This course will give you the basic skills needed to report and write news and feature stories in a clear and effective way that takes into account your responsibility as a reporter.
KEY SKILLS TAUGHT:
-Identify News
-How to Interview
-How to Structure a News Story
-Associated Press Style
-What is Media Law/Ethics
-Basics of Public Relations
ASSESSMENT CRITERIA:
Attendance: More than three absences makes “B” your maximum grade. This policy should cover most emergencies during the semester – please contact me via e-mail if you will be out. If you find you will be missing more classes, you must contact me during the emergency and outline your plans for keeping up. It is not acceptable to miss additional classes and hand in work at the end of the semester, even if you had “good reasons” for being out. Please be on time, I will take attendance each class and if you are late it’s your responsibility to tell me that you’re present.
Class Participation: You should take active part in the class discussions and have exercises, reading and stories done on time. You, as a reporter, should be curious and you should ask questions - there are no stupid questions.
News writing: You will write two stories from actual sources and several in-class from provided facts. A number of these stories, including the reaction and profile stories, will go through two drafts. It’s important to remember that you must check facts and spelling of names in your stories, mistakes happen, but they should be avoided at all costs. These assignments that must be typed must be turned in on time or your grade will suffer. I will ONLY accept late assignments the class after they are due. Source lists: All stories you hand in must have a list of sources and their contact information.
Reaction Story
A reaction story reports the views of a large number of people on an important news issue. You will select the news issue, but I will approve it. You will start with five sources, but eventually expand your reporting to include more people. Your story will not necessarily include 20 sources, but a professional journalist often “over-reports” to assure that they have strong useful material. For this class, the experience in interviewing is also valuable. Interview a wide variety of ages and types of people. [Tip: To get solid statements from your sources, ask them to respond to the arguments of people on the other side.] The reaction story is a basic story type, but provides challenges in interviewing, organizing transitions, quotation and paraphrase, identifying sources and keeping the reader interested. We will study a number of professional models, some of which you will find yourself.
I encourage you to consider subjects of interest to the John Cabot community and to do your interviewing among John Cabot students, staff and faculty.
Profile Story
Pick an interesting student as the subject of your profile, or a John Cabot academic department or club. You should not be intimately related to your subject. If it is a club, you should not be a member. You may write about a department in which you are a major or minor. Again, I will approve your subject.
A profile is not a biography or history. It focuses on news or some point of interest. For a person profile, you must interview the subject plus at least three people who know him or her. For a club or department interview a variety of officials, club president or department head, plus members or majors. Gather background information as appropriate – biographical dates, personal statistics, club budget, number of majors and faculty in a department.
The profile should state the interesting quality of the person in the lead, perhaps through a scene or anecdote. Background information and description should be worked gracefully into the story where appropriate. Don’t just dump the information or description in one section.
Quizzes/Assignments
You will have news/AP style quizzes. The quizzes will test whether you have been following the news. They will also test whether you understand AP style.
Final Exam: You will take a final exam that covers information from the textbook, AP Stylebook and lectures.