Election memo to declared board candidates

This memo is being sent to all candidates for elected office within JEA.

Dear candidate,

Thank you for taking the first step in helping lead JEA during the next three years. Your commitment to service in scholastic journalism is honorable and humbling. We wanted to let you know what the next steps will be.

Please read this memo carefully for the information we need from you, and when.

We will be posting candidate profiles on jea.org on Dec. 20, and those profiles will be available through the election, which occurs Feb. 3-12. In order to make these deadlines, please do ALL OF THE FOLLOWING STEPS BY DEC. 15.

1) Please email to me a current color head shot at least 200 ppi.

2) Please email me your biography. You may include links to your online presence (blogs, for example), but those are not required.

3) Please email me your answers to the following questions:

• What do you believe is the biggest issue facing scholastic journalism, and what would you do as a board member to address it?
• As a board member, what would you do to address the needs of multiculturalism among scholastic journalism educators?
• As a board member, what would you do to address the needs of scholastic press rights?
• As a board member, what would you do to promote the needs of journalism educators in middle schools and junior high schools?

While we are not imposing any word limits on your biography or the answers to these questions, we appreciate your ability to “write tight” so that our members can digest as much information about our candidates as possible.

Along those lines, a note about campaigning: We encourage you to promote a high voter turnout, but we hope you will do so with a sense of respect, civility and discretion. Our members do not want their email inboxes filling up with “vote for me” messages, and JEA’s core value of community clearly sets an expectation against smearing other candidates.

Far be it from a journalism organization to inhibit your free speech rights. Frankly, JEA has no mechanism in place to admonish or disqualify candidates who campaign. But please help us not have to create and enforce rules about civility by keeping the tone of this election professional and positive.

Good luck in the coming months. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to me.

Best wishes!

Jack Kennedy, MJE
Nominations Committee Chair