Textbook Thoughts

I really enjoyed reading the textbook. It didn't really feel like I was reading a textbook. It felt more like a journalist's first hand knowledge of what it takes to write good stories. The book does a good job of highlighting the important things. With some textbooks I read, I feel like some of the things aren't really that important. I didn't feel that way with this book. Even though I don't want to be a journalist when I get out of school, I still feel like the things in the book can apply to my major. I need to be thorough and accurate when it comes to writing scripts, especially if some of the subject matter is based on real-life things. I honestly couldn't find anything about this book that I didn't dislike.

Change we can believe in

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) pauses momentarily during a town hall meeting in Reading, Pa. Obama and Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.) have been campaigning in Pennsylvania as preparation for a presidential primary to be held on April 22, 2008. (Reuters photo by: Bradley Bower/April 20, 2008.)

Journalistic Principles

When writing stories, journalists tend to want to inject their own ideas and opinions into the news reports. Objectivity requires that journalists don't do that. Journalists should stick to observable facts only.

Being thorough in your reporting is very important. Journalists need to take time to find the best sources, evidence, and so on for their report. It is their goal to make sure that the audience is given enough information so that they can make informed decisions.

No one wants to read a news report that is based on false facts, that's why it is important that journalist be accurate. They need to be sure to check every bit of information that they receive from interviews against original sources.

When reporting, it is also important to be fair. Journalists need to be sure that all bases are covered. Both sides of the story need to be incorporated.

Journalists need to be transparent when it comes to reporting. This means that they need to be open about what biases they bring to the job, how they get their information and how they make decisions on choosing and reporting stories.

Personally, I think that all of them are important in one way or another. They all should be incorporated into news stories. If I had to choose just one, I would choose objectivity. When I read a news story, I want to read facts. I don't want the reporter injecting their own opinions into it.

Photos

Story

No story

Fills the frame

Doesn't fill the frame           

Action and Emotion

No emotion and action

Candid

Not Candid

Feature Story

Things are not going so well for me. I tried contacting the guy I talked to the other day to see if he could help me find some other people that I could interview, but I haven't gotten a response yet. One of the other programs I emailed responded by saying that they were too busy and that I should contact someone else in the program (which I did), but I haven't gotten a response from them either. I've been in panic mode all weekend because I don't know how I'm going to get this done if people won't respond to me. Just in case I do the NIH Loan Repayment Program, here is a rough draft of my feature lede:

Most college graduates worry about finding a job and a place to live. Paying off student loans shouldn't be one of those things.

With The National Institutes of Health (NIH) Loan Repayment Programs research scientists are able to further their career while paying off student loans. In exchange for a two to three commitment to their research career, NIH will repay up to $35,000 per year of their qualified education debt. 

Obituary

I decided to cover the obituary story. For an obituary, some basic information that you would need is the name and age of the deceased, date and place of death, cause of death, accomplishments, and details about the funeral service. In order to find out about the cause of death, you might visit the hospital and speak with the doctor who pronounced him dead. You may also find out the date of his death. To obtain personal information about President Caret, you may want to talk to family members and friends. If they are willing, they might tell you the details about the funeral service. Some other information that you may want to obtain are education and survivors, meaning people that he is leaving behind like a wife and kids.

Some challenges that I might have to deal with involve talking to his family and friends. They may not want to talk because they were too grief-stricken or any other reasons. In order to get my story, I would need to find other means of getting the information. I could ask random people if they have heard of him and would they be willing to share information about him. Of course, I would have to check out what they are saying because it may or may not be true.

In addition to the story, the paper could publish an online obituary which features slide shows and recent news stories about him. They could also provide a link to his official website or have a timeline of his life. They could also show video of the deceased as words are being narrated about him.

Loan Repayment Program

Due to unfortunate circumstances, I had to change the loan repayment program that I was doing. The student loan repayment program that I am doing now is the National Institutes of Health loan repayment program. Earlier, I spoke with Daniel Macias. He is the financial analyst. He was pretty helpful in providing me with information about the program. He also emailed me some information that may also help me with my story. While I was talking to Daniel, it seemed more like a conversation than an interview, which is good. 

I asked him if there was any way that I could get in contact with students that have benefited from the program and he said that they were unable to give away that kind of information because of privacy reasons. This is a major setback seeing as how I have to interview some people for the story. Looks like it's back to the drawing board. 

Federal Student Loan Repayment Program

For my feature story, I plan to find out more about the student loan repayment loan that the federal government offers. This program allows agencies to repay federally insured student loans as a recruitment or retention incentive for candidates or current employees of the agency. You are eligible for the program if you are a permanent employee, term employee, temporary employee, or employees serving on excepted appointments. Federal employees can receive up to $60,000 and must provide a three year commitment to the agency or department that provided the repayment. If the employee becomes unemployed by the agency within the three year time frame, then the recipient must pay back the amount in full to the agency. I emailed people today, but I haven't gotten a response. I hope to hear from someone soon so I can begin setting up interviews.

