Dear readers,

The Daily Orange cannot truly serve our community unless our newsroom and our coverage reflect the diversity of the community. If we neglect the work of diversifying our newsroom and our content, we neglect our readers, whom The D.O. exists to serve.

All readers should be able to find themselves represented in the content we produce. Our staff — the people who tell the stories of the community — should reflect the diverse identities, backgrounds and experiences present in the community.

This has not been the case for The D.O., which is and has been a predominantly white institution, specifically lacking representation of people of color and international students. Through semesterly diversity reports, we’re working to assess where we fall short in becoming a newsroom that reflects its community and produces content that does so too.

This work includes surveying and analyzing the diversity of our staff and our coverage, as well as making recommendations for improvement. We also seek feedback and insight from our readers through readership surveys. In February, The D.O. published its first diversity report on our staff and content diversity from the fall 2021 semester.

Now, we are publishing our second report, which includes breakdowns of the diversity of our spring 2021 staff across several demographics, including race, gender, ability and socioeconomic status. Additionally, you will find analysis of our coverage’s representation of marginalized communities and the racial and gender diversity of the sources quoted in our coverage. This report also includes findings from our readership surveys and our recommendations for improvement, which we discussed with The D.O. Board of Directors’ diversity committee.

We are committed to helping The D.O. become a newsroom that reflects the diversity of the community we serve, and our work does not end here. These reports, which we will continue to publish each semester, are only one part of our commitment. We will take action and follow through on the recommendations for improvement included in this report. If you have feedback, questions or concerns, you can reach us at
editor@dailyorange.com.

Thank you for reading,
Emily Steinberger, editor-in-chief 2021-22
Mandy Kraynak, managing editor 2021-22
Abby Weiss, digital managing editor 2021

Published on February 15, 2022 at 1:05 am

Contact Mandy: ackrayna@syr.edu | @MandyKraynak