journalism – College Media Review

Weathering the storm

Strategies for sustaining student media in times of crisis

By Patti Piburn and Kim Lisagor Bisheff

Abstract

Student reporters in KCPR, using remote technologies, continued producing and broadcasting live news on-air throughout the pandemic and during subsequent disruptions. This qualitative case study examines the remote strategies adopted by the station in the lockdown to determine what should remain, with two goals in mind: keeping broadcast student media going in a future crisis and better equipping journalism graduates. Semi-structured interviews with graduates who were part of the radio news team before, during and after the pandemic reveal that they acquired and refined crucial soft skills during their remote student media experience. The graduates report that their experience equipped them for a “new normal” in the workplace. They described gaining such soft skills as confidence, resilience and adaptability as well as improved organization, communication and collaboration. While in-person reporting is preferred, blending remote work, and the technologies that support it, into student media makes the organization more resilient and better prepares students for transformed newsrooms. Continue reading “Weathering the storm”

‘The Journalism Salute’

Podcast highlights people who believe in journalism

A Q&A with Mark Simon

What is your podcast about? Why?

My podcast, The Journalism Salute, is a journalism appreciation podcast. It’s meant to show

1. That working in journalism is a great career path.
2. There are so many different options someone could pursue.
3. That journalists are NOT the enemy of the people.

I do 30-35 minute interviews with journalists about who they are and what they do. It’s their platform to talk about the backstory- the how and why behind what they do.

Continue reading “‘The Journalism Salute’”

Legal analysis: Why Sarah Palin (still) matters for student journalists

‘This is—and has always been—a case about media accountability’

By Carolyn Schurr Levin

You may be tired of reading about Sarah Palin and her potentially “groundbreaking” libel case against The New York Times. However, so much has happened since our 2019 analysis of her case that I thought it was time for an update. I will focus on how the recent 2022 court resolution of this 2017 libel lawsuit impacts what student journalists do, and how best for campus media advisers to advise them.

First, a bit of background. On June 14, 2017, The New York Times published an editorial entitled “America’s Lethal Politics,” which stated that there was a connection between a 2010 advertisement by Palin’s political action committee and the 2011 Arizona mass shooting of U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords, D-Arizona, and others. The byline for the editorial was “By The Editorial Board.”

The New York Times changed the language of the editorial and published a correction two days later, on June 16, 2017, after readers noted there was no connection between the Palin advertisement and the Giffords shooting. The correction read, in full: “An editorial on Thursday about the shooting of Representative Steve Scalise incorrectly stated that a link existed between political rhetoric and the 2011 shooting of Rep. Gabby Giffords. In fact, no such link was established. The editorial also incorrectly described a map distributed by a political action committee before that shooting. It depicted electoral districts, not individual Democratic lawmakers, beneath stylized cross hairs.” But, The New York Times did not apologize to Palin. Continue reading “Legal analysis: Why Sarah Palin (still) matters for student journalists”

Applying Scanlan’s ‘The Coaching Way’ to media design instruction

Editor, adviser can assume coaching role

By Melanie Wilderman

I first heard of Chip Scanlan’s “The Coaching Way,” in 2004 when I was preparing to teach my first college-level class, Introduction to Media Writing, as a very green master’s graduate and new adjunct instructor for my alma mater. I was 23 years old and, like many new instructors, terrified my students would think I was a fraud. “The Coaching Way” saved me that first semester. It guided me as a teacher as much as it helped guide my students.

SAMPLE 1 — SAMPLES: In examples of students’ final designs for the basic business card assignment, note that they make decisions concerning color, font and placement of simple shapes to create the business cards. In doing so, they are primarily practicing the concepts of dominance, balance, hierarchy and space in their work.

For those who may not be familiar, Scanlan, a seasoned journalist and former writing instructor for The Poynter Institute, detailed his approach as an editor in a 2003 Poynter article. He said he approached coaching journalists first with the question, “How can I help?” Then he listened to the answer. Sounds simple, right? Even Scanlan admitted this, but it’s an important first step, and what follows is a more intense progression of open-ended questions throughout the writing process and a back-and-forth between editor and journalist (or, in educational settings, between teacher and student) that requires participation from both parties. He calls this style “The Coaching Way.” Continue reading “Applying Scanlan’s ‘The Coaching Way’ to media design instruction”

Navigating disasters and tragedy as a journalist

‘Empathy to the forefront’

By Christine Bartruff
University of South Carolina Honors College

A chemical smell. A haze in the air. Broken windows. Abandoned jugs of milk. Through the eyes of a reporter, this was the scene in Minneapolis following protests against police brutality sparked by the killing of George Floyd.

Erin Ailworth, Midwest correspondent for The Wall Street Journal, spoke to students via Google Hangouts while she was on the ground in Minneapolis. Ailworth is well-versed in covering heavy subject matter. She’s been The Wall Street Journal’s go-to disaster reporter since 2017, reporting on hurricanes, wildfires and, most recently, protests.

READ AILWORTH’S STORIES
IN THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

When interviewing people, especially those who are traumatized by the events she’s covering, Ailworth exercises empathy. Approach people gently, she said, without shoving a camera or notebook or recording device in their face. Start with introducing yourself, and then ask if they would be willing to talk with you. Continue reading “Navigating disasters and tragedy as a journalist “

Hight reminds student journalists to take care of themselves

Sound advice from the Mega Workshop

By Bradley Wilson, CMR Managing Editor

When it came to the opening of the College Media Mega Workshop in Minneapolis, Joe Hight asked the 350 or so students what they all have in common.

Quickly, the students stated the obvious.

We tell stories
We all individually tell stories
We have deadlines
We’re nosey. We’re curious as well.
We’re skeptical.
We follow a set of ethical standards
We’re passionate. When you lose that passion that’s when u go into cynicism.
We’re here for the truth. People wonder what the truth is these days.
We’re tough. Only heard three or four of you say yeah.
We ask the tough questions.

Then Hight turned the talk into what he really wanted students to start thinking about.

He asked, “I’ve always learned how journalists are resilient. Is that a myth?”

Continue reading “Hight reminds student journalists to take care of themselves”

2017 more like ‘1984’ than 1984

Survey details collision in classrooms between literature and reality

By Bradley Wilson
CMR Managing Editor

Lynn Neary with National Public Radio said George Orwell’s 1949 novel, 1984, again topped the Amazon bestseller list and had become, in her words, something of a political barometer.

Neary reported, “A spokesman for Signet Classics, which currently publishes 1984, said sales have increased almost 10,000 percent since the inauguration and moved noticeably upwards on Sunday. That’s when Counselor to the President Kellyanne Conway appeared on Meet The Press. When host Chuck Todd challenged the Trump administration’s assertions about the size of the Inauguration Day crowd, Conway responded with a phrase that caught everyone’s attention.”

“Alternative facts,” Conway said.

Kellyanne Conway, Counselor to the President, tells Chuck Todd that the Press Secretary used ‘alternative facts’ in his first statement to the Press Corps.

Washington Post reporter Karen Tumulty on CNN’s Reliable Sources said the phrase reminded her of phrases from Orwell’s classic: doublethink, ignorance is strength, war is peace, freedom is slavery. Continue reading “2017 more like ‘1984’ than 1984”