Female Players Of 'Crazy Sport' Jettison Jerseys; A Memorable Moment On Steps of Memorial

Feature stories are ones that don't concern a specific event or pronouncement. They tend to focus more on interesting stories than they do important stories or stories that depend on substantial background information. Feature leads gives the reader a preview of what's coming, unlike summary leads which give the reader the five W's and an H. They can be anecdotal, narrative, descriptive, or question leads. I think that Female Players Of 'Crazy Sport' Jettison Jerseys; A Memorable Moment On Steps of Memorial is a good example of a feature story.

This story fits the definition of a feature because the story is more interesting or unusual than important. The story isn't giving the readers any important information, but merely talking about an interesting thing that happened with a women's rugby team.

This lead is different from other leads that we have practiced in that it doesn't tell us what happened. It just sets the scene for the story by hinting that the women's rugby team did something.

I think that the nut graf is when the writer says "A crazy stunt but not illegal." I think that this is the nut graf because it shifts from talking about what the women did to talking about the law says about baring one's breasts.

Revised Lede

Here is my revised lede:

College students accumulate most of their debt from non-emergency purchases, according to the U.S Public Interest Research Group.

I'm still working on it, but this should give you an idea of my direction.

REVISION: Repeal of the Helmet Law

Local physicians held a press conference on Monday morning to discuss the state’s consideration of a bill that will repeal the helmet law, which says that motorcyclists must wear helmets.

A motorcyclist is injured in a two-vehicle accident while the press conference was taking place.

About 50 Towson doctors, along with over 100 nurses, paramedics and other health care workers attended a press conference on the front lawn of Memorial Hospital. Doctors from Johns Hopkins University Hospital , Mercy Hospital and Greater Baltimore Medical Center also attended.

The Maryland State Legislature is considering a bill that would change the state law requiring motorcyclists to wear helmets and many Towson physicians are not happy about that. As a result, they have unveiled a petition to legislators asking them not to pass the bill. So far, they have nearly 400 signatures and hope to have at least 500 by the time they sent it to the Legislature next Monday

Statistics show that the helmet law is doing its job. It also shows what will happen if the Legislature repeals it.

“The number of serious head injuries caused by motorcycle accidents in Maryland is over 70 percent less now then when the helmet law was adopted 25 years ago,” Dr. Karl Sodergreen said. “Reduction is directly related to passage of that law.”

“A study from last year about health-care costs related to motorcycle riding by the state medical society showed that emergency room costs alone could go up by more than 45 percent if the helmet law is repeal,” Dr. Hector Rivera said.

The bill will be considered by the Legislature next Wednesday.

As the press conference was going on, two ambulances raced into Memorial Hospital’s parking lot with victims from a two-vehicle accident. Ironically, one of the victims, 19-year-old Grady Smith, was driving a motorcycle.

Due to the accident, Smith suffered a broken arm and several broken ribs. Smith’s doctor says that his injuries may have been worse if he had not been wearing a helmet.

********************************************************************

Proofreading:

First things first, relax before you start proofreading. Take your mind off anything that may distract you. Then, you want to read it once focusing on only one aspect of the writing. Read it again focusing on another aspect of the writing. Taking breaks in between these steps may help too. When you read over something for the third time, you want to go over it and check for things that you may have missed the first two times. Forming study groups can also help because it is sometimes hard to proofread your own work.

Repeal of the Helmet Law

Local physicians hold a press conference on Monday morning to discuss the state’s consideration of a bill that will repeal the helmet law.

A motorcyclist is injured in a two-vehicle accident while the press conference was taking place.

About 50 Towson doctors, along with over 100 nurses, paramedics, and other health care workers attended a press conference on the front lawn of Memorial Hospital. Doctors from Johns Hopkins University Hospital , Mercy Hospital and Greater Baltimore Medical Center also attended.

The Maryland State Legislature is considering a bill that would change the state law requiring motorcyclists to wear helmets and many Towson physicians are not happy about that. As a result, they have unveiled a petition to legislators asking them not to pass the bill. So far, they have nearly 400 signatures and hope to have at least 500 by the time they sent it to the Legislature next Monday

“The number of serious head injuries caused by motorcycle accidents in Maryland is over 70 percent less now then when the helmet law was adopted 25 years ago,” Dr. Karl Sodergreen said. “Reduction is directly related to passage of that law.”

“A study from last year about health-care costs related to motorcycle riding by the state medical society showed that emergency room costs alone could go up by more than 45 percent if the helmet law is repeal,” Dr. Hector Rivera said.

The bill will be considered by the Legislature next Wednesday.

As the press conference was going on, two ambulances raced into Memorial Hospital’s parking lot with victims from a two-vehicle accident. Ironically, one of the victims, 19-year-old Grady Smith, was driving a motorcycle.

Because of the accident, Smith suffers a broken arm and several broken ribs. Smith’s doctor says that his injuries may have been worse if he had not been wearing a helmet.

Good Ledes

I really enjoyed reading Noelle and Jeannie's ledes. I liked Noelle's lede because it was very specific. I also liked her word choices. If I read this lede in a news story, I would immediately be hooked. I also like it because I think that she is taking an interesting take on the issue of credit card debt.

I liked Jeannie's lede because it was optimistic. When I saw the word "wise" I was hooked. I can tell that she put a lot of thought into it.

