Storytelling still at the heart of journalism
By Andrea Frantz
Buena Vista University
If I’ve learned anything in my 30 years of teaching journalism, it’s that change is hard, but inertia will be the death of any academic program. What I teach today, at its heart, hasn’t changed a lot. Journalism has always been about great storytelling. But it looks and sounds a lot different.
A 2018 Washington Postarticle by Christopher Daly, posits the seismic changes we have seen in the journalism field in the last couple of decades are not all dire. According to Daly, “NPR is having a banner year, as are MSNBC and Fox News. The New York Times,The Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal are reporting record numbers of digital subscribers…Podcasting, which did not exist as a career five years ago, is exploding.”
In fact, it’s the podcast explosion that brings me to my own embrace of change.
Continue reading “Embracing change one sound byte at a time”
ABSTRACT: Successful college media programs, when judged against their peers, are located in academic departments with faculty-level advisors (Terracina-Hartman and Nulph 2013; Kopenhaver 2015). This study aims to examine communication practices and messages of universities and academic departments that promote these top college media outlets using social media tools. Which is preferred: Facebook or Instagram for celebrating an award? Does a university tag a student newspaper? Or does the department take the lead in announcing? Or does a college newspaper post its good news, tag its home institution, and then academic departments and colleges like, share, retweet, repost and tag? Perhaps the institution, department, and/or student media outlet chooses none of these, making them virtually invisible? The posts – whether celebratory, recruiting, spotlighting an alum, or introducing editors – enhance not only visibility for the college media program, but also produce a level of association between student media and their home institutions.
This free workshop is designed for those interested in the First Amendment – students, teachers, advisers, media professionals and community activists – who want to create creative First Amendment activities in their communities. Sessions include a First Amendment refresher mini-course, discussion about current conflicts, an event planner how-to, a group brainstorm about ideas to educate others about the First Amendment and more.