Editorial Standards & Ethics

Why we publish these standards

A reader cannot see how a story was made, only the finished page. This document describes the work behind the page: how we source, how we write headlines, how we separate news from opinion, and what we refuse to do for a story or for money. We publish it so you can hold us to it, and so that when we fall short you have a written standard to point at rather than a vague sense that something was off.

These are the rules the whole AKRON SCORE team works to. They are not aspirations for a good day. They are the floor on a bad one, which is when standards actually matter.

Sourcing

Every factual claim in a report should be traceable to a source, and where we can show that source we do, with a link to the document, the filing, the transcript or the dataset. We prefer primary sources to summaries of them, and named sources to anonymous ones. When we rely on another outlet’s reporting we credit it rather than launder it as our own.

We grant anonymity to a source only when the information matters, when we cannot get it another way, and when naming the person would expose them to real harm. Anonymity is a shield for the source, not a licence for the reporter, and it is never a way to slip an unverified claim into print without owning it. A single anonymous source is rarely enough for a serious allegation; we look for corroboration and, where fairness demands it, we go to the subject for a response before we publish.

Accuracy and verification

Being fast is worth nothing if we are wrong, and on a breaking story the two pull against each other constantly. Our answer is to publish what we can stand behind and to say plainly what we do not yet know. We do not fill a gap in the facts with a confident guess dressed as reporting. The detailed mechanics of how we check a claim before it goes live are in our fact-checking policy, and what happens when a check fails after publication is in our corrections policy.

Numbers get special care, because a number carries an authority that a sentence does not. We check figures against the original, we watch for the difference between a rate and a total, and we are cautious with statistics that arrive already shaped to make a point.

Headlines, and the promise they make

For most readers the headline is the entire article, so we treat it as part of the report and hold it to the same standard of accuracy. A headline must be supported by the story beneath it. It may be sharp, but it may not claim more than the reporting earns, and it may not turn a maybe into a certainty for the sake of a click. If the story says a link is suspected, the headline does not say it is proven.

The same goes for images, captions and social posts. A striking photo that misleads about what a story shows is a false headline in another form, and we do not use one. When a headline overreaches, that is a correction like any other, and readers should tell us at support@akronscore.org.

Keeping news and opinion apart

News reporting and opinion are different products and we label them so. A report tells you what happened and attributes its claims. A column or an editorial tells you what a writer or the publication makes of it, and it is marked as opinion so you are never in doubt. Analysis, where we run it, is reporting-led interpretation, and it is presented as such rather than smuggled into a straight news story.

Reporters keep their personal views out of their reporting, including on social media where the line is easiest to blur. Wanting an outcome is not a crime; letting it bend the facts in a news story is. The reader gets to reach their own conclusion, and our job is to give them accurate material to reach it with, not to reach it for them under a news label.

Fairness, right of reply and harm

When we report an allegation or a criticism of a person or an organisation, we give them a fair chance to respond before we publish, and we carry the response fairly rather than as an afterthought at the bottom. If someone declines to comment, we say so. If they respond after publication, we add it. Fairness is not the same as false balance: we do not manufacture a phoney equivalence between a well-evidenced fact and a baseless denial.

We weigh harm against public interest, particularly around private individuals, grief, children, and survivors of violence. Being able to publish something is not the same as needing to. We identify people caught up in a story only when there is a real reason to, we handle graphic material with care, and we treat the dignity of people who did not choose to be in the news as something that has to be actively set aside for a reason, not assumed away.

Independence from money and power

What we cover and how we cover it is decided by the newsroom, not by advertisers, not by the powerful subjects of our stories, and not by anyone offering access in exchange for a softer line. No advertiser sees a story before it publishes, and a company that buys space here is reported on as if it never had. The full arrangement is on our ownership and funding page and our advertise page.

We do not accept paid trips, gifts or favours that could buy a slant, and where a writer has a personal or financial interest in a subject they declare it and step aside. Plagiarism and fabrication are firing matters, not slips to be smoothed over. These standards are reviewed as the newsroom grows, and readers who think we have breached one should write to support@akronscore.org and quote the line we broke.

Last updated: August 2026