Report the story, don’t become part of it.
This is one of the first lessons students learn in Journalism 105, the required prerequisite for any aspiring journalism major at Arizona.
A month into class, I failed at this objective in the most humiliating way possible.
As I stepped out of Saguaro Hall after a J-105 morning lecture, I opened my phone to a text and missed phone call from the Arizona women’s basketball sports information director. The tone was urgent. The message was clear.
Then-head coach Niya Butts wanted to speak to me about a column I’d written in that morning’s Daily Wildcat, accompanied by an unflattering front-page headline.