Monday, June 14, 2010

The Grand Old Duke of York

Milton Coleman spoke at the ASNEReynolds Institute today, telling the participants that "we (the media) don't control the medium," and that we should "just adjust to the reality that news cycles have channged from 12 hours to 15 minutes." Isn't that the truth!

Coleman advised, "People don't want to be told what to think, they want to be provoked to think." That certainly struck a nerve with me-isn't that exactly how a high schooler is? Students say, "Don't tell me what to do." So, my goal this year for my staff is to get them to write articles to make their classmates thinking on issues, starting out with the simple and moving onto the more complex.

He later commented on writing news articles calling it a chase, and that it is as the institute goers found out this afternoon when they simulated interviewing people after a catastrophe...and chase we did. We chased after the elusive answer, chased false assumptions, and chased (some of us) to Starbucks.

2 comments:

  1. Jodie,

    The chase made me re-think some of my assumptions of what it meant to be a journalist. I found it so hard to think on my feet. I was frustrated at my inability to connect with the people in front of me, as well as my seeming lack of intuition on when to ask something or what to ask. I felt I was foundering a bit, which is good for the soul sometimes, I think.

    Meghan Brannon
    East Early College High School
    Houston, TX

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  2. I find that so much of learning journalism is trial and error, harsh lessons learned, etc. The only solution is doing it over and over, which was the point of the exercise. Glad it was of value. I enjoyed seeing folks have fun with it despite the chaos.

    Steve Elliott
    Arizona State University
    Phoenix

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