Reporting 2

MC3203 - Newsgathering II

Instructor: Jay Perkins

Office Phone: 578-2381

E-Mail: jrperk@lsu.edu

Webpage: http://www.lsu.edu/faculty/jperk

Office Location: 207 Johnston Hall

Office Hours:  Tuesday:  8:30 a.m.- 12 noon, 1:30 p.m. - 2:30 p.m.

Also by appointment

Course Objective

This lecture/lab course is designed to improve the ability of students to handle detailed stories in the feature and hard news formats and to give them a basic understanding of computer assisted reporting techniques. As such, you could think of the course as having three parts --a component on feature techniques, a component on investigative techniques and a component on database techniques.

You will write two stories in this class and have two exams. Because detailed stories rely heavily on the quality of research done, the focus of all writing done in this course will be on finding and using good journalistic research resources from people and from documents. 

You will be expected to know basic AP style and to turn in neatly typed assignments. Incorrectly spelled words and grammatical mistakes will result in a lowering of your grade.

Your first writing assignment will be graded on the quality of your writing and on how well you did in using good interviewing techniques to find points of view that go beyond those used in daily reporting. For example, a personality profile that is heavily dependant on what one person tells you will not be considered as valid as a personality profile that uses multiple sources such as the person profiled, the wife of the person, the children of the person, the neighbors and business acquaintances of the person, etc.

Your second writing assignment will be graded on how well you did in collecting information from human sources, from government and academic documents and on how well you did in formatting the story in a logical consistent way by using a series of pyramids organized by subject matter. In short, on this assignment, details and logical thought matter more than the writing ability.  

In both types of stories, the goal will be to write stories that  go beyond the day-to-day coverage, put a human face on a complex issue,  and present an overall picture of an issue.

We will use standard feature writing techniques for the portion of the course that deals with human interest stories. We will use the nut graf approach for the portion of the course that is focused more on hard news.

Materials Needed:

• The New York Times

• The Los Angeles Times

• The Washington Post

Look for the big picture stories in these newspapers. The LA Times has a feature called Column One which uses the formats we will use in this class. Also, the Wall Street Journal is the pioneer of this format and is a good reference source. Look for the left hand column stories in the Journal if you are confused about the format or requirements.

You also will be given handouts by the instructor which will be of use in this class. And, of course, the links in this syllabus will be considered part of the instructional component and a subject for testing.

Grading

Your grade will be determined as follows:

• 20 percent will come from a written report (midterm project)  that will require you to locate and use governmental records and internet resources for journalistic research.

• 20 percent will come from a final examination on using Access and SQL commands to query a database and to draw patterns from the data.

• 25 percent will come from a complex feature. You will discuss your story idea for this feature (or personality profile) with the instructor before beginning.

• 35 percent will come from a detailed, in-depth hard news story written in a Wall Street Journal (or nut graf) format. You will discuss your story idea for this depth story with the instructor before proceeding.

You will be given a numerical grade on each assignment and your grades will be posted to PAWS.

Pay close attention to deadlines. If you do not turn in your story before the assigned deadline, you will lose 10 points from your numerical grade for the first day it is late, 20 points for the second day, 30 points on the third and 40 points on the fourth day. If your story is more than four days late, it is worthless. Do not bother me by asking if you can turn in your story a day or two late. You can -- but you will be assessed the penalties.  The grading scale for this class will be 90 to 100="A", 80 to 90="B", 70 to 80="C" and 60 to 70="D".

There will be no exceptions to these grading rules.

Class attendance

Classes will begin on time. If you are late, take a seat quietly. I will not repeat information already presented in class simply because you were late. Exams and any quizzes will be given at the start of class. All exams will end at a specified time so if you're late to class, you lose time to complete the exam.

There will be no makeup exams or assignments given unless you have the documentation necessary to convince LSU your absence meets the requirements for excused absences.

Unethical behavior

Plagiarism can get you expelled from LSU. Don't do it. Do not take information from another source, including your classmates and portray it as your own. Do not quote anyone as having told you something if they did not. Do not interview friends, roommates or others and portray them as experts when they are not. Do not take the words of other reporters or information collected from media outlets as portray it as your own research. If you must quote another reporter's work, attribute the information to that reporter.

August 25

Getting started, outline of requirements, discussion of story ideas, basics of Project Reporting.

• Requirements for the personality profile.

• Requirements for the midterm project and selection of gubernatorial candidates who will be the subjects of the midterm project.

• Writing Tip 1

• Writing Tip 2

Wednesday -- Writing the Complex Personality Profile and a look at other features.

• Alice Roosevelt Longworth- Sally Quinn, Washington Post

• Julie Tavalaro- Rick Meyer, Los Angeles Times

• Revolutionary Thinker -- Guy Gugliotta, Washington Post

• The Boy Behind the Mask -- Tom Hallman Jr.,The Oregonian

• Coney Island--Barry Bearak, Los Angeles Times

• Con Man--Barry Bearak, Los Angeles Times

• Mrs. Kelly's Monster -- Jon Franklin, Baltimore Sun

Monday--Lab Day

Wednesday-- Assignment Due. Turn in your feature or personality profile at the start of class. This assignment is worth 25 percent of your grade in this class.

• The Narrative lead and Nut Graf Approach

•  

• The Big Picture Story

• Sample Project Outline

• Story that resulted from outline

• Followup story on system changes as a result of the initial story

Warning: By now, you should have decided on the topic for your second story, discussed it with the instructor and worked out with him an outline for how you plan to organize this story.

Oct. 27

Monday-- SQL, the languages of databases

• SQL Tipsheet - A quick summary

• SQL explained

• Richard Mullins on SQL

• SQL tutorial - A very good step by step guide

Wednesday- Lab Day -- work on your project story.

Monday--Assignment due: Turn in the complete rough draft of your story. This should be a complete story, with a solid, Wall Street Journal lead, and with your story broken into sections and organized around the subjects you laid out in your outline. It should be ready (in your opinion) to be printed in a newspaper. This assignment will be worth 25 percent of your grade in this class.

Downloading and Importing Commonly Used Databases

Wednesday--Databases

• Tutorials for Access

Nov. 10

Monday --Databases

Wednesday --Databases

Nov. 17

Monday --Databases  

Assignment due: Turn in the final draft of your story. By this time, you should have fixed the problems found in your rough draft. This assignment is worth 10 percent of your grade in this class. 

Wednesday -- Databases

Monday --Review of course

Wednesday -- Final Exam on databases. This exam is worth 20 percent of your grade in this class.