Your responsibility includes everything here and in the General Class Policies. Read both, then sign the contract and return by the third class meeting if you intend to stay in the class. If you have questions, consult the syllabus then consult me. Ignorance will not save you points. General Class Policies Index: ETHICS || FEEDBACK || e-MAIL || WebCT || DEADLINES || ATTENDANCE || ELECTRONIC DEVICES || ACCOMMODATIONS Syllabus Index: TEXTS || GRADING || BRIEFS || OPPORTUNITIES || ENTERPRISE SERIES || THE VOICE || PORTFOLIO || SCHEDULE PREREQUISITES
Advanced writing and reporting techniques, including an in-depth analysis of newsgathering and a focus on beats likely to be covered by aspiring writers, such as government, public safety, education, business, the courts, environment, health and elections.
TEXTS AND SUPPLIES
Suggested Readings:
Syllabus Index: TEXTS || GRADING || OPPORTUNITIES || ENTERPRISE SERIES || THE VOICE || BRIEFS || PORTFOLIO || SCHEDULE
I grade on performance, not effort — it takes great effort to perform. By
practicing the concepts learned in class and meeting standards for style,
grammar, spelling, etc., your work will meet publishable grading standards over
time,
Fatal errors — People can
sue if you publish incorrect factual information, i.e. fabrications and
incorrect age, name spellings, addresses and date or time of an activity. Work
with fatal errors will receive a 20-point deduction for each instance.
B — Publishable article with minor editing and/or rewriting, featuring an acceptable lead, writing and organization. It contains no serious information gaps or factual errors and only minor grammar, style and spelling errors. C — Article might be adequate for publication, but only if extensively rewritten to fix the following needs:
D — Cannot publish article due to:
F — Cannot publish article due to serious defects including:
Your grade includes in-class and out-of-class writing assignments; published
work; campus briefs; news, style and reading quizzes; and attendance and class
participation.
CLASS PARTICIPATION
As noted in the grading scale, you'll receive 100 points for class
participation, which includes good listening and discussion skills, an open
attitude to learning, attendance, effort, professional attitude, making a WebCT
homepage, producing a beat report and attending midterm conferences. Due to the subjective nature of this grade, I suggest getting all the
points available here as I'll assign these points at my discretion otherwise.
STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES
Demonstrate the ability to
write news stories and feature articles fluently, concisely and clearly. Write
publishable news under deadline pressure with few errors and NO factual errors,
culminating in a portfolio. Apply the elements of Associated Press style and the
inverted pyramid, answer the five W's and H, and offer context. Use the Internet as a resource. Stay abreast of current events in business, politics, the arts, finance, science, media and international affairs.
Demonstrate an understanding of the practices
and importance of mass media. Demonstrate an
understanding of journalistic ethics. Demonstrate skill in using the
technologies commonly used in newspaper and magazine production. Syllabus Index: TEXTS || GRADING || OPPORTUNITIES || ENTERPRISE SERIES || THE VOICE || BRIEFS || PORTFOLIO || SCHEDULE
OPPORTUNITIES
What's News? - Bring in three articles on the same topic from three
different prestige press newspapers and one broadcast Web site for each article
type under discussion. Be prepared to
discuss the similarities and differences between the articles.
Speakers - Bring a list of questions you'd like to ask the speaker.
Remember: a good journalist ALWAYS asks questions.
Quizzes — You will take 12 quizzes over the course of
the semester. I will drop the two lowest grades before compiling the remaining
grades for a possible 100 points. Quizzes may NOT be made up.
Articles - You will write a personality profile from your beat plus at least nine hard-news
articles (not including the final project article.) An article fulfilling more than one requirement (e.g. a town
meeting focuses on the environmental concerns) will provide you an opportunity
to write a free article, but does not mean you may miss a deadline. Each article will be
two-to-three pages in length, with no fewer than three separate sources.
Topics include:
Most assignments require out-of-class interviews. Real journalists interview people instead of using the Internet, which should ONLY be used for background purposes for the majority of your assignments. Though you may observe speakers or participants at an event, they will not be counted as individual sources unless you interview them separately before or after the event. Keep copies of all notes to verify quotes and information throughout the semester. All stories must use at least three different sources, which will be identified with contact information if applicable. Employ a combination of sources, including public documents, interviews, library and Internet research, backgrounders and objective reportorial observation. Strive to add different sources in follow-up articles, i.e. repeat sources only when relevant or necessary. At least one article must focus on a cross-cultural issue requiring you to use sources outside of your culture: minority, handicap, gay or lesbian.
