Should you trust the Monitor? We asked one media watchdog to audit us.

Commentary

We know identifying responsible, credible journalism in a sea of agenda-driven messages and misinformation can be exhausting and overwhelming. As people who study trust in news and train journalists to demonstrate credibility, we believe all people should have access to factual, evenhanded news that reflects their priorities and values.  

That’s why we were thrilled when Editor Mark Sappenfield invited our team at Trusting News to do an audit of the newsroom’s trust and transparency efforts as part of the staff’s Rebuilding Trust series. We have held The Christian Science Monitor up as an example for the news industry to follow, and we were eager to take a deeper dive into the newsroom’s practices.

The short answer: The Monitor is a trustworthy news source, based on a foundation of solid ethics and a public service mission. They could make their credibility easier for the audience to detect, and we’re sending them suggestions along those lines. 

What our trust assessment found

We based our evaluation on 10 themes we have found are foundational when it comes to building trust between journalists and the public. We were able to find answers to some of our questions by taking a close look at the Monitor’s online content, and for others, we relied on interviews with staff members.

1. A solid About Us page. The Monitor has a great About Us page that includes the organization’s mission, perspective, and voice, with a section dedicated to answering questions about the publication's name and its affiliation with the church. It could be improved by linking to a Contact Us page to invite input from readers and by including ethics policies.
2. Ethics policies. The Monitor has many ethically sound internal policies and principles that guide its reporting, including a commitment to correct errors and a form for readers to submit corrections. However, many of its internal policies are not public-facing. Publishing ethics policies would invite important public scrutiny and accountability. 
3. Ownership and funding. The Monitor does get on the record about its name and relationship with the Christian Science Church in an FAQ on its About Us page. We recommend the Monitor go deeper in its transparency around its funding and ownership by explaining how that relationship does and does not influence coverage, and then regularly share that explainer back with readers. 
4. Daily transparency. While readers consume Monitor news, they can also learn how the Monitor operates. The newsroom already has several standard transparency practices that can serve as a model for the rest of the news industry. Staffers in the newsroom routinely insert explainers into stories sharing why they are doing the story and the values behind their coverage. The newsroom also produces an array of columns and podcasts that lift the curtain on its reporting processes and other behind-the-scenes work. As the Monitor publishes more information about ethics policies, we hope those are shared within and alongside daily stories as well. 
5. Audience engagement and input. The Monitor has a feedback form embedded on its website, which appears at the bottom of every article and prompts people to reply with feedback, corrections, or questions. It appears the staff also makes it a priority to be responsive to its readers.
6. Opinion and commentary. It is vital for newsrooms to clearly delineate between straight news and opinion pieces so readers know what to expect. The Monitor does this, with stories that are part of the commentary or Monitor’s View sections being labeled as such. Those labels would be even more effective if they were written into headlines, so that if an opinion story is shared by a reader on Facebook, for example, it is clear that the piece is designed to share a perspective or opinion.  
7. Explaining the Monitor’s value. Telling the story of the values behind its news is one of the Monitor’s real strengths. It’s visible in the mission language on its About Us page, in staff columns, and through its values labels. We hope more newsrooms will follow this lead.
8. Fairness in coverage. From talking to staffers and reviewing Monitor content, we can tell journalists at the Monitor care deeply about being fair and accurate. They want their coverage to feel fact-based and evenhanded to people who see the world differently. The newsroom could do a better job talking publicly about what that looks like day to day and pointing to specific stories of evidence of that commitment. 
9. Staff diversity. It sounds like there is a fairly diverse group of journalists at the Monitor, in terms of racial diversity, lived experiences, religious beliefs, and viewpoints. However, staff acknowledged that it could be more diverse and that leadership wants to move in that direction. At Trusting News, we often ask this question: Who would feel seen and understood by your coverage, and who might feel neglected or misrepresented? Some newsrooms are not interested in having that conversation in a meaningful way, or equipped to grapple with what they might find out if they examined it. Our impression is that the Monitor is more prepared than many other newsrooms to make that question and the resulting answer part of newsroom routines.
10. Newsroom culture. Part of reflecting diverse viewpoints is creating a newsroom culture in which journalists with different lived experiences and perspectives feel encouraged to challenge the status quo or dominant assumptions that might be driving news coverage. This is hard for outsiders to assess, but our sense is that the Monitor has a stronger foundation than many other newsrooms in this area.

We shared more detailed recommendations with the newsroom team with the hope that they continue to evolve their trust and transparency practices.

What the public deserves

In a world in which news consumers are confused and exhausted by information, responsible journalists should be transparent and proactive about why they are worthy of trust. We believe all people should have access to journalism that works to earn their trust, is responsive to their needs, and reflects their diverse priorities and values. 

The Monitor is a newsroom we’re proud to work alongside. We hope you will hold its journalists accountable for living up to the high standards they set for themselves. 

We also hope that local newsrooms in your communities are working to earn your trust as well – regularly examining what they could do to strengthen their credibility and better reflect the communities at large. If they are, they will welcome your input and questions, and we encourage you to be in touch with them.

Joy Mayer is the director of Trusting News. She founded the project in 2016 after a 20-year career in newsrooms across the United States and teaching at the Missouri School of Journalism. Mollie Muchna is the project manager at Trusting News. She joined the project in 2019 after working as a reporter, editor, and producer in newsrooms across the Southwest. They can be reached at info@TrustingNews.org.

This article was not edited by the Monitor, apart from several style changes to make it consistent with the Monitor Stylebook.