All right, we’re just going to come right out and say it: We messed up.

In Wednesday’s Northern Star, at the top of page one appeared a story about how the Student Association Senate election lacked publicity.

So we tried to publicize it, but we didn’t do a very good job.

Toward the end of the article we listed eight candidates for the SA Senate. The problem? The election had 50 candidates, not eight.

We were more than “juuust a bit outside,” as Bob Uecker might say. We are sorry and regret the 42-person error.

Back on Aug. 24, the Star’s staff editorial explained why self-reporting of errors is so important. Without corrections, retractions and apologies, the public trust would erode a bit more every time we made a mistake. Clearly we are far from perfect, but when we do screw up, we try to own up to it.

You may have seen other corrections in the Star, sometimes on page two, other times more prominently.

Much like a correction that ran at the top of page five Sept. 22, egregious errors require blatant corrections. This error is one of those cases.

People make mistakes, but not everyone has theirs published. If you see an error in the Star, let us know; this is your newspaper, not ours.

Reporters and editors strive for accuracy. We definitely don’t want to be seen as the next Stephen Glass or Jayson Blair. While our error may not be as serious as completely fabricating a report, it is still serious. Again, tell us if we mess up. We want to know.

That being said, the SA election still lacked significant publicity – at least five students thought so. And it’s a good bet that if five students thought it lacked publicity, then many other students likely shared that opinion.

So since we have an apology theme rolling here, why stop with the Star’s apology?

“On behalf of the Student Association we would like to apologize to students that felt the election was not publicized well,” SA President DuJuan Smith said. “We will be looking into solutions for the future.”

And we at the Star will, too.

We don’t plan to make errors, but if we do, we’ll be sure to let NIU students and DeKalb residents know about them.

Agree? Disagree? Contact us at

www.northernstar.info.