Al Giordano

Al Giordano
16 mins ·

We had a couple of 11th hour cancellations this week from our school that begins tomorrow. This happens each year but I am still not comfortable with it. How does anybody in good conscience apply and get accepted for a program that others applied for and did not get, occupy that space that somebody else wanted very badly, and then cancel at the last minute, when it is too late to substitute them? There are always excuses, most often work or family or both. And then I think of this year's scholar who quit her newspaper job rather than be told by her bosses she cannot attend, and then any sympathy for the cancelling parties flies out the window.

Every time we occupy a space with limited participants we are displacing someone else. To take up that space and then not to fill it is worse than discourteous. It is sabotage. After 14 years of it I have no patience for it. Other people were harmed by losing an opportunity that somebody else tossed into the trash. But wait! The story gets more twisted from there.

A new friend who I've been hanging out with recently simultaneously was begging me to be able to attend the school. I had said "no" because one has to fill out the long application to do so just like everyone else. But when she did it on the heels of the two cancellations on Thursday I gave in. "Okay. You can come. But you must sign the Scholar's Agreement by tomorrow and then comply immediately with the next eight steps we send you to get caught up to speed." Friday went by and she had not done it (a task that takes maybe 15 minutes, max). And yesterday afternoon I informed that the invitation has been withdrawn. Then came the pleading and begging and apologies and suddenly the compliance with the first step. Being a little too soft-hearted I said, "okay, you can come but only if today (Saturday) you complete all eight steps. If you don't by midnight you're out." I was assured profusely that this would happen.

Then midnight came and it still wasn't done. So I had to be the big, bad meanie and definitively withdraw the invitation. This time the apologies and appeals were ignored. And that's that.

I have a lot of tolerance for people's eccentricities and flaws. I have my own, as everybody knows. But when it comes to the school, that's a different story. Do not disrespect the school. And do not ever become a distraction for it or for me while I am in the middle of it. That will lose a person more than an opportunity. It will always lose my goodwill and friendship. The school is the one thing in my life that is more important to me than me. If somebody doesn't respect it, they lose more than an opportunity. They lose my respect.

The good news is that I'll be spending this week with 39 colleagues, old and new, who complied with all that was expected of them to make the 2017 School of Authentic Journalism happen successfully, some of whom made grand sacrifices in order to comply. With that they won, beyond my respect, my loyalty.

Al Giordano, School of Authentic Journalism