ink-stained wretches

LaSalle Student Newspaper Rebels Against Administration

Last week, a LaSalle University professor came under scrutiny for inexplicably hiring strippers to appear during a classroom symposium on business ethics. (“[One stripper] was just kind of laying on top of [the professor],” a witness explained. “Not laying on top of him but straddling him. It was like a lap dance, you could say.”) It’s a strange thing to do, but it’s also a great story for a college newspaper. Getting wind of the news, the university-funded paper quickly prepared an article about the incident, but was ordered by administrative officials to hold the story pending the school’s official investigation. They complied, and, of course, ABC broke the story a week later. So frustrating.

The student paper again prepared to run the story on page one, but was ordered by the administration, once more, to hold it, before the dean gave them permission to run the story “below the fold,” on the lower half of the front page, which cannot be seen from a vending box or in a stack of newspapers. Finally, these kids remembered they’re in college, and they did something ballsy. “The story ran Thursday on the bottom half of the front page,” the Philly Inquirer reports. “The top half was left blank, except for four small words: ‘See below the fold.’”

Nice. A solid fuck-you to the man from Vinny Vella, the executive editor of the paper, who plans to pursue a career in journalism. Vella says he doesn’t know how the school will react to the rebellious issue, but it was also his last as editor. “You need to stand up for yourself every once in a while,” he explained. “You can’t let authorities intimidate you.” Kudos. He’ll be smoking cigarettes topless in no time.

Collegian editor at La Salle gets his point across [Philadelphia Inquirer via Runnin’ Scared/VV]

LaSalle Student Newspaper Rebels Against Administration