KAZU Newsroom Policies

The KAZU news team follows NPR’s standards and practices. Our journalists adhere to rigorous standards for ethical reporting, which includes fair and accurate presentation of the stories we report.

We also have the following specific policies:

Covering our license-holder

We make clear when we are reporting on Cal State Monterey Bay, which holds our FCC license through its auxiliary nonprofit, University Corporation at Monterey Bay (UCorp). We mention this at the end of radio stories and include the following after digital stories: Cal State Monterey Bay holds the broadcast license for KAZU. KAZU is solely responsible for its editorial decisions.

Reporting on Underwriters

KAZU relies on contributions from individuals and local nonprofit organizations and businesses. We cover our financial supporters in the same way we cover any other source. In the event we are covering a major funder, we will disclose that on air and on the web. The station’s underwriting department and the clients they work with are not involved in editorial productions or decisions.

Reporting on Ourselves

When KAZU itself, or a station staff member, does something newsworthy, the KAZU news team will aim to report on the station in the same way it reports on any other organization.

This policy is derived from the protocol that NPR follows when covering itself.

Should the news team determine that it needs to cover a story about KAZU, neither the station’s leadership nor UCorp management will have prior review of the work before it is broadcast or published. If necessary, because of news team involvement in the news event, the news director may seek an outside editor and/or reporter to produce the story. In that case, KAZU’s news director will not have prior review of the story.

A statement will be read on-air and published at the end of a web story reflecting how the work was produced, and by whom.

NPR’s examples include, (on the air): “as with all our coverage of our own network, no corporate officials, no news executives have reviewed our report here.” And, on the web: “Under NPR's protocol for reporting on itself, no NPR corporate official or news executive reviewed this story before it was posted publicly.”