News-Record.com

We were picketed by some A&T students this afternoon for unfair and negative news coverage. They didn't like the frequency with which we wrote about the State Auditor's report concerning the alleged misappropriation of funds at the school.

For the record, we published four stories about the report from Aug. 26 through Sept. 11. All on the front page above the fold.

Meanwhile -- in an odd juxtaposition of timing -- we published feature stories about the marvelous A&T band Saturday and the rich history of the ROTC program at A&T this morning. Both were on the front page. Update: I switched the pub dates on the ROTC and band stories. The band piece ran today. The ROTC story ran Saturday.

Newspapers write about the good and the bad in the community. We must write about the apparent misappropriation of nearly $400,000 at the state institution. We wrote three stories pegged to the Auditor's report because A&T gave us additional information about what happened with each story. But all that has little, if anything, to do with all the good things occurring at A&T. We would be derelict if all we wrote about were problems at A&T. We haven't.

Personally, I'm delighted the students came over. They are civically engaged, keep up with the news and read the newspaper. That's a good thing no matter how you slice it.

By the way, I was interviewed by The Peacemaker and WFMY. WXII called, but I could never reach them on my call backs.