
Mark Memmott
Mark Memmott is NPR's supervising senior editor for Standards & Practices. In that role, he's a resource for NPR's journalists – helping them raise the right questions as they do their work and uphold the organization's standards.
As the NPR Ethics Handbook states, the Standards & Practices editor is "charged with cultivating an ethical culture throughout our news operation." This means he or she coordinates discussion on how we apply our principles and monitors our decision-making practices to ensure we're living up to our standards."
Before becoming Standards & Practices editor, Memmott was one of the hosts of NPR's "The Two-Way" news blog, which he helped to launch when he came to NPR in 2009. It focused on breaking news, analysis, and the most compelling stories being reported by NPR News and other news media.
Prior to joining NPR, Memmott worked for nearly 25 years as a reporter and editor at USA Today. He focused on a range of coverage from politics, foreign affairs, economics, and the media. He reported from places across the United States and the world, including half a dozen trips to Afghanistan in 2002-2003.
During his time at USA Today, Memmott, helped launch and lead three USAToday.com news blogs: "On Deadline," "The Oval" and "On Politics," the site's 2008 presidential campaign blog.
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There's a question that's always good to ask in these cases. If you were that person, would you feel you'd been given a fair chance to either respond or decline to comment? The answer should be "yes."
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Not only are they tired phrases, they're especially inappropriate when another mass shooting is in the news.
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We do not need to add to the loaded language of the day or adopt the label that one side wants to pin on the other.
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There are no exceptions. If a piece being prepared for broadcast has an offensive word or phrase, or involves excretory or sexual issues, care and consultation are required.
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NPR this week discovered ethical violations in many reports prepared for it by freelance journalist
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"Throwaway intensifiers" are wastes of time and space. By cutting them, you can make room for more facts and words that do a better job of moving a story along.
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When debunking falsehoods, it may be best to wrap them around two slices of reality.
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The University of Tennessee Chattanooga has said the decision to terminate the employment of reporter Jacqui Helbert was made by university officials, not…
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A fascinating true-crime case and the shame of being well-rested: two of the stories recommended by NPR staff, using the #NPRreads hashtag.
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Fans and foes want the news media to label the armed individuals who are occupying part of a national wildlife refuge. NPR is trying to describe, rather than characterize. Here's our thinking.