OPPORTUNITIES
You will read chapters and
do assignments for each meeting as listed in the schedule.
Readings and assignments MUST be done prior to class,
as we often will discuss them. Don't be the one holding your classmates back.
I grade on performance, not effort — it takes great effort to perform. I
do not grade on a curve as your objective is skill mastery. While it's OK to
err, penalties increase for repeated mistakes. You only compete with yourself as skill mastery demands time and practice.
Articles - You will write a beat report and personality profile from your beat plus at
least seven hard-news articles, i.e. not including the
Enterprise Series, you'll write nine total articles, five of which qualify for The
Voice.
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. 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.
All stories must use at least three different
sources, which will be identified with contact information for follow-ups (if
necessary by the publication editor or the adviser).
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. 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, you MUST ask additional questions before or after the
event for the sources to count. Remember: people come to your
publication for the story behind the story, i.e. if they attended the city
council meeting, they read your account to find something they previously did not know. Keep
copies of all notes to verify quotes and information throughout the semester.
Each article will be at least 1,100 words in length or longer; provide the word
count after your -30- mark at the end of the article. All assignments must be submitted in the correct
article format and rich text format to receive credit.
We use RTF documents because they can be read regardless of operating system or
software; if you don't understand RTF, ask me about it.
Process
Interviewing: 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.
Keep copies of all notes to verify quotes and information throughout
the semester.
Writing: All assignments must be submitted in the correct
format
to receive
credit. Store work on a disk of your choice, but also send it to yourself to an
off-campus email so you'll never have to worry about losing it. The computer hard drives
in the lab will be erased regularly. Any work left there will be lost.
If you lose your work, you will lose points in the portfolio!
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.
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.
Mulligan Policy - You learn as you work but my standards remain
high. I will provide you the opportunity to redo one assignment for a better
grade near the end of the semester.
— receive once per semester
(your choice!):
- publishing an article written for class in a recognized non-campus
publication (100 points)
- publishing an additional article in The Voice (70 points).
- reviewing a journalism novel by the 13th week of the semester
(70 points).
First Interview - Use the First Day Survey to
interview your classmate. Write a brief profile of them and make sure you get it right! Email the profile you've
written to your classmate for verification, then submit it to the
Editor-in-Chief of The Voice. To practice, edit your profile written by your classmate whenever you
learn something new in class. AP STYLE hint: Check ages,
nicknames, composition titles, courtesy titles, academic titles, addresses,
Internet, Web, newspapers.
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The following assignments must be done over the course of the semester. Individual information follows each assignment topic. However, you may determine the order in which you attempt these articles as news does not necessarily happen when you want it, e.g. no one can predict weather hazards at the beginning of the semester, but if you write about them when they happen you could fulfill your public safety requirement.
1 Beat Profile
2 Beat
1 Local Gov't
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1 Public Safety
1 Education OR Business
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1 Survey/poll OR election
1 Specialty (Science, Health, Environment, Religion)
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1) BACKGROUNDER/BEAT REPORT - After meeting contacts on your beat, combing through the archives of The Voice
and viewing handouts, calendars, interviews, Internet sources, directories,
etc., write a 750- to 1,000-word backgrounder detailing the following:
- Name your specific beat and a little background information, but do
NOT provide a cut-and-paste from the Web site of the school
or division covered by the beat.
- Who are the chief officials and newsmakers?
- Name any clubs or organizations within the beat, and the elected or
appointed officials of each.
- Detail any special services provided within the beat.
- Provide links to previously occurring newsworthy events found in the
morgue of The Voice. Do yourself a favor and see what's been written
previously.
- Speculate on the likely news stories from the beat that will break
during the semester, e.g. upcoming trips, speakers, application deadlines,
etc.
You may
use the beat report as background for a personality
profile of a newsmaker on your beat.
2) PROFILE - Profile either a new professor or the chief official on your
beat. 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.
NOTE: Be careful to write with AP style and make sure you do not use
passive voice or personal opinions. Remember to provide sources and an end-mark.
This may be suitable for publication in The Voice.
3-4) BEAT ARTICLES - Choose and write two newsworthy articles from your beat in a hard news manner. In your portfolio review, explain how you found the articles and what news values led you to cover the issue for each. NOTE: Be careful to write with AP style and make sure you do not use
passive voice or personal opinions. Remember to provide sources and an end-mark.
These may be suitable for publication in The Voice.
