Policies

The Vanderbilt Hustler’s policies regarding guest editorials, Letters to the Editor, comment sections, anonymity, content, advertisements and corrections and updates are as follows:

Guest submission policy

We welcome op-eds from members of the Vanderbilt community who are not on staff. We do not allow non-Vanderbilt-related op-eds. These pieces will undergo an editing process similar to staff-written pieces. All Vanderbilt students (undergraduate and graduate), faculty, staff and other community members are encouraged to submit guest editorials and Letters to the Editor for review and possible publication. Guest editorials and Letters to the Editor may be eligible for anonymous or pseudonym publishing in cases of threats to the author’s safety and/or health privacy. These will follow anonymity guidelines for The Hustler and will be applied at the discretion of the editorial team. We reserve the right to edit submissions, determine whether to publish guest submissions based on our discretion and decide the publication timeline of submissions. The submission of a guest editorial does not guarantee publication.

Guest editorials: Guest editorials must relate to Vanderbilt in some way. We prefer guest editorials to remain at around 1,000 words.

Letters to the Editor: Letters to the Editor are more brief responses to a piece of news or opinion that has been recently published in The Hustler. We recommend that these remain under 250 words. They must relate to a particular piece published in The Hustler and must be submitted within a week of the publication of the piece to which they react or respond. At the discretion of the editorial team, Letters to the Editor about the same topic may be published in groups.

Submit a guest editorial or Letter to the Editor here.

Comment sections policy

The Hustler welcomes and encourages readers to engage with content and express opinions through the comment sections on our website and social media platforms. The Hustler reserves the right to block users or remove comments that contain vulgarity, hate speech, personal attacks or that appear to be spam, commercial promotion or impersonation, including those submitted using a fabricated or unverified email or display name. The comment sections are moderated by our Editor-in-Chief, Rachael Perrotta; our Managing Editor, Jorie Fawcett; and our Social Media Director, Jennifer Son. You can reach them at [email protected], [email protected] and [email protected].

Anonymity policy

The Hustler anonymity policy for sources and authors follows the AP standard for anonymity, and requests for anonymity will only be granted if they fall under this standard. The Hustler reserves the right to grant anonymity on a case-by-case basis. A request for anonymity does not guarantee anonymity. The identity of anonymous individuals must be known to the editor of the section in which their quotes or writing will appear, as well as to our Editor-in-Chief, Rachael Perrotta.

Requests for anonymity that have been granted historically include those related to FERPA, HIPPA and Title IX regulations, members of the LGBTQ+ community whose gender/sexual identity is revealed but who are not out and individuals who would face legal, academic or professional repercussions for having their name attached to a piece.

Content policy

Vanderbilt Student Communications (VSC) does not allow the removal of content, including but not limited to author and source names, parts of articles or quotes, articles, editorials and photos, from online archives of its divisions once the content has been published in any format. For more information on this policy, please reference VSC’s Bylaws. If you have any questions, please email our Editor-in-Chief, Rachael Perrotta, at [email protected].

The Hustler reserves the right to determine its own content in a way that aligns with our mission, goals and audience. The focus of and information included in our articles, while potentially informed by sources and internal research, is ultimately our journalistic decision. We welcome pitches from the community.

The Vanderbilt Hustler does not publish advertisements of any kind, with the exception of occasional promotions for other VSC organizations. The only guest posts that are permitted are guest editorials and Letters to the Editor, which must be written by individual(s) affiliated with the Vanderbilt community.

Corrections and updates

Occasionally, corrections and updates will be made to pieces that contain either inaccurate or misrepresented information or for which additional, relevant information has been obtained post-publication, respectively. The Hustler works to minimize errors in publication and to issue corrections in a timely manner. Corrected articles can be viewed here. If you are aware of an error in Hustler content, please contact our Editor-in-Chief, Rachael Perrotta, at [email protected].