Opinion editorial

In a weak field, Sharma and Ndengeyingoma best option

Specificity, realistic goals lacking from all tickets

CORRECTION TO THIS ARTICLE: In a previous version of this editorial, Shruti Sharma’s first name was spelled incorrectly on one mention. Additionally, while the original article was not in error on this issue, the ban on electronic communication with undergraduates applied to the candidacy of Jeffrey M. Sperling ’15 and Nathan H. Varady ’16 by the UA Elections Commission was relaxed early Thursday to extend only to email communication. Additionally, the Commission said that new information obtained from MIT IS&T led it to believe that the campaign did not in fact violate the MITnet rules of use as previously stated.

By the end of the week, MIT undergraduates will choose Andrew M. Acker ’15 and Grace E. O’Malley ’15, Shruti Sharma ’15 and Billy Ndengeyingoma ’15, or Jeffrey M. Sperling ’15 and Nathan H. Varady ’16 to be the next Undergraduate Association president and vice president. It is encouraging to see three tickets so eager to tackle the challenges facing undergraduates. But the leaders of the UA need not only detailed, specific proposals, but also the experience and tact to realize their visions.

Unfortunately, The Tech does not believe that any one of the three tickets fully satisfies these criteria.

The candidates’ platforms tend to resemble wish lists rather than detailed policy proposals. Furthermore, vague appeals for increased “transparency” and “communication” were common to all three candidacies in the P/VP debate held by The Tech and the UA on Wednesday, March 12. Nevertheless, we believe that Shruti Sharma and Billy Ndengeyingoma are the best option to lead the UA.

Sharma and Ndengeyingoma have demonstrated thorough institutional knowledge and an encouraging ability to foster relationships with administrators. When pressed to defend the feasibility of students influencing MIT’s policy on online education, Sharma specifically referenced a plan for working with Sanjay E. Sarma, MIT’s first director of online learning. And Ndengeyingoma is particularly adept at articulating the ticket’s plans, as well as providing details of implementation when necessary.

Our optimism is curbed by the fact that several of the ticket’s specific ideas have already been tried, only to be proven ineffective. UA drop-in hours and a monthly newsletter are well-intentioned but simply haven’t worked.

Additionally, while many of their individual platform goals are more feasible than their opponents’, their list of objectives is far too long to be implemented in one term. Still, we believe Sharma and Ndengeyingoma can prioritize appropriately, and we therefore recommend them as the first choice for UA P/VP.

We recommend ranking Andrew Acker and Grace O’Malley second. This ticket portrayed themselves as “UA outsiders” and “fresh faces” and claimed that the ingenuity of their ideas would outweigh their lack of experience. But even slight scrutiny of their platform shows that this isn’t the case.

Student/faculty dinner enhancements, academic mentoring programs by graduates for undergraduates, online resource education for incoming freshmen, and social initiatives are all commendable goals. But they are not compelling enough to overcome a lack of critical institutional knowledge and experience.

Acker and O’Malley were unable to provide specifics on a number of UA and MIT policies during the debate and frequently seemed left out of conversations on topics the UA president would almost certainly have to address. While their leadership skills would be valuable in the UA, the presidency requires a great deal of familiarity with the MIT administration’s processes and workings, which would be difficult to learn, let alone leverage, within a single term.

We believe the Sperling/Varady ticket should be ranked third. We worry that by overestimating the power of the UA, they fail to realize that many of their goals are unrealistic, and they may instead push forward in ways that will damage the UA’s long-term credibility.

For example, their platform indicates that they want to make large changes to the curriculum to increase flexible major options, open the meetings of the Academic Council to undergraduates (while failing to note that even faculty have only one representative on the Council), publicize results of the generally confidential MIT Corporation Visiting Committees, and make significant operational changes to the Student Center.

Each of these projects would be difficult to complete even if the P/VP spent their entire term on nothing else, but Sperling and Varady seem to think that their experience will allow them to achieve their goals through sheer force of will alone.

