It was the Spectrum editor-in-chief, then Brendan Williams, who gave me my first tour of the Sacred Heart campus when I was a senior in high school. He showed my parents and I the Spectrum office and media arts editing suites I now occupy most of my week in. The following spring I was a freshman sitting in Professor Kabak’s CM-211 class, listening to then editor-in-chief Maddie Beekman pass down article-writing advice. The next fall semester, the current editor-in-chief George Triebenbacher was running our weekly Sunday meetings, mentoring the new editors, me being one of them. As the current editor-in-chief, it isn’t lost on me that I have big shoes to fill.
Being recognized by the Princeton Review is immensely gratifying to the work of our staff writers, editorial board—both past and present—and faculty advisor Professor Kabak. Spectrum alums and current Spectrum staff have gone on to work and intern at professional news outlets including NBC, NBC Sports and Fox.
George Triebenbacher, Moira Staples, Shannon Tuttle, Theo Weismann, Daniel Greene, Jack Cavicchi, Jordan Dorsey and their predecessors have all left their respective marks on Spectrum.
In Prof. Kabak’s CM 211 class, we are taught that a journalist’s job is not to tell the public what to think but to peel back the curtains for the public, giving them a window into what is happening so they can make up their own minds.
As Spectrum writers emerge in their craft, they cover news from as local as our immediate campus area to as far reaching as national headlines. What do our fellow students think? Faculty and staff?
Keep reading, keep asking questions. Spectrum is dedicated to remaining Sacred Heart University’s student-run newspaper, training emerging journalists, photographers and public relations professionals in their respective areas.
National news outlets tend to focus on the Washington, D.C. news bubble. Working on Spectrum has shown me that local news can provide insights into the world beyond that bubble. Global news is no doubt important to our media and global literacy, but the twenty-four hour news cycle can feel exhausting as it washes us with the same headlines reported by different talking heads each hour. Local news is essential in anchoring our shared experiences and broadening our knowledge.
Finally, to our Sacred Heart community, thank you for your continued support for Spectrum.
