Covering the New College Story with Steven Walker

In this episode of the Palm Court Podcast, we are joined by Steven Walker, Education Reporter at the Sarasota Herald-Tribune, who has been on the ground covering the “hostile takeover” of New College of Florida. Just as the battle for the Sarasota School Board was heating up, Walker arrived, excited to step into his first job after graduating from the University of Florida Journalism School and working as the Editor-in-Chief at the student newspaper, the Independent Florida Alligator. Dropped straight into highly politicized, polarizing and seemingly interminable school board meetings, Walker live-tweeted the scene, and published articles that would soon have national relevance. It was good preparation for what came next when Ron DeSantis announced the takeover of New College’s Board of Trustees. Walker’s prior experience with sports and political reporting became increasingly relevant in covering the evolving New College education beat. Walker highlights the importance of maintaining journalistic integrity, while presenting the many facets of a story without amplifying bigotry or misinformation. Initially unaware of New College and its unique history and philosophy, Steven quickly got up to speed. He details his process tracking the story's developments, from the removal of the president to the appointment of new trustees and the introduction of an athletics program. We learn about Walker's investigative approach, strategizing public records requests and building relationships with key sources. Steven emphasizes the challenges of balancing the sound and fury of daily reporting with in-depth, enterprise journalism, along with his desire to dig deeper to cover topics of educational substance beyond the political machinations. Steven encourages listeners to support local journalism, subscribe to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune and follow him on Twitter for updates on both the New College story and his sometimes strident basketball commentary. Notes: The Independent Florida Alligator has an interesting history, vis-a-vis “Independent.” Walker’s athletics coverage became a key part of the overall picture at NCF. Walker received attention (and awards) for his coverage of the unfolding absurdity of the Sarasota School Board takeover, live-tweeting the meetings as the brand-new education reporter in May 2022. Bridget Ziegler, if you somehow missed this story, is the anti-gay GOP star who fell from grace when her taste for FFM threesomes came to light, as part of a (CW) assault investigation that ended her husband’s career as leader of the Florida Republican Party. Before the fall, she had fun with fundraising when Moms For Liberty was declared a hate group by the SPLC. Walker covers the drama surrounding her continued presence on the school-board. NCF remembers her as a member of the presidential search committee that certified Richard Corcoran as president. Walker plays Twitter pretty well, from livetweeting key events to the tougher game. The Nulls sailing team competed in the SAISA conference for more than a decade, and NCF intercollegiate athletes got rowing, swimming and powerlifting medals regionally, at the state level and competed nationally. Walker discusses the notion of newsworthiness and public interest, at times with pushback from radically different constituents, including the recent story about a New College student athlete accused of felony battery of a Sarasota police officer. The Jefferson County scandal is large and complicated and here is one way in. The prose is purple; the facts are solid. Florida had some of the first and strongest Sunshine Laws (thanks, Reubin Askew), but that’s been changing over the last year (thanks, Ron DeSantis). The MSNBC coverage of the NCF “hostile takeover” has been surprisingly thorough and long-running. The Catalyst couldn’t get a sit-down with Corcoran, and then it did … with “autonomous electric vehicles to shuttle students”?