Most importantly, we doubt that the pair will have the tact and sensitivity necessary to manage complex, confidential, and sensitive situations as P/VP. Sperling repeatedly brought up his experience on other committees as evidence that he was qualified for the job, although Sharma questioned his performance and attendance at such meetings.

To clarify, The Tech spoke to former UA Chief of Staff Ravi M. Charan ’14, who was in charge of selecting students for committees from Fall 2012 to Spring 2013. Charan said of Sperling, “Jeff often missed and rarely paid attention in meetings of the nominations committee (the UA committee that nominates students to faculty-run Institute Committees). Additionally, he did not conduct as many student interviews as other committee members. There was also negative feedback from fellow student committee members about his performance as a member of an Institute Committee, the Committee on the Undergraduate Program.”

When asked to comment, Sperling maintained that he “attended every nominations committee meeting except for those that conflicted with varsity tennis,” and that he “attended all his scheduled interview times.” Regarding the alleged negative feedback from other committee members, Sperling claimed that he was urged to “scale back [his] advocacy on smaller issues so the faculty would be more receptive to [their] suggestions on larger topics.”

Additionally, on Monday, the first day of voting, the pair sent emails to the MIT addresses of many undergraduates, in a violation of both UA election rules and MITnet rules of use, according to an email to undergraduates from UA Election Commission Chair Leonid Grinberg ’14.

This kind of careless behavior would not only impede their work but also potentially threaten the future credibility of the UA.

We cannot forget that all six of these candidates have shown a sincere desire to improve the lives of undergraduates, and we applaud them for doing so. But desire alone doesn’t yield results, and hopefully future candidates will put forward more specific and realistic proposals. Until then, we hope that this year’s field — despite its inadequacies — will still produce an effective administration.

29 Comments
1
John Halloran over 10 years ago

Factual error - Jeff and Nathan do not say that they would seek to "publicize results of the generally confidential MIT Corporation Visiting Committees."

I was at the debate and these words were said by a questioner to them. Their first reaction to the question was to clarify this error.

Their point was to use UA influence to put pressure on under performing departments and to act as a resource for the corporation in doing so.

The underperforming departments Jeff and Nathan mentioned were brought up by the Chairman of the Corporation at a UA Council Meeting. The meeting minutes may be found by MIT students here:

https://web.mit.edu/ua/council/45UAC/minutes/45UAC04Minutes.pdf

Additionally, I wanted to substantiate my comment further and the youtube video of the debate, posted by the Tech, is no longer available. I question why this is not still available since it is highly relevant during the voting period of the election.

It was once found at this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?vztnTkH4I1Mw

2
Anonymous over 10 years ago

1:

From their platform: http://www.jeffnathanua.com/#platform

"Use the results of visiting committee inspections to mobilize the undergraduate population to pressure underperforming departments"

This isn't explicitly stated, but publishing the results is the only way to do this.

(in case the candidates try to change this, took a screen shot, seen here: http://imgur.com/kL4orpi)

3
John Halloran over 10 years ago

Yes, "use the results of visiting committee inspections to mobilize the undergraduate population to pressure underperforming departments" is in their platform. However, you are claiming that publishing results is the only way to do this, but that's not necessarily true. That is an oversimplification of their words. I believe my point stands.

4
Anonymous over 10 years ago

how else would they do so, pray tell? simply telling undergrads "courses 9 and 14 are underperforming!" 'cause that'll definitely rally students to make the necessary changes with all the specific information they now have!

5
Anonymous over 10 years ago

What happened to the debate video???

I wanted to watch the debate before I decided on which ticket to vote for.

