How we verify

The paper's job is to report what is true, say how we know it, and fix it in public when we get it wrong.

Our labels

Every piece carries one of four labels at the top of the page and in our feeds.

• News: reported and verified. Every factual claim is tied to a named source. Nothing is published without a primary source (a person we spoke to, a document we read, an event we watched) or two independent sources, and a written verification log of what was checked against what.
• Analysis: an interpretation of reported facts. Held to the same sourcing rule as news and labelled so a reader knows judgement is involved.
• Opinion: commentary, the view of the writer. Still fact-checked, never presented as a report.
• Faith and Culture: a commentary column, labelled as commentary.

The fact-check

Before a piece can be marked fact checked, a second student or a parent works through the same list for every article: every claim has a source; names and spellings are checked; numbers, dates and quotes are verified against the original; the language is neutral, with no loaded words; the piece is fair, with opposing views represented and anyone criticised given a chance to respond; no private detail about any person appears; and any help from an AI tool is disclosed in the verification log. A writer never checks his own piece.

Who publishes

Only a parent can approve a piece and publish an issue. The software refuses to publish an issue if any article still has an unticked check, an unapproved image, a link that is not a plain web address, or anything that looks like a phone number, an email address, a street address, a schedule or a name on the family's private never-publish list.

Corrections

When we get something wrong we say so on the article itself, with the date, and we keep a public log of every correction. A piece that should not have been published is retracted and its page says so. Each term the editor publishes a count of corrections and what the newsroom changed to prevent repeats.

The newsroom code

Seek the truth and report it. Minimise harm. Act independently. Be accountable and transparent. These are the four principles of the Society of Professional Journalists' code, and we hold them as a matter of conscience: "You shall not bear false witness." In practice: every claim has a source; two independent sources for anything contested; primary sources first; a clear line between news and opinion; disclose it when a machine helped; and the writer owns the work under the byline.

AI

No sentence written by an AI tool is published. A tool may be used to check a fact or suggest a question, and when it is, the verification log says so.

Readers and privacy

The paper sets no cookies, runs no third-party scripts and keeps no record of who read what. It counts page views per day, without addresses, so the students can study their audience. Readers can subscribe by email as adults only, with a confirmation step and a one-click unsubscribe in every message.