There’s a new publication coming to campus. The Davidson Lux, a new student run publication, was founded by a group of sophomores and is part of the Student Journalism Association out of the The Fund for American Studies (TFAS).

TFAS is a national  educational nonprofit  that hosts, among their 30 plus. academic programs, seminars, and fellowships, a “Center for Excellence in Journalism.” 

“Fewer conservative- and libertarian-minded journalists are being provided with early opportunities to build successful careers in the press,” their website states. “This has resulted in a skewed and biased media landscape. TFAS seeks to continue to address these concerns and more by offering world-class journalism training for students and fellows nationwide.”

Within the Center for Excellence in Journalism, TFAS runs a program called the Student Journalism Association, which Lux founder Ethan Tran ’28 confirmed the paper is a part of. 

The Student Journalism Association, according to TFAS, “supports young conservative, libertarian and independent journalists who believe in restoring objectivity to the media with a platform to develop their skills, voice and network.”

Publications that are members of the Association have the opportunity to gain $15,000 dollars in funding. They receive this monetary support by “hitting certain benchmarks related to their staff size, the number of articles published, the percentage of articles including original reporting, meeting frequency, and the number of active freshmen.”

The Davidson Lux is one of such publications. It joins in the ranks of publications like The Harvard Salient and The Princeton Tory, journals of conservative thought at their namesake  universities, and other independent publications like the Columbia Sundial and the Madison Federalist. 

Tran said funding from TFAS is “pending”, and that Lux is intended to operate as an “alternative source of news.” When pressed on what “alternative” would include, Tran, who is also Editor-in Chief, had this to say:

“[It’s alternative] to the Davidsonian, whatever media we have, Libertas,” Tran said. “So just an alternative newspaper.”

Managing Editor Ezra Steinman ’28 said that TFAS will have no editorial influence over what they publish, and Executive Editor Colin Blakeslee ’28 said that Lux would be oriented around their writers’ perspectives. 

“[We’re] giving people a space to editorialize, share their views, make their opinions heard, express their voices, their personalities, all the Wildcat pride that defines who we are, right? Davidson, exceptionalism. Lux gives people a space to talk about how they feel.”

A spokesperson for the group Davidsonians for Freedom of Thought and Discourse (DFTD) confirmed that they helped connect students involved with Lux to TFAS, but DFTD itself is not involved with the new paper. 

Tran said that Lux does not have plans to receive funding from DTFD, but he confirmed speaking with them in “June or August” as Vice President of Davidson College Libertarians. 

Other members said that they were looking for funding from any direction. “We would happily accept funding or support from anyone within reason,” Steinman said. 

Blakeslee said that funding was coming from “here, there and everywhere.”

Lux hosted an interest meeting on Sept. 9 with one prospective writer in attendance. At the meeting, it was emphasized that writers for Lux should “own their words”. This student ownership of writing extends to the direction of the paper as well. 

“[The content is] going to be mostly dictated by the students [and] writers we have,” Tran said. “I have a very laissez-faire way of trying to organize this paper. [It’s] mostly what the students want.”

Steinman said that Lux hopes to highlight a variety of perspectives and voices. 

“The Davidson Lux  wants to platform and feature people from all different political persuasions, not just conservatives, not just liberals, [but] everyone and anyone that would like to write for The Davidson Lux.”

Their coverage will largely be published online. 

“We’re gonna roll out a website. It’s gonna be a real stupendous time,” Blakeslee said. 

For now, their website exists on Substack, with a bio describing the paper as “An independent student newspaper carrying forward the liberal arts tradition.”

At the time of publication there were no posts, but a message “The Davidson Lux will be posting its first issue soon.”

As for what readers can expect concerning the paper’s impact and intent, Steinman said that it will simply be another source of news. 

“I don’t think there’ll be any mixing it up that radically. I think that it will serve as another campus newspaper.”