Ask The Editors

This past week, two talented individuals placed 2nd in differentially prestigious competitions, and were both reported in the paper for mastery in their respective fields. One of these competitors braved laudably over rivals for most resembling his master in a local municipal park; the other, journeyed 2,000 miles to compete against the brightest and most promising young minds in the nation in a high-pressure ring of ferocious mental prowess. Can you guess which of these silver medalists splashed the front page of the Local section with a colossal picture to augment the story?

Though I extend my sincerest gratitude to Fortune for adjourning breaking news, the threshold for my patience was crossed when perusing June 8th’s Local & State section. Nilesh Tripuraneni, a former classmate and fellow science enthusiast, was shelved to obscurity on page B2 following a triumphant victory in the International Science and Engineering Fair—the World Series of high school academic achievement.

The coveted front-page for local affairs was instead bestowed to a leather-clad Shih Tzu posed on a tricycle. In fairness, congratulations are due to Ms McPherson, the owner of the immortalized canine, though the juxtaposition of the winners lends credence to somber criticism: where exactly are the Bee’s priorities in reporting?

Articles chronicling strides in academia are highly critical to contemporary relevance, as these achievements represent the burgeoning of an advancing civilization. These projects are the precursors to the technology any one of us could be exploiting in the future and better instill community pride than, say dog shows, prompting the requirement for this paper to relegate extensive coverage of science and math in the future. The maintenance of a status quo is a most grave offense to logic.

Arjan Singh Puniani
Clovis West H.S. ‘07
UC Berkeley ‘11

Covering academic achievements by local students has always been and continues to be important to The Bee. For example, in the past couple months our reporters have written many stories that focus on academics, including coverage of:

• A local student who made it to the final rounds of the national spelling bee.
• A community college student who won a prestigious scholarship.
• A 2008 version of our annual Academic All Star awards, which honor academic excellence in all grades.
• The achievements of hundreds of graduates throughout the Valley, including valedictorians, scholarship winners and honors college students.

The Bee wants to reflect broad interests in the Valley. We often do that by covering local events, such as the K9 Mardi Gras at Woodward Park where we chose to send a photographer to capture the fun, lighter side of life in the Valley.

Our goal is to offer readers a look at many parts of life here, academic successes included.

Posted by Jack Robinson at 5:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Yes I have a question why do they keep saying that Obama is Black when he is half breed his mother is white and his father black so answer me why does the new's media keep saying that he's black when he is half white and half black I don't understand their thinking so if you would please enlighten me I would be so appreciative.

Timothy Keith Cardenas

The short answer is that we in the news media adhere to the customs of our society, which traditionally identifies people as members of minority groups even if their heritage is mixed. To unilaterally adopt a different model of race would be not only presumptuous, but highly confusing.

That leads us to question, of course, the tradition itself: Why are people with some measure of African or African-American ancestry customarily described as "black" when they are of mixed racial descent? Barack Obama is not the only example. Many people were surprised to learn that Tiger Woods, most often described as black, is part Thai, African-American, Chinese American Indian and Dutch.

A lingering stereotype from the old South, the so-called "one-drop rule, " declared a person black if he or she had any black ancestry at all. Today it's still common for someone whose ancestry is less than 50% "minority" to be identified as a racial minority. But people are increasingly unsatisfied with this practice.

The Census Bureau, private scholarship funds and others have grappled with racial issues long and hard - yet they have so far failed to arrive at a definitive means of pinning down race in this "melting pot" of individuals who may be one-quarter this or one-sixteenth that. Sometimes, the lines of differentiation can seem blurred or even arbitrary.

A final point worth making: We don't really have the luxury of leaving out racial designations altogether in stories about Obama. He is the first person of significant African-American ancestry to claim the presidential nomination of a major political party, and race is often a theme in his campaign. We will just have to do the best we can to identify his ancestry appropriately.

Posted by Jack Robinson at 10:32 AM | Permalink | Comments (3)