Letter From the Editor: With Regard to Anonymity

Rollins College,

In this semester’s first issue of The Sandspur, I addressed you to say what the paper planned to do for you, the reader, this year. However, I’m coming back to you at the end of the semester with a plea from your editorial staff. Recently, I received a letter from an anonymous faculty member. The content of the letter was a passionate and well-written response to the censure, a topic that The Sandspur has covered several times this semester. I had originally planned on running the letter as an article and sharing the perspective from a young faculty member. However, after careful consideration, it seemed that running an anonymous letter would cause The Sandspur to lose credibility.

We at the paper feel it’s very important to maintain the trust of our readers. By publishing an anonymous letter, it sends a message that we publish material that does not have someone standing behind his or her words and, therefore, we cannot stand behind the words either. Yes, all of our opinions articles come with the disclaimer that the words do not reflect our ideas or the ideas of the college. Despite this, without a name to associate the words with, I do not feel comfortable publishing.

We have always been, and will continue to be, a open forum for well thought out opinions on topics and events that probe our campus.

This is in no way meant to be discouraging to members of the community who wish to send in Op-Ed articles. In fact, we encourage everyone who has an opinion on the topic of the censure or any other matter to send in an article to submit@thesandspur.org at anytime. But, if you choose to send material in, you need to be comfortable with having your name associated with the content. If you can stand behind your articles, so can we.

One specific note I will point out from this anonymous letter is that everyone should have a say. We agree, and that’s why we support the submission of articles. We have always been, and will continue to be, an open forum for well thought out opinions on topics and events that probe our campus. I hope that the goals proposed in the first issue of the paper this year have been fulfilled. Next semester, we hope to continue in our efforts to improve The Sandspur with every issue. If you ever have any questions about The Sandspur, feel free to email chief@thesandspur.org. Remember, The Sandspur is made up by the voices of the Rollins community. Without you, the readers and writers, we cease to exist. Thank you for your continued support and we look forward to another exciting semester of Rollins College news.

—Jennifer Stull
Editor-in-Chief