Al Gore Goes to J School



February 10, 2001



BOB GARFIELD: This week Gore goes to college and TV dating shows opt for the school of hard knocks.
WOMAN: He doesn't wear underwear. [GASPS AND SHOUTS FROM AUDIENCE]
MAN: It's like Temptation Island! It's cruel! It's cruel. I, I, I'd rather watch gladiator fights.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Also British spies pose as reporters. The Second Coming comes to a theater near you. Fear and loathing at the Olive Garden, and Hollywood's primal scream. [A PRIMAL SCREAM] But first this news.
[MUSIC]
BOB GARFIELD: From WNYC in New York this is NPR's On the Media. I'm Bob Garfield.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: And I'm Brooke Gladstone. Former Vice President Al Gore taught his first class at Columbia University Journalism School this week, but the most important lesson for his students may have been what transpired the following day, and that lesson is: don't provoke the press. Columbia's journalistic chieftains really should have known better. First they call a press conference; then they call it off. Then they say the lecture is off the record, then on the record, then off the record. Then they say it was their decision. Then they say it was Gore's. And then they say it wasn't. At week's end Columbia capitulated and took the gag order off once and for all. What made it all so much worse -- it occurred at the nation's most prestigious journalism school and most of the working press would never admit to setting foot in such a place, the general opinion being that J School is for pampered little wimps.
BROOKE GLADSTONE:The media were not amused. The New York Times said the students learned 3 key points: 1) if a newsworthy person says anything of interest in class, you can't write about it; 2) you can't talk about it either; and 3) plenty of reporters are willing to pay you to break lessons 1 and 2. The Boston Globe said it enabled students to learn firsthand the meanings of off the record, official waffling and passing the buck. The Ventura County Star said quote "the usual course for an electoral loser is not to hang out with a bunch of smart-mouthed ingrates. And the New York Post fumed what a freaking disgrace.
MAN: [SHOUTING] Mr. Gore, why won't you allow the reporters inside?
MAN: It's a school policy.
MAN: Would you, would you invite us in if it was up to you?
MAN: I'm n-- I'm new here! That's above my pay grade. Thank you. [LAUGHTER AND APPLAUSE]
BROOKE GLADSTONE: After the lecture, as the students filed out, they were overrun by reporters.
MAN: I-- Can I talk to you?
WOMAN: Sure-- [LAUGHS] [LAUGHTER]
MAN: Or does somebody else want to do it - you - I heard you, you were already on 5 - does anyone want to do radio?
BROOKE GLADSTONE: One of the students was Michael Arnone.
MAN: It's strange watching the coverage now after the day. It really has become a national story which is quite ironic because when you think about it the class is about national reporting, and he's there to impart his knowledge to us, but the fact that something's that's completely out of his control became the national story related to this just goes to show that you can never expect where the real story's going to come from when you cover something.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Also it tells you a little bit about how the press operates. Were you surprised by how the press operates?
MAN:No, not at all. I mean I have some newspaper experience myself, but it is certainly different from the student perspective and also just as the source perspective to come in and suddenly have all these people swarming around you! I mean I felt like I had rubbed raw meat all over myself and jumped into a pool of piranhas.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Did anybody offer you money?
MAN:Yes, they did. I'm not going to say who or how much, but people were dying for exclusives; dying to get somebody to rat out what happened in the class in the off record section.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: So what happened in the class?
MAN:Well-- Gore came in and you know he's very personable - you know, he's dressed very professorially. I mean he had the cashmere jacket and the maroon sweater vest, and it, it was very much like one of his town hall meetings -- arms spread wide, you know, speaking in his big game show voice, you know, very stentorian, and even though I really can't share the content of what he taught us, he did it very well.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Now you don't agree with this policy.
MAN: No, I don't.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: But you're following it.
MAN:Yeah, well I think it's out of a matter of respect. I understand why they're doing it. I don't think it's necessary; I mean as a journalist you have to respect on the record or off the record or else you cannot work in the business! And it's something that's drilled into us.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: What lessons have you learned from Al Gore lecturing you, either inside the classroom or outside.
MAN:It's gotten everybody at the school really thinking about the value of speaking on the record, off the record - what does it mean - I mean is it bad that the university is trying to withhold information that is most likely harmless? Where is the university getting off in telling journalism students of all students at the university to restrict their speech? I mean we don't know how the lesson's going to end up, and we certainly don't know what the test is going to be, but I think as a learning laboratory this has been absolutely invaluable!
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Michael Arnone, thank you very much!
MAN: Thank you!
BROOKE GLADSTONE:Bruce Cohen is an old-fashioned New York theatrical press agent and I take it you were rather surprised at the way these journalism professionals handled the press.
MAN: Well I was actually very surprised at many of the contradictions in the way they handled the press as opposed to when they're press themselves how they want to be handled, and in my business as a press agent, you either handle the press right or you'll find yourself not handling any press at all!
BROOKE GLADSTONE: And so where did Columbia Journalism School go wrong?
MAN: They probably went wrong first by not hiring a press agent and a public relations professional.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Okay, after the plug, what then?
MAN:The greatest problem I had with the way they handled it was one of their spokesmen said that the lecture is not a news event, but the media was contacted for this! They were invited up for a photo opportunity and were quite taken aback by a journalism school telling their journalism students not to talk to the press! I think that's probably the headline error.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: If they had come to you and said okay, we've got Gore coming; he's giving a lecture; how do we deal with the press?
BOB GARFIELD:Gore would have had a press conference following the lecture, and then he could have commented on what the students asked him, and having just spent the last 16 years campaigning for president, he would know very well how to answer those questions; the journalists would have had their 800 words and their 90 seconds, and it wouldn't have been this embarrassing controversy! But when you have 25 reporters standing outside the door and you tell them no one's going to talk to you, you're going to have this kind of reaction, and Columbia University came off as bumbling. So I do think that the faculty and the administrative staff of Columbia University School of Journalism could use a couple of lessons in PR 101.
BROOKE GLADSTONE: Thanks, Bruce. Bruce Cohen is a press agent based in New York City. [MUSIC]