5) LOCAL GOVERNMENT - Choose a story that fits a local government angle as detailed in class discussion, then write
an article. If covering a meeting or speech, remember DO NOT
write this article in chronological order; instead, lead with the MOST IMPORTANT
topic of the meeting or the speech. NOTE: Be careful to write with AP style and make
sure you do not use passive voice or personal opinions. Remember to provide
sources and an end-mark. This may be suitable for publication in The Voice.
6) PUBLIC SAFETY - Write an
article about the police department, fire department, emergency medical
technicians or a natural or man-made disaster. Remember: Hard news articles should feature a lede of 35 words or less.
NOTE: Be careful to write with AP style and make sure you do not use passive
voice or personal opinions. Remember to provide sources and an end-mark. This
may be suitable for publication in The Voice.
7) EDUCATION/BUSINESS - Choose one of the two genres, then write
an article. Either should explain the angle of how a new program or new business benefits the campus community.
Although an Assembly article could technically count as an education article, we'd typically consider it as local government.
NOTE: Be careful to write with AP style and make
sure you do not use passive voice or personal opinions. Remember to provide
sources and an end-mark. This may be suitable for publication in The Voice.
8) SURVEY/POLL/ELECTION - Write an article describing and analyzing a survey, poll or election
that conforms to AAPOR standards. If
you write a hard news article, the lede should be 35 words or less. If you write
a feature-type article, make sure to have a nut graph by the third graf. NOTE:
Be careful to write with AP style. Remember to provide sources and an end-mark.
This may be suitable for publication in The Voice.
9) SPECIALTY - Choose either a science, environmental, health or religious topic to cover and write a news article fit
for The Voice. Explain how diverse groups will be affected within your copy. You may want to write about something happening on your
beat. NOTE: Be careful to write with AP style. Remember to provide sources and an
end-mark. This may be suitable for publication in The Voice.
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WRITING for STUDENT PUBLICATIONS
Good communicators do not write for themselves, i.e. they always consider their audience. Community feedback encourages along the way and sometimes discourages threats to the community standard..
At least five articles should qualify for inclusion in The Voice,
i.e. you should write articles with the campus community in mind as your
audience. They depend on you to be their eyes and ears at functions they cannot
attend.
For every Voice article above the minimum (not counting the
Enterprise Series), you will earn an additional 2 percent to your grade prior to
grading. You're responsible for keeping track of your
published articles on your disk. These will be added to your portfolio at the
end of the semester. To count for credit, the story must meet the
format criteria.
CAMPUS BRIEFS
As upper-level students, you get first
preference on your
beat
choice. Meet with contacts on your beat
and have them email 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 five briefs, worth up to 20 points each, over the course of the semester.
Briefs must be submitted at least once every three weeks.
Briefs must follow proper AP style and journalistic format. If you don't submit a brief during the three-week period, you miss the deadline and LOSE 20 points.
PORTFOLIO
At the end of the semester, submit a DIGITAL portfolio containing:
- resume
- links to published work, labeled with name of article
- backgrounder/beat report
- five news briefs (on one page with NO AP errors)
-
nine writing assignments
For each written assignment, provide printed copies of the following:
- an edited version of your article — I will be looking for AP style, passive voice, grammar, punctuation and spelling errors. This version should be virtually free of those!
- an original copy of your article — This is the version originally returned to you. I may not catch every mistake the first time, so be sure you look for mistakes in addition to the ones I caught the first time.
- paragraph detailing the lesson learned from this experience — Next to the article, or on the next page, briefly explain one thing you learned from the process of writing the article, e.g.
- What did the copy-editing of the story teach you about conciseness, accuracy or news style?
- What problems did you encounter covering the story and how did you solve them?
- What news values does the story contain?
ENTERPRISE SERIES
Your portfolio will not contain your final project, i.e. your enterprise series. "Enterprise" indicates you came up
with an article idea worth more than a single story. Cover a comprehensive subject in a three-part series
(~1,500 words 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.
Critics praise Russell Crowe for the
research he conducts on each period piece he makes, e.g. "Gladiator." We can
learn from Crowe, in that you must conduct the appropriate research to make a
good article. You should feature background research in your enterprise series,
similar to that necessary for articles on biofuels or the
KABF anniversary.
Though the latter took 17 interviews to complete, background helped the reader understand where the station started in order to
appreciate 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
hopefully already 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.
These enterprise series originated as class projects. Some show higher quality than others, yet they may have earned similar grades due to deadline adherence
as well as the bonus option taken by some, i.e. run your enterprise series over the last three issues of
the semester and receive a 15 percent bonus for the project (prior to grading).
At least one series led to a student being named the second best reporter in the state!
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