Education Reporter Resigns From WBEZ Chicago Public Radio education reporter Jay Field (pictured) is no longer at the station. Field has not so far responded to my attempts to find him (call me, Jay!). Earlier today, however, WBEZ managing editor Sally Eisele stated that Field had resigned, as of Friday, April April 18th, but said she could not provide any further details.
It looks like Field was at the station for roughly seven years, the last two and a half of them on the education beat. The first education story that I can find from Field is from October 2005. The last story that I can find posted on the WBEZ site is April 14th -- about students returning to DuSable after a recent scare. A list of his pieces is here. (A bunch of his work was also picked up by the national, NPR. See list here.)
His LinkedIn profile says he's a graduate of Colby ('94). He won a Lisagor for a piece he did with Julia McEvoy in 2003 -- perhaps as a freelancer. According to this website, he joined the station in 2001 as a general assignment reporter.
Field's departure seems sudden and may have been unexpected, given that he only recently returned from paternity leave. I'm still hoping to find out what, if anything, happened, and who, if anyone, will replace him.
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Thu May 1, 2008 at 2:42 PM
Education Reporter Resigns From WBEZ
Say it ain't so! Let's hope Jay shows up again soon in the Chicago media landscape, and that WBEZ fills his role with an equally thoughtful reporter.
Thu May 1, 2008 at 7:08 PM
Education Reporter Resigns From WBEZ
his education stories never seemed to get to the real story imho
Fri May 2, 2008 at 12:48 PM
Education Reporter Resigns From WBEZ
Feder says:
Jay Field is out after seven years as a reporter at Chicago Public Radio WBEZ-FM (91.5).
Field, who most recently was on the education beat, was forced to resign over allegations that he had fabricated a story, sources said. The story never made it on the air.
http://www.suntimes.com/business/feder/928116,CST-NWS-feder02.article
Jay Field is out after seven years as a reporter at Chicago Public Radio WBEZ-FM (91.5).
Field, who most recently was on the education beat, was forced to resign over allegations that he had fabricated a story, sources said. The story never made it on the air.
http://www.suntimes.com/business/feder/928116,CST-NWS-feder02.article
Mon May 5, 2008 at 2:24 AM
Education Reporter Resigns From WBEZ
I thought Jay Fields's reporting tended basically to the "He said/but she said" talking head variety of non news that passes for "balance" today, but that's a general problem with any news outfit that refuses, as a matter of policy, to go behind the numbers. It's kind of a cheap shot to "report" (as in the Sun-Times?) on an ethical problem, and then not provide at least some details or rebuttal time.
The "fabricated" stories on the education beat in Chicago usually come out first days of the week based on sourcings that are spoon fed by CPS propagandists to selected reporters (including those at WBEZ).
The news fabrication business in Chicago begins at the highest levels of government, controlled by Mayor Daley or his people in the outposts (Peter Cunningham and the propagandists at "Communications" for example). CPS gets these guys and gals to set the general narrative line, which is then spoon fed to the "reporters."
Suddenly, the city is supposed to be obsessed with the latest line of attack on facts. For a couple of years the most important big lie has been "deficit" (even as revenues were going through the roof and CPS couldn't spend all the extra dollars on patronage). That lie was used to screw hundreds of special education kids and buffalo a federal judge (via the Tribune; Sun-Times; and NPR) two years ago.
This year got really exotic. it's "underperformance" (as opposed to context for low test scores) or "underutilization" (my favorite, repeated by every non-entity in the news business in Chicago this year). Using "average" attendance rates to hide all of the centralized neglect of the general high schools in this year's round of teacher bashing attacks on "poor performing" schools was one of several places where the general approach to news reporting in this town was dangerous. Another was using the ACT scores of the high schools as the measure of anything at all about a high school's value. But Arne got away with all those nonsensical ploys -- "underperformance"; average absence; ACT "progress" -- because of reporters like Fields.
So the danger remains. As long as nobody's asking any serious question at the dog-and-pony shows, this problem will remain. It's about to get very serious this week, when the Lie Factory sprays out all those phony numbers about the "capital" program on the one hand, to be followed next month by the bigger lies about the operational budget, on the other.
If my colleagues in the press corps aren't willing to read the real data (which have to be dug out then studied over time, like the budget numbers that come on stage beginning this week and for the next eight) and demand answers beyond talking points, it doesn't matter which of them sits primly at Board meetings or at the mayor's media events and takes dictation from Mom and Dad. The stories are always going to wind up the same --
the general line of the Daley administration and its corporate sponsors.
