Al Neuharth Media Center

Our newest Legacy interview shares the impact of Jack Marsh, a 2020 South Dakota Hall of Fame inductee.

From leading the Argus Leader Media to co-founding South Dakota News Watch, Inc., Jack has built a legacy of integrity, truth, and community connection. His lifelong work as a Champion of the First Amendment continues to inspire journalists and citizens alike.

Join Jack Marsh as he shares stories and lessons from a remarkable career in journalism, mentorship, and leadership.

Read the full story and watch the interview here: www.sdhalloffame.org/news/championing-the-first-amendment-with-jack-marsh

Perspective of Conor Friedersdorf. Principles at stake as President Trump attacks higher education:

FREEDOM TO MAKE PERSONAL CHOICES

UNRESTRICTIVE FREEDOM OF THOUGHT

RIGHT TO DUE PROCESS

By Conor Friedersdorf in The Atlantic, May 22

Why defend academic freedom even when the ideas in question are wrongheaded or harmful? “It is precisely because any kind of purge opens the gate to all kinds of purge, that freedom of thought necessarily means the freedom to think bad thoughts as well as good.”

LINK TO FULL ARTICLE https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2025/05/in-defense-of-academic-freedom/682914/

Those words, written in 1953 by Joseph Alsop, an alumnus of Harvard who later served on its Board of Overseers, are relevant today, as the Trump administration cancels the visas of foreign students for viewpointsthat it deems “bad.” And they were relevant in recent years as institutions of higher education investigatedand disciplined members of their communities for expressing views that ran afoul of various progressive social-justice orthodoxies. But Alsop wrote them in response to the McCarthy era’s efforts to identify and punish Communists who were working in academia. Hundreds of professors were summoned by the House Un-American Activities Committee and the Senate Internal Security Subcommittee, forced to appear as witnesses, and pressured to name names –– that is, to identify fellow academics with ties to the Communist Party. Many were then censured or fired and blacklisted by their employers.

“I have been profoundly and actively anti-Communist all my life,” Alsop declared in a letter to the president and fellows of Harvard, published in The Atlantic. “Unfortunately, however, the question that confronts us is not how we feel about Communists and ex-Communists. The question is, rather, how we feel about the three great principles which have run, like threads of gold, through the long, proud Harvard story.”

The first principle he listed was the freedom to make personal choices within the limits of the law. The second principle was “unrestricted freedom of thought.” And the third principle was one’s right to due process when accused of breaking the law. “A member of our faculty is not to be penalized for any legal choice he may make, however eccentric or controversial,” Alsop wrote. “He may become a nudist or a Zoroastrian, imitate Origen or adopt the Pythagorean rules of diet. If called before a Congressional investigating committee, he may seek the protection of the Fifth Amendment, and refuse to testify on grounds of possible self-incrimination. However much we disapprove, we may not interfere.”

By standing for “unrestricted free trade in ideas,” Alsop sought to conserve the university’s ability to extend the frontiers of human thought and knowledge at a moment that has long been regarded as one of the darkest in the history of American academia. But as Greg Lukianoff, the president of the Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE), documented in a 2023 Atlantic article, the threat to academic freedom today arguably surpasses the threat that existed in the 1950s. . . .

CLICK LINK AT BEGINNING OF THIS POST TO READ THE FULL TEXT.

You're invited on Wednesday, May 7th to help us celebrate Dr. Michelle Van Maanen as she retires from her role as Chair of the Media & Journalism Department. We’re throwing an Open House-style reception full of good vibes, great stories, tasty appetizers, and drinks to toast her USD career. The fun starts at 4:30 immediately following the A&S Retirement Event beginning at 3:00. Come to one or both celebrations in the Al Neuharth Media Center's Freedom Forum Conference Room and Concourse. Drop in to say hello, share a memory, or just to say congrats. We hope to see you there.

