Do you have summer camp memories?
Mine come from years spent at Camp Wakanhi, a Camp Fire Boys and Girls camp in Walnut Grove, Missouri. There were platform tents and covered wagons and, for the older girls, rows of cabins. I remember the screened-in mess hall, the long hike up a rocky hill to the horses and delightful hours spent at the craft hut.
I started attending camp for one week each summer in elementary school, and each Friday I’d come home sun-burned, covered in mosquito bites, vowing to never go back. And each summer, I did.
I went back for the silly songs, the melty chocolate at the canteen, the goofy counselors I looked up to, and the strangers who felt like lifelong friends by week’s end. Now, I think I also went back for the cicada songs that put us to sleep, the letters from my mom full of details of home and the magical feeling of being out in the middle of the woods and feeling totally safe.
The stories coming out of Texas now, after deadly floods hit the Guadalupe River and Camp Mystic particularly hard, strike me because I had that camp experience and because I’m a parent who has left my children at an overnight camp.
It’s both familiar and awful.
This week, I want to share some great work coming from local journalists in Texas. But first, this story by my colleagues, Angela Fu and Loreben Tuquero, is important for all of us to learn from.
They write:
As torrential rains slammed central Texas and the death toll from the resulting floods grew into the dozens over the weekend, rumors started to spread online about a sliver of good news.
Two girls had allegedly been found alive in a tree near Comfort, Texas. The “crusty, embittered, grouchy journalist” in Louis Amestoy, editor of The Kerr County Lead, was skeptical — but the messages he was getting about the miraculous rescue wouldn’t stop, he said. An on-the-ground social media report from a volunteer seemed to corroborate the story. After sending a reporter out to investigate and hearing from what he said were multiple self-described eyewitnesses, the Lead ran with the story Sunday, which was subsequently shared both locally and nationally.
The only problem was that the story was not true. “100% inaccurate,” as a local sheriff put it.
The story relied on accounts from multiple people. So where did the newsroom get it wrong?
“One of the most important things the Kerr County Lead neglected to do was to reach out to officials for comment on the alleged rescue,” Fu said. “Even if a local official has a history of ignoring media requests or declining to comment for stories, they'll generally speak up if they think a journalist is about to publish incorrect information. Reaching out to local officials likely would've prevented the story about the fake rescue from being published in the first place.”
“Similar to the Kerr County Lead’s report, volunteer Cord Shiflet’s account of the story came from unnamed sources,” Tuquero said. “He said it came from Department of Public Safety officers with badges and guns, but he did not know their names or titles. Without those, it was difficult to determine any credibility.”
I asked my colleagues what journalists should do differently so they and their newsrooms don’t amplify misinformation.
Be very careful with anonymous sources, Fu said.
“The Lead's story is based entirely on nameless sources with no explanation in the text as to why they chose to keep those sources anonymous. All new information that is being reported should be attributed to a source," Fu said. "That gives transparency to the reader, and as Kelly McBride, Poynter's senior vice president and the chair of the Craig Newmark Center for Ethics and Leadership, pointed out, it puts sources on notice. People are less likely to exaggerate or lie about witnessing something if they know their name will be attached to their comments.”
And when news is moving fast, apply extra care.
“The fact that multiple news outlets and reporters shared the story also led so many people on social media to believe it was true, and the story exploded before anyone realized something was off,” Tuquero said. “That shows the need for news media to be thorough and careful in their reporting, especially during tragedies, so they can uphold their audiences’ trust.”
I’m grateful to Kerr County Lead’s editor, Amestoy, for being willing to talk with Poynter and help us all do better work.
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