After reading these ledes, there are a few things I would do to mine. I would be a little more specific in my lede. I would also pick better word choices in order to grab the reader's attention.

News Lede

Here is a rough draft of my news lede:

College students struggle to pay off credit card debt that they accumulated even after graduation.

For this news story, I think that students and counselors who have dealt with student credit card debt will be good sources. The only one I could get in contact with at the moment is my cousin Jillian Jones in Georgia.

My cousin is a 26 year-old college student getting her Master's Degree. She has three credit cards with a debt of about $8,000. When she told me that, I was shocked. Most of the articles I looked at said students have about $3,000 in debt. She told me that most people look at her $8,000 and don't think that it is a big deal because they are more in debt that she is.

Like most students, she charged things on credit cards with the mindset that you can pay it back later. She says that paying off the bad hasn't been too bad, but it just seems like it is going to take forever to pay it off. She told me about a guy named Dave Ramsey. He has books out that can help people in debt. She is currently reading this book to help her out.

After listening to what she had to say, I think I want to focus on how students who have debt are dealing with it. When I say that, I mean what steps they are taking to try to pay it off. I want to focus on that because we all know that students have debt, but we don't necessarily know how they are dealing with it.

Credit Card Debt Among College Students

According to Financial Traps for College Students, the average credit card debt owed by college students is about $2,700. About 10 percent of college students owe more than $7,000. Part of the reason for this could be the fact that most students hold an average of three separate credit cards. I don't see any reason why a college student would need three credit cards. In my opinion, you only need two credit cards. One of them should be your bank card so you are only spending money that you actually have. The second should be a major credit card that's only used in case of emergencies.

Learning to be in Debt 101 says that credit cards are easy to get. For this reason. students are getting and using them more than ever. In a study done by Norma Mendoza, students with a future orientation tend to use their credit cards more. They may spend the money now thinking that they will be able to pay it off in the future because they will be earning more money. That's not a bad way of thinking, but you need to be realistic.

I think that the issue of credit card debt among college students is something that needs to be taken seriously. There is no reason why we should be 25 or 30 years old still paying off debts that we made in college, especially if it isn't a loan. We need to be more aware of how we use our credit cards. If you have cash or a bank card, use that. Don't be so quick to charge something just because you have a credit card.

Journalism 2.0

In my opinion, Celebritology exemplifies good blogging. This blog is done by Liz Kelly as apart of The Washington Post. I think this is an example of good blogging because it uses some of the mechanics that were described in Journalism 2.0. One of the mechanics of a blog that it listed was: Link, summarize, analyze. I feel that this blog did just that. The author gave you a sentence or two about what was going on with a specific celebrity. Using a few words from the sentence, the author links to the article where more information about the celebrity and their situation can be found. After linking and summarizing, the author would analyze the news story by giving their own opinions about the situation. Journalism 2.0 also says that a good blog is an ongoing conversation. The author analyzes the situation as they see it which in turns gives readers the opportunity to respond like you would in a face to face conversation. Photos and videos also make this a good blog. Photos are good because they let your reader see who it is that you are talking. Blogging is really different from other types of newswriting. In print, you don't always have the luxury of giving your own opinion on a subject. Your main job is using facts to create a news story. With blogging, you're free to write about whatever you want. Print isn't always open for commenting, while blogging is. I feel that print has more of a "these are the facts how I see them, deal with it" attitude while blogging is more about gossiping and ranting, so readers have the opportunity to share their opinions. In the blog that the author did about Marie Osmond's comeback is an example of how blogging is different from newswriting. In print, the story would have just been about how Marie Osmond is going to be having a new daytime talk show. With blogging, the author was able to inject her own opinions about the situation.

From time to time, I might write a blog. I have a MySpace page and that's one of the things that you can do on there. I only write one when I'm extremely bored and I just get the sudden urge to write one which isn't often. I like to read my cousin's blog on MySpace because it's funny. She likes to use something that happened to her that day and turn in into a blog. When i read it, I laugh because it's so funny because she is a very sarcastic person like I am. Entertainment blogs appeal to me. I like to read the print version of an article about a particular celebrity and then see what bloggers have to say about it. Journalists and public relations professionals could use to blogs to give readers more information about things that they may not have been able to put in the print version. They can also use it to give readers instant information. With a blog, all you have to do is type something up. Newspapers have to be printed which takes time and readers may want to know what's going on right then and there.

Convergent Journalism

I think that the fire maps used are an example of convergent journalism. They provided concerned people with more information about the fires. With the maps, they were able to get information that they may not have been able to find on the Internet. People were able to find out which areas were being affected and whether or not the fire was getting close to them. People who lived in other states or outside of the San Diego area were able to look at the map and see if their families were being affected if they had family members in the San Diego area. I think that my Google map is an example of convergent journalism because it's another way of having information about the people in my class that may not be available on Towson's website or their Facebook or Myspace accounts. The information may not be relevant at the time, but it may be in the future. What if one of them gets famous in the future. A fan may be looking up information about them and come across this map. They may find out something about them on the map that they didn't find anywhere else.

My Classmates

Interactive Informational Graphic using Goggle Maps



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