6
Anonymous over 10 years ago

To number 4:

How about they actually pass along messages from the Corporation to the undergraduate population. From the council minutes and from councilors I have spoken to the Chairman of the Corporation wanted to make it clear to the UA and the UA Council that there were specific departments that were underperforming. The first time the majority of undergraduates heard this news was at the UA debate. The UA failed in it's responsibility to communicate with the undergraduate population. One of the strongest points in Jeff and Nathan's platform is their plan to improve communication between the UA and the undergraduates. I think they could easily find a way to work this information, that the Corporation occasionally wants to pass, into their plans for increased communication and transparency without revealing the entire visiting committee reports.

7
Judy Hsiang over 10 years ago

The link to the debate video has been fixed. It can be viewed at http://bit.ly/1gvelcV

8
Anonymous over 10 years ago

I have a hard time believing this article represents the views of The Tech as a whole, as it implies. The authors should just state their names clearly.

The UA's scope can evolve over time, especially with a strong desire to change that scope. You can't possibly believe the UA's responsibilities have not changed since it's inception?

Also, to summarize the benefits of your top choice, as you see them:

- They knew who the director of online learning was.

- They will be able to prioritize their long list of objectives.

Please put more critical thinking into these editorials. There is disgustingly little content about any candidates besides Jeff/Nathan, where you put in tremendous effort (relatively) to oppose their ticket. Where are your outside sources to support Shruti/Billy?

9
Anonymous over 10 years ago

To 8: If you read the Tech, it tells you that editorials are written by the editorial board which consists of four people: Chairman, Editor in Chief, Managing Editor, and Opinion Editor.

The whole message of the article was that the candidates are weak, though Shruti/Billy are the best option. That is why the benefits are few.

On the other hand, there are several real reasons to NOT vote for Jeff/Nathan, making them the weakest of the bunch. The fact that Jeff could not consistently attend and participate in his Committees is a SERIOUS issue. The presidency requires much more time commitment than that. He also lacks academic integrity, as evidenced by the Jlab "rumors" (I can first-hand guarantee that these are not mere rumors). It is unacceptable for a UA president to not have academic integrity.

Finally, Jeff/Nathan blatantly violated the MITnet rules of use, which demonstrates serious irresponsibility and unawareness.

Now compared to Andrew/Grace, Shruti/Billy have more experience with the UA, and more knowledge on how it works. But the real point here is that Jeff/Nathan are unsuitable for office.

10
Anonymous over 10 years ago

9 While I don't particularly care about this election, I was actually thinking of doing something along the lines of what Jeff/Nathan did myself, and so I reviewed the MITNet link sent to undergrads, and see in no way shape or form where they violated it.

Could you please elaborate for my own benefit?

Thanks

11
Anonymous over 10 years ago

WRT andrew/grace, can we agree that "UA Outsiders" should be a deterrent to people voting for them? If they don't have experience in or knowledge of the organization they want to run (an organization that just so happens to be one of the largest and most important org's on campus) voters should really shy away from them.

Theoretically, think about you just going into any other student org's elections and running for president, saying you want to "bring a fresh perspective". That org would almost definitely just laugh at you and tell you to become a member and get familiar with the org before actually running the entire thing. Why's the UA different? If anything, the UA should be held to a much higher standard--no other org on campus literally represents all undergrads.

Practically, we saw this year that with two "UA outsiders" who had no clue (and still don't really fully know) how the UA functions, the UA suffers. They necessarily had a huge learning curve to overcome to just be semi-competent at their jobs. Sid Devin's "vision with a checklist" never got realized (at all). Their secretary resigned. They completely ineffectively ran Council last semester. The list goes on.

While I agree with the Tech that the ordering is probably the best in theory, I would say that when voting, people should rank Shruti/Billy first and either leave the rest blank or put random write-in candidates. While all 3 tickets might be "weak", Shruti/Billy are at least the strongest of the 3. Many people on different articles' comment threads and in dorm email list discussions always ask why people don't point out more of Shruti/Billy's flaws, instead of focusing on the negative characteristics of the other two tickets. Well, maybe people should stop to consider that Shruti/Billy have the least amount of negative things to be said about them. Obviously, Jeff/Nathan have a laundry list of flaws. And Andrew/Grace, as evidenced by their platform and performance at the debate last week, just have no clue what they're talking about or getting into. In fact, just go to Andrew/Grace's website and see how serious they are taking this. Their platform is mostly implausible/inaccurate--which is sad because it's already so short. And their "funny" bio's suggest that they are just trolling.