All assignments must be submitted in the correct
format to receive credit. All written work will be
stored on a disk. The computer hard drives will be erased regularly; any work left there will be lost.
If you lose your work, you will lose points in the portfolio! It is your
responsibility to have clean copy when you submit assignments for a final grade.
Tip: Though not required, you may use two sets of eyes to look over the
assignment before its submission. Immediately rewrite your graded work.
Not only will it help you understand the attributes of a successfully written
article, it will also prepare you for the portfolio due at the end of the
semester.
Assignment Redo Policy - You learn as you work but my standards remain
high. Most likely, there will be a huge gap between where you begin and end the
semester in terms of your writing knowledge. I will provide you the opportunity to redo an assignment if the
original was submitted on time, provided that you submit the redo and the
original within a week of its return.
— receive once per semester
(your choice!):
Syllabus Index: TEXTS || GRADING ||
OPPORTUNITIES || ENTERPRISE SERIES || THE VOICE || BRIEFS || PORTFOLIO || SCHEDULE
ENTERPRISE SERIES - "Enterprise" indicates you came up with the article idea. Cover a comprehensive subject in a three-part series (three to four pages per section). The subject should develop from one of the areas covered during the semester, or it may focus on a topic or issue that interests you. Submit a one-page synopsis per section of the series; document four sources and contact information for each section. Russell Crowe is known for the research he does on the period pieces he makes, e.g. "Gladiator." We can learn from Crowe, in that you need to do the appropriate research to make a good article. I will be looking for background research in each enterprise series. It's the same work I had to do when writing the pieces on Deltic Timber or the KABF anniversary story. Though the KABF story took 17 interviews to complete, I needed the background from the station manager to understand where the station started in order to explain how far it has come.
Only conducting two or three interviews often fails
to provide the necessary background research required to provide context to a
situation (especially when writing a series of articles).
Prepare questions beforehand (which you
probably do) by doing your background research first (which you might not
typically do), i.e. if you've prepared for the interview by reading relevant
documents, you won't ask unnecessary questions.
Bonus Option: Run your enterprise series over the last three issues of
the semester and receive a 15 percent bonus for the project.
Syllabus Index: TEXTS || GRADING ||
OPPORTUNITIES || ENTERPRISE SERIES || THE VOICE || BRIEFS || PORTFOLIO || SCHEDULE
WRITING for THE VOICE
The Voice Submissions: Use WebCT's
e-mail for submissions to The Voice. This means you will submit an electronic version of your article for the newspaper and a paper version of your article for class (if it's part of an assignment).
As upper-level students, you get first
preference on your
beat
choice. Meet with contacts on your beat
and have them e-mail me to verify the initial meeting. Information from
your beat will appear in The Voice's Around Campus briefs column, which alerts the campus to upcoming events or short bits of news that can be condensed into a single sentence. Some briefs may lead into larger news stories.
You must submit a beat report, i.e. a detailed, two- to three-page memo from the student-reporter to
the instructor-editor that outlines your specific beat, its chief officials and
newsmakers, and elected or appointed bodies. Speculate on the likely news
stories from the beat that will break during the semester. To complete this assignment,
you may rely on handouts, calendars, interviews, Internet sources,
directories, etc. The beat report counts as a third of your class participation
grade.
You may
use the beat report as background for a personality
profile of a newsmaker on your beat, which will count as one of your 10
articles. When writing the profile, remember to gather information similar to
that found in an obituary, i.e. importance to the community, accolades,
education, etc. You will need at least three sources. In this case you could use
the person profiled, a colleague and perhaps a student. At the end of the semester, submit a portfolio containing:
Published work — As each edition of The Voice comes out, clip your story and paste it on a sheet of notebook paper. Label it with the date of publication, and file it in a folder. For each written assignment, provide:
Syllabus Index: TEXTS || GRADING || OPPORTUNITIES || ENTERPRISE SERIES || THE VOICE || BRIEFS || PORTFOLIO || SCHEDULE
If you don't understand something in this Web note, please e-mail Dr. Sitton.
©Ronald W. Sitton 2009 Revised 101309 — http://www.uamont.edu/FacultyWeb/sitton/crz/nrpt.html |
