From the Editor’s Desk: Covering the Barry Freundel Story

By Jonathan Munshaw
The Towerlight
October 21, 2014

http://www.thetowerlight.com/2014/10/from-the-editors-desk-covering-the-barry-freundel-story/

When I signed up for Barry Freundel’s honors seminar last spring, I never expected to be covering his arrest.

Over the course of the past few days, I’ve received calls and requests for interviews from The Washington Post, The Daily Beast and NBC4 in Washington, D.C.

These requests — as well as my role in covering the story as Editor of The Towerlight — have tested my ability to be a student, a journalist and a human being all at the same time.

On Tuesday, we had our first class meeting under the new professor, who is in just as unfortunate a position as the students. It was emotionally exhausting to say the least. No one knows where to take the curriculum at this point, and it’s impossible to avoid the topic of Freundel’s arrest.

I have never been in a classroom environment where students were on the verge of tears, with some of them even having to exit the room early. Despite the fact that the University emailed students in the class with outlets for support, it still couldn’t have prepared the class for the emotion of the first class back.

These are students who had been invited to Freundel’s synagogue and asked to shower in the mikvah — the same shower that Freundel is now accused to setting up hidden cameras in. Although his court case has not been settled yet, just the accusations levied against him have put these students in an adverse position.

I never went to Freundel’s synagogue, but he was still a professor of mine who I trusted to share his knowledge with me, on ethics no less. Journalists are expected to be perfectly impartial writers, but unfortunately as a student in his class, I have become part of the story.

I will not be reporting any longer on the Freundel story, and will be allowing my more than capable colleagues to handle it from this point forward.

It’s one thing to have to report on an arrest of my professor.

It’s another thing to have to ask students in my class to speak to me about a situation that they were in that now has legal, and more importantly emotional, ramifications.

If any students have been emotionally impacted by this, they are encouraged to contact Christina Olstad, the assistant to the vice president of student affairs, at 410-704-3921.