People need to put aside their personal ties to the candidates and actually think about the future of the UA. I don't know them personally, but I've researched enough to know who to vote for.

12
Karleigh Moore over 10 years ago

For those wondering why the authors names aren't shown and complaining that the article does not represent The Tech as a whole-- if you actually read The Tech it specifically states in the Opinion Policy (which is directly below the article in the printed Tech) that "Editorials are the official opinion of The Tech. They are written by the editorial board, which consists of Chairman Annia Pan, Editor in Chief Austin Hess, Managing Editor Judy Hsiang, and Opinion Editor Jacob Landon." Just saying.

13
Anonymous over 10 years ago

To 11: You raise many good points, and I will likely follow your advice when voting. As you seem to be very well-read, outside of the "MITNet Violation" (that I am not so sold on either), could you please point out one verifiable "flaw" from that laundry list? I don't plan to vote for them, but it is getting a little suspicious that there is some sort of organized slander campaign going on against them, and I have yet to see anyone post any factual complaint against them. In fact, every attempt I have seen at such has been shot down with a source to the contrary (e.g. see other debate article comments about Jeff "not being on Presidential Search" when he verifiably was).

One could argue "people don't point out more of Shruti/Billy's flaws" because the other campaigns are not taking a slam approach to the other tickets. It is just as easy for the other tickets to mobilize people saying "Shruti was a horrible CoS and didn't ever show up to her meetings." "She was always late and frequently missed meetings." "She conveniently started institute committee lunches (supposedly) just in time for the election, but failed to be receptive all year." "She has explicitly said she does not care for the job, but just wants to be a Rhodes Scholar". "I can 100 verify she got caught cheating in 20.310" (the one class of mine I think she was in). I am sure there are many anonymous friends of the other tickets who could vouch for this. Food for thought.

On another note, while I am obviously posting anonymously, I wish the Tech would remove anonymous commenting entirely. What does it add, except for a way to start false allegations?

14
Anonymous over 10 years ago

I can verifiably point out one flaw in the Sharma/Billy ticket: they are NOT leaders. Anyone who has talked to them, saw them at the debate, knows them can attest to this. The position of UA P/VP is a position of leadership, and that is not an ability either of them possess. Both are great with policy, and this is not an attack on them, as they are our best bet right now, but leadership ability is not something they possess. According to a friend that is a UA Council member, Shruti would fail miserably at getting anything accomplished in these meetings as it supposedly requires a tremendous amount of leadership ability. I don't know enough about internal UA affairs, but I can't imagine Billy being much more effective at his role either.

As for Jeff/Nathan, if the rumors regarding Jeff cheating in Jlab are true, he cannot be our next UA P, period. However, if they are not I'd make the case that the Jeff/Nathan ticket is our best bet moving forward. They are the only ticket to possess both the institutional knowledge and the leadership ability to succeed as UA P/VP. Consequently, as undergrads, I propose we mandate Jeff to come clean. If he is as innocent as he claims (though I have not seem address this issue at all, actually) then it is not difficult for him to get a statement from the Physics Dept stating such. If he does not do this, he effectively confirms what we all already suspect.

Most people agree the Jeff/Nathan ticket would do the best job moving the UA forward, if it were not for personal issues surrounding Jeff. In fact, not that anyone takes the Tech seriously anymore, but the Tech article is really the first to criticize the Jeff/Nathan ticket for anything in regards to how they'd be as a UA P/VP. They do so by claiming their goals are too big. As an undergraduate, I laugh at this, and as John Halloran's Facebook piece pointed out, the fact the Tech even thinks they can credibly claim to know more about what the UA can and can't do than a current UA Exec member (Nathan) is laughable. They instead applaud Shruti for an approach of more of the same, which clearly is not working. Having a plan to have a functional student government is precisely what we from our student leaders.

