Jess, reporter for The Jungle, knew what was coming as she walked into her editor’s office. He was going to spout some old journalism trope that was about to make her article worse.
“You have no opposition to this article,” Editor Kent Ellis said as she walked into the office. Kent fixated on various journalism convictions that were outdated and usually irrelevant.
“The article is about a group of kindergartners throwing a graduation for their teacher, who is retiring,” Jess said. “It’s a fun story. There was no opposition.”
“There are two sides to every story,” Ellis said. He sat back in his chair with his feet on the desk. Jess waited for him to start throwing out ideas. “This teacher has had a long career. You can’t find the kid whose life the teacher ruined?”
“From Kindergarten?” Jess asked.
“You never know how deep those scars can run. Glue mishaps, playground troubles, maybe losing a class pet—you can find something there.”
“I don’t think that’s the other side of this story.”
“Fine,” Ellis said. He twirled a pencil in his hand while thinking. “What’s wrong with these kids anyway? Don’t these kids know you have to accomplish something to graduate? She just did her job. Maybe find a child psychologist who’s worried about how this confusion about a graduation is going to affect these kids’ long-term.”
“I talked to a child psychologist,” Jess said, not mentioning that it was her friend Katie. “She thought it was sweet.”
“How about this?” Ellis said. Jess could not believe this guy was in charge of the editorial views of The Jungle. “Find one of those people who thinks we’re giving out too many participation trophies. What if this leads to a string of participation graduations?”
“I had to have a graduation for passing the HR course at this publication,” Jess said.
Ellis ignored her this time, “How did the kids even come up with this idea? Maybe there’s a story combining parents doing kids’ homework and the retiring teacher’s graduation?”
“It’s in the story. The teacher was explaining graduation, and one of the kids went home and asked her mom about having a graduation for the teacher since she was leaving too.”
“That was in the story?” Ellis said, flipping through a copy he printed out.
Jess grabbed the paper, circled the section and started walking out of Ellis’s office. She yelled back, “Let me know when we can publish the story.”