Journalism dean search: Dean candidate brings experience in newsroom, but lots of controversial history

Part of a Stories Beneath the Shell series covering the appointment to dean of the University of Maryland’s journalism school.

First published Saturday, March 25, 2023 in Stories Beneath the Shell.

She’s doubled the number of reporters of color in her newsroom. She capitalized the “B” in Black before anyone else. She turned her newsroom majority female. She led a massive project that looked at where former President Donald Trump’s wall would go and what communities it would cut through.

These are ways USA Today Editor-in-Chief Nicole Carroll describes herself as she embarks on a quest to become the next dean of the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill College of Journalism. 

But Carroll lugs heavy baggage with her. She published blackface in her college’s yearbook, which she has since apologized for. She is also the president of Gannet’s news division, a media conglomerate that has laid off almost half its staff since 2019. 

“It’s a problem,” she said when asked about the cuts, but said she was not responsible for those decisions to hire and fire staff. “I can tell you, in every job I’ve had when anybody has come to me for list of cuts, the first thing I say is, ‘Let me get your revenue instead.’”

If chosen by Provost Jennifer King Rice, Carroll would be the dean of Merrill College and succeed Lucy Dalglish, who is in her 11^th year as dean. Josh Madden, the journalism school’s assistant dean for undergraduate studies, said that the perfect candidate for dean would value diversity, equity, and inclusion, would be willing to advocate for the school, take criticism well, and have a vision for the college of over 400 students and over 100 staff and faculty.

During Carroll’s half-hour presentation to a packed room of faculty, staff, members, and students in the Knight Hall’s Eaton Theatre, she highlighted her poor upbringing, working three jobs to put herself through college, her struggles in the newspaper business as a woman, her attention to diversity, and her role in defending journalism and journalists. 

“She’s very impressive in front of a room,” said one person familiar with her speech, speaking anonymously to speak freely. “She can work the crowd and she seemed to do that.”

Upon wrapping up her glossy presentation, faculty members took turns grilling her about her past, her plans to work with for-profit news corporations, and her attitude toward diversity.

She said she came from 1970s Texas, where there was no education about race, so she didn’t even remember publishing two students at a Halloween party wearing blackface in Arizona State University’s yearbook. 

“I didn’t know what I didn’t know,” Carroll said. “I grew up in a place that didn’t have DEI and none of that but going to college and then especially graduate school. I went through that transformation, and I see the power of that for students, for communities, for universities.”

That’s the power of education, she said. Nowadays, armed with that knowledge, she said she more than doubled the number of editors of color to 38% and changed the newspaper to be majority female for the first time since her arrival on the job five years ago. 

The paper’s record on diversity is not without its critics, though. USA Today fired Hemal Jhaveri, a columnist at For The Win, after she tweeted that mass shooters are “always” white men. She later deleted the incorrect tweet and apologized, saying that it didn’t represent her “commitment to racial equality.” 

Jhaveri was soon fired, though not by Carroll. But Jhaveri said it spoke to USA Today’s record on diversity and inclusion.

“Like many places, USA TODAY values ‘equality and inclusion,’” she wrote, “but only as long as it knows its rightful place, which is subservient to white authority.”

Moreover, she argued, she was fired while Carroll was able to keep her job after publishing blackface and after a congressional inquiry revealed that the paper’s Washington bureau chief hosted a celebration for the administrator of Medicare and Medicaid appointed by Trump. Jhaveri did not respond to an email seeking comment.

Carroll said the news organization is actively combatting systemic racism, pointing to a declaration in July 2020 announcing the establishment of a diversity committee and reiterating that Black lives matter. That committee has helped USA Today implement new policies that require at least one diverse candidate to be considered for open positions. The committee also revamped its crime coverage to follow cases all the way through, rather than merely reporting a person’s arrest, in addition to USA Today shining a light on diversity “success” each morning with a story or an interesting source. 

“I don’t have all the answers, she said of her strategy on diversity. “It’s got to be collaborative.”

Collaboration with others will be a key factor if she becomes the dean of one of the country’s leading journalism schools. She would oversee over 500 students, staff, and faculty. She portrayed herself as an “educator” ready to dive into the deep end. But, many were quick to point out, she comes without any previous experience working in an academic setting.

“I think she would be a horrendous dean,” another person familiar with her speech said. “And I have absolutely no idea how she managed to rise to the top of the candidate pool.”

The school not only trains the next generation of journalists, according to the source, but also has a scholarly arm and makes contributions to journalism and its ethics.

Her connection to Gannett, the conglomerate media company that owns USA Today and hundreds of other publications, raised many eyebrows. It has laid off over 10,000 people in four years – about half its staff.

“I worry what hiring someone with the association long association with a company like Gannett says to the larger universe,” the first source who spoke on condition of anonymity said. “You don’t want a Gannett model to be the one you strive for.”

Perhaps the aptest question was asked during her meeting with students: Why leave such a position at one of the United States’ biggest newspapers? 

She is passionate about helping people grow and succeed, she responded. About saving journalism. About saving democracy.

“I see this moment of time as all of these forces are aligning where the universities and nonprofits and for-profit companies can align together to do more together than we can do alone,” she said. “And I see Merrill, with your reputation with your programs, your student body, with your faculty, you are in a prime position to make a big difference in the life stage journalism and frankly, democracy. Who wouldn’t want to be a part of that?”

Her possible departure from USA Today should she receive the position, she said, has nothing to do with recent cuts and other editors leaving the paper – her application predated that crisis considerably. 

The one thing she didn’t do, some felt, was outline a comprehensive vision for the college. She outlined her achievements as editor-in-chief, promised to look into specific things such as graduate students having to work 32 hours a week for the Capital News Service, and noted her support for the college’s strategic plan. 

One phrase by author Maya Angelou that Carroll repeated seemed to encapsulate her philosophy best:

“Do the best you can until you know. Then, when you know, do better.”