In summary, I encourage everyone to hold their votes as long as possible. If Jeff can come clean, he is our guy, but if not (as is likely), then much like the Tech asserts, we are left with little choice other than Shruti/BIlly.

15
Anonymous over 10 years ago

If Shruti was horrible at her job, so much of the UA wouldn't be supporting her...

16
John Halloran over 10 years ago

While I certainly understand why people would want to ascertain the veracity of cheating allegations that have been made against both Shruti and Jeff in comments on this website now, I ultimately do not think that this should be a matter of public record.

I think anonymous comments are cowardly and cannot be trusted. That is why I have signed my name here three times now. The comments claiming that Jeff or Shruti were caught cheating should be removed because they are anonymous, unsubstantiated, personal character attacks in direct violation of the Tech's own comments policy.

I would even hazard to say that the Tech has been selectively negligent in allowing these character attacks to continue against (primarily) Jeff despite the clear confidentiality of student academic records in accordance with FERPA regulations. There is actually no way that the claims can be proven, and should therefore not be allowed.

I respectfully request that all mention of unsubstantiated cheating allegations be stricken from this public record. Any comment with mention of cheating should be deleted immediately from both the comments on this article and any prior Tech articles containing similar content.

Tangentially, I just want to say how disappointed I am that members of our community would feel the need to publicly denigrate another student(s) in this manner. We all are a part of this community because we have a shared mission towards learning and succeeding in our future endeavors. Petty, public accusations of this kind are not only pathetic in a student government election, but also risk damaging the future reputations of all involved. This is truly malicious and not fit for a fair electoral dialogue.

17
Anonymous over 10 years ago

Thank you John. Finally somebody with their head screwed on properly made a comment. You know privacy rights and you

understand maliciousness, and pettiness.

Well done.

Frankly I don't care who anybody

votes for, and I am not here to lobby for one candidate or another. But fair is fair and accusations without any proof are, as John says malicious and pathetic. I fully also agree with John that "Any comment with mention of cheating should be deleted immediately from both the comments on this article and any prior Tech articles containing similar content."

Now my answer to #14.

We live in a country where if someone accuses another, the accuser and NOT the accused must prove the claim. You cannot ask Shruti or Jeff to prove that they are innocent. No no no. That is not how it is done in civilized societies. But all I see from the one person (I believe it is only one person spreading rumors and making accusations) is that he/she says "I know" it is true. Nothing more. Not fair, not right. And I can't believe this person and I will tell you why:

Read the intelligent and informed comments of John Halloran again. FERPA does in fact prohibit the breach of onfidentiality of student records, so my question to the person who is spreading these rumors is this: Even assuming that Shruti and Jeff cheated, (which I highly doubt,) in light of FERPA, no professor or TA would have the right of divulging it, as they would be violating FERPA.

So The only way this accuser would have

access to that information, would be if

HE or SHE snooped into a student's private academic records. If so, how can this accuser be trusted. Violating someone's privacy is cheating itself.

Even more curiously all that he/she says is "I know", and does not have the guts to give his or her name. Again, at least in the U.S., the person who is accused has a RIGHT to know who accuses him. So why don't we ask this person to come forth and identify himself/herself?

One last thing: President Clinton purjured himself in the Lewinsky scandal. That was bad, very bad, but the fact is that despite that, he did a lot for this country. His personal weakness did NOT bear on his ability to preside. Same analogy here. Again I am NOT lobbying for anyone, but I truly believe that the one who can do the best job in this campaign is the one who should be elected, despite all this unsubstantiated nonesense.