Rest in Peace, friend and colleague Chuck Baldwin of Burbank, S.D., respected journalist, editor, teacher, mentor, diversity advocate, First Amendment champion, father and husband.

The sad news of Chuck’s death, Dec. 18, 2023, was shared in a Facebook post by his son Josh: “I just wanted to let everyone know that my father passed away this week. Memorial service information will follow at some point, but nothing imminent is planned yet. To his colleagues, students, mentees, and everyone at USD: teaching journalism was one of the great loves of his life. He cared deeply for you all.”

Chuck led an impactful life and career. He leaves a great legacy.

Chuck spent his first 35 years in the news business as a working journalist – editor, photographer and reporter – covering sports, politics, race issues, refugees and other issues, writing columns and editorials, traveling several states and traveling several countries to tell stories.

He was opinion editor of the Sioux Falls Argus Leader until 2007, when he was hired by the Freedom Forum and University of South Dakota to become the first full-time journalist in residence at the Al Neuharth Media Center in Vermillion.

At USD, Chuck was advisor to The Volante, oversaw Journalism City for South Dakota Girls State and taught writing, reporting, media law and ethics to undergraduate students in the Department of Media and Journalism. Chuck ran the Al Neuharth Journalism Scholarship program, supervised newsroom internships for USD students, was a long-time faculty member of the ground-breaking American Indian Journalism Institute and a mentor for a dozen years at the Crazy Horse Journalism Workshop held at Crazy Horse Memorial. Chuck served on the First Amendment Committee of the South Dakota NewsMedia Association and was a founding board member of South Dakotans for Open Government.

Among the well-deserved tributes to Chuck is this post from Dr. Michelle VanMaanen, chair of the USD Department of Media and Journalism: “It is with great sadness that we announce the death of a beloved journalist and mentor. Former Media & Journalism faculty member Chuck Baldwin died on December 18th. As adviser to The Volante and in the classroom, Chuck mentored so many former students who now serve in the industry as digital storytellers, public relations practitioners, and journalists who serve the public interest across the country and beyond. A spring celebration of Chuck’s life is being planned by his son Josh, to whom we send our deepest condolences.”

David Bordewyk of the South Dakota NewsMedia Association writes: "It is with great sadness that we learned of the recent death of Charles “Chuck” Baldwin, a longtime journalist and journalism educator and SDNA friend and colleague. Chuck died unexpectedly on Sunday, Dec. 17. He was 70. Chuck was a career newspaper journalist who worked at the Argus Leader as its editorial page editor. He went on to teach at USD Media & Journalism and was adviser for the student newspaper, The Volante. Chuck was passionate and vocal about First Amendment and free press issues and contributed a great deal to SDNA’s work on those fronts. He was a longtime member of the SDNA First Amendment Committee, mentored at the Crazy Horse Journalism Conference for several years and led various presentations for SDNA on editorial writing. We extend our condolences to his son, Josh Baldwin, who posted on Facebook recently that a celebration of Chuck’s life is planned for this spring."

National premiere Nov. 23 on PBS
“HOME FROM SCHOOL: The children of Carlisle”

An “Independent Lens” featured documentary, for which our accomplished friend Jordan Dresser was associate producer, debuts starting tonight, Nov. 23, on PBS stations and on the PBS Video app. Dresser is a journalist, filmmaker and chairman of the Northern Arapaho tribe on the Wind River Indian Reservation in Wyoming. As a 19-year-old, Dresser began pursuit of his journalism and media career with classes, training and ongoing mentoring provided through the American Indian Journalism Institute, a Freedom Forum program then directed by Jack Marsh at the University of South Dakota. Dresser returned to the USD campus to host a screening of the film on Nov. 19.

ABOUT THE DOCUMENTARY: “Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.” This was the guiding principle that removed thousands of Native American children and placed them in Indian boarding schools. Among the many who died at Carlisle Indian Industrial School were three Northern Arapaho boys. Now, more than a century later, tribal members journey from Wyoming to Pennsylvania to help them finally come home.