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The Observer recently received some criticism over typos, misspellings and other errors. It got me thinking about just how common errors are in a news environment.
First, I would like to thank our critics. I will not name all of them, for there are too many to even count. However, it must be said that in this environment, constructive criticism (note I said constructive) is welcomed and in fact encouraged. Newspapers are in perpetual correction mode, you see.
If you read my column, you may remember my piece about my yearbook teacher who passed away. As much as I loved that woman, she was always hard on her students about error, so much so that some of the yearbook typos made it onto the white board every week. Additionally, it was impossible to get a 100% in her class. But going into the semesters in high school, every one of her students knew about this because she said so.
She never gave the 100% grade for one simple fact. No matter how many times a writer goes over a piece of copy, no matter how many people look at it and no matter how many of those people are experts in grammatically correct prose, there will always be at least one mistake that could have been corrected and there is always room for improvement. I never got that 100%, but I did get a 99% once.
Now, as I grow in my career and approach three years at the Rio Rancho Observer, it occurs to me that philosophy still applies here.
Our newspaper is not perfect, and it never will be. Perfection is an imaginative pursuit but doesn’t produce results. Human beings are capable of fault and therefore so is our paper.
This fact is perhaps magnified by the fact that besides myself, there is my editor and another full-time reporter putting in the work. I cannot deny that we are a small staff. Ideally, we would have a desk dedicated to corrections besides us three but, alas, this is the hand we have been dealt.
This means more work for us as a team, but I will say it brings us closer together as a work family. We work in a place we can walk over to each other’s desks and make suggestions about an article. In a fully staffed newspaper, that might not be possible.
The other thing that comes to mind about mistakes is our editorial process. Usually a story starts on a notepad, a sticky note or if you’re out of paper, the palm of your hand. I make sure to take a pen with me everywhere I go for this reason. Then, the idea is pitched to the team. If it is given the go-ahead, we proceed by getting all of our sources in order. Sometimes we can have anywhere from one to even 10 sources in a story.
Here is where the error starts. When people talk colloquially, they make mistakes. There are unnecessary words thrown into the jumble that don’t add to the point a person is trying to make like “like,” “um” and “you know?” Words are mispronounced, mumbled, whispered, screamed, stuttered and dropped off. Then you add dialect to the pile. New Mexicans, especially, have a particular way of conversing that other states may not understand.
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Sometimes it can take us hours to go through an entire recording of an interview or meeting.
Once that is done, we start drafting the article. On top of correcting our sources, we are also mentally correcting ourselves. Usually what we write sounds correct, but then we look at it later to find we interchanged some words that don’t quite mean what we intended. The draft should be checked multiple times by the writer for spelling and grammar, yes. But then we journalists also have to check to make sure we followed Associated Press guidelines.
Those guidelines change every year. One year numbers might be spelled out from one to nine and the next they won’t. A good journalist should be checking those guidelines at least quarterly online and getting the printed copy every year. The AP style is very different from your average English writing.
In English class you were probably told a paragraph consists of five or more sentences. Imagine the reset my brain had to do when I found out that wasn’t the case for journalistic copy. Additionally, simple is better. The less words we use, the more likely a person is to read the article. It is sad, really, as the reason we keep it short is because people’s attention spans are drastically shorter. Adults are capable of about eight seconds, according to the American Psychological Association.
We also have to simplify our words because the average reading level has gone down in recent years. According to National Center for Education Statistics, New Mexico carries about a fourth-grade reading level. The United States holds steady at seventh or eighth grade.
Once the writer has done all that, it moves on to their coworkers for editing.
At the Observer, the editor sometimes makes multiple revision suggestions before sending it back to the writer for review. Then it is sent back to the editor for publishing.
Now, we get to our print ready process. We publish weekly on Thursdays, but we actually get our paper ready to print a couple days prior. Usually, we have until 5 p.m. Tuesdays to make any corrections after getting our layout late Monday or early Tuesday. Again, we have a staff of three, so usually our editor is the one doing the layout while the reporters get out our red pens and make corrections.
It is incredibly nerve-wracking when you first receive review from your peers on the page in red ink, but it is a necessary part of the process. It is the last line of defense before the content is released to the world publicly. Once it’s out there, it’s out there.
While it can be a bit humiliating to find out that we missed a correction, it also can bolster one’s confidence. It develops a thick skin to criticism. It is hard these days because everyone fancies themself a critic or an expert. The critics I take to heart are my family, friends and, most importantly, other journalists.
I will leave you folks with a little exercise. Take a day to tally how many times you say the words “like,” “um,” “right?” and “you know.” I think you may be surprised at how often you insert these unnecessary words or phrases. If you want, take it a step further and see how many times you mispronounce a word. Also, if you are curious, check out the AP guidelines I mentioned.
