Hard hitting news journalism can be found in this week’s issue of the Gettysburger, on newstands now.
Photo Credit: Screenshot/The Gettysburgian
By Jack Gentes and Alex Grun, Professional Reporters
It is a longstanding tradition here at The Gettysburgian to produce an “April Fools’ Day” edition of the newspaper around April 1st. Every year, people get a good chuckle out of the silly fake news reports or stories about odd things going on around the school. While these stories are made in jest, people do not often realize the chaos they can cause. As one of The Gettysburgian’s newest crack team of reporters, the two of us took it upon ourselves to expose the fallout caused every year by this “harmless” tradition.
We first spoke with an alumni of Gettysburg over the phone, who wished to stay anonymous. During her junior year at the Burg, she read in the April Fools edition of the newspaper that her dorm was going to be closed for a week to fumigate it, as there was an infestation of deadly centipedes in the building. Due to this false claim, the student said she had to “…walk all the way over to res life to ask them about the fumigation.” Obviously, this poor student did not realize it was April Fools’ Day. When she arrived at res life, they told her the whole story was a hoax. The two of us were shocked by the undue stress this student was put under, asking about how furious and disappointed she was about the “joke.” She responded by saying, “It really didn’t bother me at all. I thought it was pretty funny. So can you guys leave me alone now?” After this, she promptly hung up. Clearly, she is still traumatized by this event and wished not to speak about it.
As tireless reporters, the two of us were not satisfied by this singular interview. We took our efforts to the streets, asking current students about their experiences with the April Fools’ Day edition of the newspaper. While no one really cared about our cause, we managed to talk to two very outgoing students on this issue. A student who wished to only go by Jack told us that, “The April Fools’ Day edition has ruined my entire college career…I failed a class last year because of it.” Another student who wished to only go by Alex could not even express in words how adversely the April Fools’ Day edition has affected him. He simply broke down in tears. We were shocked by these testimonies, but we must also mention that these two students we met on the street were quite handsome.
Is it really worth ruining lives for a few chuckles? These reporters think not. The April Fools’ Day edition of The Gettysburgian has done enough harm to the students of this campus. In protest of the April Fools’ Day edition we decided to expose the truth, to break the trend of “joke” articles, and write a serious article in order to keep this campus respectable. We truly hope that our efforts go unnoticed.
April Fools Day Special
