to speak when that’s not the idea at all.
6:44 PM