CAIR-Chicago Invited to Chicago Tribune Editorial Board Meeting

On Monday Nov. 16, the Communications Department had the opportunity to sit it on the Editorial Board Meeting at the Chicago Tribune.

The Board welcomed Renner Larson, Communications Coordinator, and four communications interns to contribute to the discussion. As the Board discussed possible editorials, the conversation went from media coverage of the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris and lack thereof for Beirut; how technology affects the way young people consume their news, school shootings and our often false sense of security, to a much larger question: what, if any, is the right response to these acts of terrorism? If so, what is it?

Overall, the experience taught the interns that every news story has the potential to be addressed in many ways. Within just the subject of the Paris attacks, the Board discussed social media, school shootings, media coverage, international diplomacy and the refugee crisis. The interns were forced to think critically and respond to the things that seasoned journalists were saying, according to communications intern, Mary Byrne.

"The experience was a lesson in articulating my ideas in a way that would form a stronger argument," she said.

Interns were also surprised to see how the editorial topic selection process works.

“I didn’t expect it to be a conversation,” cartooning intern, Vanessa Barajas said. “It was interesting to hear everyone express their different opinions that way.”

 “I didn’t expect it to be a conversation, either” agreed Ryeisha Farmer, a communications intern at CAIR-Chicago. “I thought it would be more of a situation where someone said ‘this is what we’re writing, who wants to write it?’”

CAIR-Chicago was invited by veteran editorial cartoonist Scott Stantis who has supported Larson's creation of CAIR-Chicago's editorial cartooning internship over the last year.