18
Anonymous over 10 years ago

I would like to propose that the Tech not be allowed to have an official opinion on the ua elections. Personally, I'm still undecided, and while I think it's great to have discussions about the best candidate, I think it gives an unfair advantage to whomever the Tech ranks first. It was in clear violation, as this article mentioned, of elections procedure for one ticket to send out mass emails to the undergrads. But why is the Tech given the freedom of essentially free "mass emails" to the undergrads?

Notice that there is no chance of rebuttal from the tickets ranked second or third. I would be fine with having members of the Tech submitting this editorial as students of MIT (as opposed to members of Tech). In addition, publishing as the official opinion of the Tech but not publishing other pieces by other people/groups gives this article an unfair sense of authority.

Please reconsider this policy.

Furthermore, if the Tech does decide not to relinquish this power, can it at least consider just putting the objective facts. For instance, in the case about Jeffrey's attendance, I would much prefer a solid number (like he was late by an average of __ minutes for __ number of meetings).

19
Anonymous over 10 years ago

17, Jlab presentations are public, and anyone attending could know whether or not he cheated.

20
Anonymous over 10 years ago

totally agree with 18.

21
Anonymous over 10 years ago

to 19, you don't seem to understand the legal and fairness principles that dictate here. Re-read 17 again, please. All these accusations reek of illegality. And yes, 18 is correct. The Teck is lobbying and that is not cool.

22
Anonymous over 10 years ago

21 please find me the law that states that peers may not divulge legally known information about peers.

23
Anonymous over 10 years ago

19

Only the public final presentation, which is just a public presentation of one of the three main experiments, is public. The 8.13 staff do not post students submitted works publicly; not the powerpoints nor the papers. And it's very easy to present data in presentations that isn't yours.

That said, Jeff dropped 8.13 before the public presentation because he was in serious danger of doing poorly in the class. He frequently missed lab sessions and barely did any work for the class, using all of his partner's work for his assignments. I took 2 terms of jlab and it requires a lot of commitment and ability to work hard and well in a collaborative setting. If he didn't succeed then, then I really doubt his ability to work at this scale.

He's retaking 8.13 right now.

24
Anonymous over 10 years ago

Did Jeff cheat?

Facts: Jeff is still here.

Let's work backwards. What are the possibilities?

1) Prof did not think the incident was serious enough to report to the COD.

2) Prof did report to COD. The COD acquitted Jeff.

3) Prof did report to COD. The COD did not acquit Jeff, but the incident was not considered drastic enough to warrant suspension.

Bottom line: MIT allowed Jeff to remain part of our community despite this incident. Given that, I have a damn hard time holding it against him.

Also, 23: You suggest that his UA commitment will be equivalent to his 8.13 commitment. That isn't how people work. Should I not elect anyone who isn't fully committed to their GIRs? After all, the institute has decided they're as necessary to our education as every one of our major classes.

25
Anonymous over 10 years ago

I totally agree with 24. The same analysis should apply to Shruti. She too is still here and part of the community despite any allegations. We need to be fair to her as well.

26
Anonymous over 10 years ago

18, 20, and 21:

from dictionary.com:

lobby (v.):

"to solicit or try to influence the votes of members of a legislative body."

Students are not a legislative body. The Tech is not lobbying anyone for anything. Know what words mean before you use them.

The Tech is its own entity and is fully within its rights to endorse any candidates it pleases, just as every other group or person is free to endorse any candidates they choose. The people who wrote this are elected to their positions and are literally writing this on behalf of the Tech, not just the individual students.

As any newspaper has the right to do, the Tech chose to write an editorial that endorses a candidate. Any news publication can do this. And if an editorial didn't give an opinion and just stated objective facts without drawing any subjective conclusions, it would just be another news story, not an editorial.

For an editorial (again from dictionary.com) is:

editorial (n.):

"an article in a newspaper or other periodical presenting the opinion of the publisher, editor, or editors."

Or take the Tech's definition:

"Editorials are the official opinion of The Tech. They are written by the editorial board, which consists of Chairman Annia Pan, Editor in Chief Austin Hess, Managing Editor Judy Hsiang, and Opinion Editor Jacob London."

