Volume 85, Issue 6 Web Edition
SERVING BREVARD COLLEGE SINCE 1935
2019 J.R. McDowell Speaker
Inside Politics with Judy Woodruff
By Sam Hipp
staff Writer
PBS NewsHour anchor Judy Woodruff
arrived at Brevard College Thursday, Sept.
19 as the McDowell Lecture Series speak for
fall 2019.
A longtime journalist covering politics in
Washington, including stints as White House
correspondent for NBC News and host of a
weekday show on politics on CNN, Woodruff
spoke in the Porter Center that evening on
the topic “Inside Politics,” during which she
discussed the important and controversial
topics in today’s political climate to a wide
audience.
Among the most controversial topics of
today are the attacks that President Donald
Trump has made on the press, referring to
networks such as CNN as “fake news” and
constantly hurdling insults via Twitter.
“Trump says that the media is the enemy
of the American people,” Judy Woodruff
said in an impassioned speech about these
attacks. “He couldn’t be any further from the
truth. The press is there to serve and inform the
American people.”
She had strongly assured the audience that the
purpose of the press is to report information for
the people, not to act as their enemy.
While upset at the President’s comments.
Woodruff also brought up the issue of why news
outlets are being called out for “fake news.” She
pointed out that there are multiple news sources
that are lacking in journalistic integrity by
showing extreme bias, hiding certain pieces of
news from the public or even outright reporting
falsehoods.
Woodruff moved on to discussing elections she
has covered in the past and what the upcoming
election would probably bring.
“This will probably be the most important
election in your lifetime. I know they always
say that about every election,” she said, “but
so much depends on what happens next year.”
She continued with statements of how both
the Republican and Democratic parties will
be tom up if President Tmmp is reelected due
to the division that he is presently causing in
Washington, D.C.
Left: PBS NewsHour anchor Judy Woodruff presents her talk on “Inside Politics” to a sold-out crowd at
the Porter Center on Thursday evening. Right: Earlier that afternoon, Woodruff met with students, staff and
faculty in MG 125 and answered their questions.
Judy Woodruff
meets with BC
students in MG
By Sam Hipp
staff Writer
Before her “Inside Politics” talk on
Thursday, Sept. 19, broadcast journalist
Judy Woodruff met with students, faculty
and staff to discuss her career and answer
some questions.
Woodruff began her talk with stories of
growing up in a military family, moving
from place to place, wherever her father
was stationed. She talked about the bases
she lived in that were spread out across the
United States and in a few bases in foreign
countries, including Germany and Taiwan.
Her formal education began in 1964
where she attended Meredith College, an
all women’s college in North Carolina, to
pursue a degree in Mathematics. The pursuit
in Mathematics was put off by gaining an
interest in Political Science from one of her
professors. She eventually transferred to
Duke University and graduated in 1968 with
a Bachelor’s in Political Science.
Though she had a great drive to pursue a
career in journalism, Woodraff faced some
rough patches along the way. When she began
as a secretary at an ABC affiliate in Atlanta,
her superiors made sexist comments about
her appearance rather than focusing on her
abilities as a rising journalist.
Sexism did not hold her back. She still
wanted to rise up in a male-dominated field
where women would usually, at best, report
on the weather.
Her career went on during a very turbulent
era for civil rights where women were
gaining better career opportunities, in part
to her efforts as a journalist. Her work for
news outlets such as PBS, CNN and NBC
has empowered women to pursue careers in
the field to where now we see many women
anchoring and reporting for most news
outlets.