Madison County Record honored

HUNTSVILLE — The Madison County Record has won a prestigious award from the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University.

“An unflinching investigation by The Madison County Record into attempts by the Huntsville, Arkansas, school board to cover up sexual assault allegations by junior high school basketball players, is winner of the 2021 Taylor Family Award for Fairness in Journalism,” according to the foundation.

The Madison County Record beat out much larger competitors — including The Washington Post and Miami Herald/ProPublica — who were finalists for the award.

“The reporting by the community weekly with a circulation of just 4,000 and only five staff members found that the local school board members sought to conceal not only the assault allegations but also their decision to reduce the recommended punishment for some students and to throw out punishment for others,” according to the Nieman Foundation.

The Madison County Record’s series was written by Ellen Kreth, the publisher and owner of the paper, and Shannon Hahn, the general manager, with assistance from summer reporter Celia Kreth.

“Our goal was to hold the people in power accountable for the way they handled this,” said Ellen Kreth. “This was not a story that we sought out. When it came to us — we can’t go to bed at night and put your head on a pillow and say ‘I didn’t do what I should have done.’”

Hahn said “I think I went into a shock” when Taylor Award judge Pat Beall called her on April 19 to tell her the Record had won the award.

“I cried and told her how much of an honor that was for us,” said Hahn. “What I think really hit my core was that it was for fairness in journalism because that’s what we strive to make happen with any of our stories, but above and beyond with this series because of the sensitive contents of it.”

“Shannon and I worked together on this,” said Ellen Kreth. “We literally spent hours and hours on weekends trying to piece together the timeline, trying to make sure our facts were accurate. We did get some negative feedback over the fact that we reported it, but never because the facts were incorrect.”

The Madison County Record began its investigation after concerned parents shared Title IX documents with the staff, fearing that the school district wouldn’t be transparent in its own review of the matter, according to the foundation.

Title IX of the federal Education Amendments Act of 1972 is a law to ensure all students have access and equality in education. It offers a wide range of protection related to things such as athletics, admission, housing and sexual harassment.

According to a “Title IX Sexual Harassment Determination of Responsibility” report completed after the internal investigation, the accused players had placed their “genitals in the faces” of several eighth- and ninth-grade boys who were being restrained by other boys in the locker room after games. The practice — called “baptism” — occurred several times during the basketball season, as well as the previous year, according to the report.

Two boys admitted to “baptizing” other players, according to the report. Other boys were cited in the report as helping restrain the victims while they were being “baptized.” Because they are underage and students, none of the boys’ names were used in the report.

The scandal spawned two lawsuits against the school district, one in state court and one in federal court. Both cases are still pending, but school administrators have admitted to several violations of the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act in connection with the state suit.

“We are thrilled to win it, but it’s a heavy story,” said Ellen Kreth. “It’s kind of bittersweet to celebrate it. This story is still ongoing.”

“I was grateful that we were able to be a voice,” said Hahn. “That’s the biggest honor of this series, even though it’s heavy, we got to be a voice for those who felt voiceless and powerless in this process.”

They persisted in their investigation despite public backlash, a loss of advertising and letters and social media comments that questioned their integrity and attacked their decision to print the stories, according to the foundation. After the newspaper’s coverage, 19 people filed to run for seven school board seats. In comparison, no one filed during the last school board election.

“This small paper was punching far, far above its weight class, from its initial decision to publish stories critical of the community’s popular basketball team to its willingness to push back on violations of public meeting laws,” said Pat Beall.

“This strong, impactful series cannot be read outside the context of how the fairness and accuracy of these stories, published by a family-owned, third-generation newspaper in a small community where school basketball is king, would have been challenged in ways no national or major regional news organization would have experienced. These stories allowed the voices of young victims to eloquently rebut the adults’ attempts to dismiss the abuse.”

“The newspaper clearly had inadequate resources to perform such an investigation,” said Emily Corwin, another Taylor Award judge. “And yet this small publication didn’t just shine light on this injustice. It did so with a remarkable commitment to fairness: presenting facts without sentimentality; protecting families’ identities; and returning to update its audiences on developments month after month.”

“Our goal was to hold the people in power accountable for the way they handled this. This was not a story that we sought out. When it came to us — we can’t go to bed at night and put your head on a pillow and say ‘I didn’t do what I should have done.’”

— Ellen Kreth, Madison County Record publisher