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Northeastern’s Lack of Transparency Undermines Student Journalists

The lack of access to university administration makes it hard for student reporters to report fully on campus affairs.

Working for a school newspaper and seldom getting a response from your own school officials can be an important lesson in experiential learning.

For 100 years, Northeastern University’s independent school newspaper, The Huntington News, has been in service to its campus community. In 2008, the News became independent from the university to gain editorial freedom.

As is the nature of school newspapers, significant energy is dedicated to campus affairs. And as students report on more issues that require university comment, from the 2024 pro-Palestinian encampments to employee salary disparities, Northeastern has failed to deliver time and time again.

In 2020, then editor in chief Kelly Chan and managing editor Deanna Schwartz spoke to Georgetown University’s Free Speech Project about Northeastern’s lack of transparency and failure to respond to newspaper interview requests.

Six years on, not much has changed. Emily Spatz, the News’s 2025–26 editor in chief, recently wrote a letter from the editor titled “Why The Huntington News is participating in a Boston City Council hearing about Northeastern’s transparency.”

In her letter, she explained that reporters are normally redirected to media relations for requests for comment, and it’s rare to even get a response from the comms professionals. When administrators do comment, they often don’t answer the reporters’ questions. Virtually all correspondence with the university happens through e-mails with media relations, in accordance with university policy. Even interviews with professors speaking on their areas of expertise are rarely allowed.

“Most of my relationship with them was lots of nonanswers and pushback on our stories,” Spatz said. “One time we were doing a story about [gender salary discrepancies] at the university and we e-mailed the university for comment and one of the media relations people called me and was trying to convince me it wasn’t a story.”

The lack of access to university administration makes it hard for student reporters to report fully on campus affairs.

In 2023, one of the university’s residence halls, White Hall, was shut down after structural engineers found significant water........

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