Again, please look up words before you use them.

The Tech has exactly zero obligation to present all/any side(s) of any issue. The Tech is an independent newspaper that has its own control over its content. You don't like that they did this? Talk to them. Write an op-ed of your own. Go join the Tech and change things. You think it's unfair? It is. But the Tech has no obligation to be fair. Don't like that? Go do something about it. (And no, complaining about it on a comments thread is not actually doing anything substantial about this.)

The Tech can write this editorial because they are an independent newspaper that has every right to do so, just any other newspaper does. Candidates, however, are bound by election rules set by the governing body that runs the elections. As the Election Commissioner stated in his emails to undergrads, what Jeff/Nathan did was a violation of the campaign rules, so they were sanctioned for it. You are comparing apples and oranges here. You don't like the election code? Go talk to the Election Commission. Hell, go JOIN the Election Commission. Do something substantial.

27
Anonymous over 10 years ago

I'd like to point out that Shruti was accused of cheating in a class that she hasn't actually taken...

28
Austin Hess over 10 years ago

The Tech uses this opportunity to remind readers that it makes no assurance of the factual accuracy of claims presented in the comments section of its website. In particular, critical readers should remember that anonymous comments do not constitute standalone journalistic evidence and should be treated with whatever credibility usually afforded to anonymous comments.

While some criticisms made in comments on this article are fairly personal, they are also very relevant to the election and office at hand, hence The Tech's decision to leave them up. Nevertheless, we recognize the potential for overly negative comments and believe the discussion has become unproductive. Therefore, we urge commenters to carefully consider any statements made from this point on, as well as encourage all commenters to use full names when posting comments. The Tech reserves the right to close the comments section if unproductive discussion continues.

While The Tech is normally equipped to investigate claims of misconduct, federal law prohibits it from obtaining student academic records, which is the only definitive source on some of these claims, meaning it is not in a position to substantiate or refute these criticisms.

-Austin Hess, Editor in Chief

29
Anonymous over 10 years ago

The elections are done and the results in and what I write therefore has nothing to do with politics.

I am however deeply concerned and saddened about the lack of integrity of the Tech and its Editor in Chief Austin who bears the responsibility for steering all his staff towards ethical, fair and responsible journalism. Instead, the Tech goes so far as to blatantly deny that fairness has anything to do with ethical journalism. That is a disgrace, and evidence of the failed leadership of Austin Hess as the Techs Editor in Chief.

Read comment 26 to discover the cavalier attitude of the Tech: Tech states:

YOU THINK IT'S UNFAIR? IT IS. BUT THE TECH HAS NO OBLIGATION TO BE FAIR.

Wow. No obligation to be fair??!

Then there is the way the Tech, blatantly spins words, and omits all definitions of a word to show that they are not lobbying. Here is how the Tech defines the word lobby and surmises that what it has done is not lobbying.

lobby (v.):

"to solicit or try to influence the votes of members of a legislative body. Students are not a legislative body. The Tech is not lobbying anyone for anything. Know what words mean before you use them.

Here is the additional definition of Lobbying which the Tech conveniently ignores so that they can feel justified in being unfair.

Dictionary.com To Lobby TO ACT IN THE MANNER OF A LOBBYIST.

So, No, lobbying is not just an interaction with a legislative body. You, as journalists are supposed to be word smiths. You should know this.

And also see some examples that Miriam Webster online dictionary gives of the use of the word to lobby in sentences:

1. A player who has lobbied hard to be included in the teams starting line up.

2. I lobbied our company for a new computer.

Amusing and at the same time disturbing that the Tech has to resort to censorship to support its crude and cavalier unfairness.

Power corrupts. And we see that with the Tech and Austin Hess.

Hey 26, you asked me to write an op-ed to oppose your views. I just did. Lets see it published in the editorial section of the next issue of the Tech.