The "fabricated" stories on the education beat in Chicago usually come out first days of the week based on sourcings that are spoon fed by CPS propagandists to selected reporters (including those at WBEZ).
The news fabrication business in Chicago begins at the highest levels of government, controlled by Mayor Daley or his people in the outposts (Peter Cunningham and the propagandists at "Communications" for example). CPS gets these guys and gals to set the general narrative line, which is then spoon fed to the "reporters."
Suddenly, the city is supposed to be obsessed with the latest line of attack on facts. For a couple of years the most important big lie has been "deficit" (even as revenues were going through the roof and CPS couldn't spend all the extra dollars on patronage). That lie was used to screw hundreds of special education kids and buffalo a federal judge (via the Tribune; Sun-Times; and NPR) two years ago.
This year got really exotic. it's "underperformance" (as opposed to context for low test scores) or "underutilization" (my favorite, repeated by every non-entity in the news business in Chicago this year). Using "average" attendance rates to hide all of the centralized neglect of the general high schools in this year's round of teacher bashing attacks on "poor performing" schools was one of several places where the general approach to news reporting in this town was dangerous. Another was using the ACT scores of the high schools as the measure of anything at all about a high school's value. But Arne got away with all those nonsensical ploys -- "underperformance"; average absence; ACT "progress" -- because of reporters like Fields.
So the danger remains. As long as nobody's asking any serious question at the dog-and-pony shows, this problem will remain. It's about to get very serious this week, when the Lie Factory sprays out all those phony numbers about the "capital" program on the one hand, to be followed next month by the bigger lies about the operational budget, on the other.
If my colleagues in the press corps aren't willing to read the real data (which have to be dug out then studied over time, like the budget numbers that come on stage beginning this week and for the next eight) and demand answers beyond talking points, it doesn't matter which of them sits primly at Board meetings or at the mayor's media events and takes dictation from Mom and Dad. The stories are always going to wind up the same --
the general line of the Daley administration and its corporate sponsors.
Mon May 5, 2008 at 2:31 AM
Education Reporter Resigns From WBEZ
Sorry to forget...
The biggest spun story of the past 12 months (anniversaries coming up) is the Dead Kids story that links the problems of Chicago's massive drug gang murders to CPS (rather than the guy in City Hall and his allies in half the wards sitting in City Council) and "guns."
Most reporters who are trying to figure that one out from outside Chicago have noticed that the Dead Kids are all from a handful of schools (most notably "Youth Connections" charter school) and all off campus.
But taking the story to the "next level" (I love some of Arne's cliches, even if they're generalized across his generation of corporate apologists) and asking how 30 years of Richard M. Daley (State's Attorney; Mayor) power leaves us with the biggest gang problems north of the Rio Grande River is still a work in progress.
The problem isn't "guns." It's guns in the hands of drug gang shooters.
The problem isn't "violence", it's the violence that's steaming out of Chicago's drug corners and gang turfs.
But as long as Chicago can shift the narrative to "guns" and "violence" (two convenient abstractions, without social or economic roots in the policies of the past quester century), we get these bizarre Ground Hog Day media events. Marches. Recycled stories. And a town that seems to refuse to even take pictures of the walls in the alleys or the stalls in its public school washrooms and ask what all those symbols mean.
The biggest spun story of the past 12 months (anniversaries coming up) is the Dead Kids story that links the problems of Chicago's massive drug gang murders to CPS (rather than the guy in City Hall and his allies in half the wards sitting in City Council) and "guns."
Most reporters who are trying to figure that one out from outside Chicago have noticed that the Dead Kids are all from a handful of schools (most notably "Youth Connections" charter school) and all off campus.
But taking the story to the "next level" (I love some of Arne's cliches, even if they're generalized across his generation of corporate apologists) and asking how 30 years of Richard M. Daley (State's Attorney; Mayor) power leaves us with the biggest gang problems north of the Rio Grande River is still a work in progress.
The problem isn't "guns." It's guns in the hands of drug gang shooters.
The problem isn't "violence", it's the violence that's steaming out of Chicago's drug corners and gang turfs.
But as long as Chicago can shift the narrative to "guns" and "violence" (two convenient abstractions, without social or economic roots in the policies of the past quester century), we get these bizarre Ground Hog Day media events. Marches. Recycled stories. And a town that seems to refuse to even take pictures of the walls in the alleys or the stalls in its public school washrooms and ask what all those symbols mean.
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