EDITORIAL: Without Globe, Suffolk Loses Local Presence

By eliminating the Boston Globe from the Suffolk campus, the Student Government Association took away one of the region’s strongest journalistic entities. But by choosing to replace the paper by doubling the size of the school’s New York Times subscription, the SGA has ignored the value of having the local news perspective on campus.

Put aside, for the moment, the circumstances surrounding the SGA’s decision to discontinue its Globe subscription. It was an overreaction to end the subscription to spite the Globe’s unflattering Suffolk coverage in the first place. But, what was done was done, and before winter break the SGA committed to soliciting the student body’s response in finding an appropriate replacement.

They sent out an email survey, SGA Senator Rob Stanton conducted his own personal survey, and they used the results of a poll from a Voice blog, to gauge public opinion and determine which new paper would best suit Suffolk.

The most popular choices were the Boston Herald, the Times, and USA Today. The Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times also received votes, and some even asked that the Globe be returned to campus.

In the end, the SGA chose to double the Times subscription, reasoning that it was the most popular choice among survey respondents. The Times ran neck-and-neck with the Herald for votes, but in picking the winner, the group should have applied some common sense to the numbers.

The Times is a great national paper, but for one, it’s already on campus. Some respondents complained that they often had trouble grabbing a copy in the morning because there were two few, but that’s hardly a reason to give the Times a monopoly.

Second, without any Boston paper, Suffolk students won’t be able to benefit from having a local news source. The Times rarely covers big issues in the city of Boston and certainly wouldn’t touch most of the news out of the surrounding suburbs, places that are important to the commuter student population at Suffolk.

And third, the decision shows an ignorance of the trends in journalism. There has been a concerted effort in journalism to localize news coverage, to focus on the news that is immediate and relevant to the community. In picking the Times, the SGA has taken the exact opposite approach, swimming upstream against the flow of modern news in favor of nationalized coverage.

With these factors in mind, it should have been a slam dunk to pick the Herald to replace the Globe. Of course, the student body can always find the Boston papers online. But having the local papers physically on campus, in print, would symbolize the school’s desire to keep its student body connected with the community around them.

Imagine: a major Boston university, located in the center of the city, that does not subscribe to a single Boston news source. Does that make much sense?