This summer, what you will be doing is working as a staff reporter for Spartan Newsroom, an online news site run by MSU's School of Journalism. One is Listen Up Lansing, which has been a site that's been open for a few years now, and regularly reports on trends and issues in the City of Lansing.
I'd like everyone to take a look at the site here. Please take a deep look at the types of stories and issues the site has covered in the past. The ones that involve trends and issues are the types of stories we want to do this summer.
I'd like everyone to take a look at the site here. Please take a deep look at the types of stories and issues the site has covered in the past. The ones that involve trends and issues are the types of stories we want to do this summer.
I'd also like you to review the site page that focuses on news from the City of Lansing, which is almost entirely trend and issue stories. These are the kinds of stories I want us developing and doing on our beats.
Some of you will be assigned to cover the City of Lansing beat for the site, and others will be assigned to geographic areas in and around where you are this summer. Assignments are as follows:
Lansing staff reporters (covering the City of Lansing ONLY):
Ingham County reporter (covering the county but NOT the cities of Lansing or East Lansing)
National correspondents (areas of coverage in parentheses):
Next week, we will have a number of in-person exercises designed to help us get accustomed to our beats, which in journalism is what we call our coverage territories or topics. Lansing, our beat is the actual City of Lansing (since you are students who are here in the Lansing area this summer). For our national correspondents, it's the area in and around where you are living this summer.
Before then, we have one online exercise for you to do: I want you to use Google and the U.S. Census Bureau Web site at www.census.gov to explore your beat, and come up with 5 interesting facts, figures and footnotes about your beat. It could be random facts or statistics or historical matters. But do see what you can find, and don't just rely on the Census, Wikipedia and the City Hall Web sites; do some exploring and see what you can find.
Don't use news articles from news sites to act as a cue; we need to find our own stories, and not ones that have already been reported on.
Then, I want you to write your answers in a Word document with the following heading:
Your name
Date
JRN 300
Your beat
... and then email it to me at omars@msu.edu. Your deadline will be Wednesday, May 31 by 9 a.m.
Next, I want your beat to meet together in-person or video conference via Google Groups or some other remote conferencing system. Please share what you discover and start helping each other out as needed regarding story ideas and sources and sharing resources like rides and such (there is one person in the Lansing group who does not have a car, so ride-sharing would certainly be helpful, though that beat can also be covered by using CATA to get around).
Also, going forward you will be responsible with knowing what story ideas your group is working on at any given time to ensure two people aren't working on the same story idea.
Then, on the week of May 30 I want you to make on-site visits to your beats on Tuesday, May 30; Wednesday, May 31; and Thursday, June 1. This will be our work for the week. The Lansing team may go as a group or groups if you'd like. Spend some time walking around your community and doing interviews -- at least 1-2 hours per day. You may also schedule and arrange meetings with newsmakers on your beats, like mayors or police chiefs or business leaders and such.
Then, there are three things I'd like you to submit to me, using the same format as the previously-disclosed assignment. (These have to be submitted individually with your own work and answers, separate from those of others, even if you go as a group).
They are:
1. A list of observations. Tell me five things you noticed about your community. For example, was its downtown busy or dead or booming or kind of sad? Why or why not? Great story ideas can come from simple environmental observation, so look for things that stand out and are crying out for an explanation.
2. Questionnaire responses. I want you each to interview five random people on the street and get answers to the following questions from each: what drives you crazy about living or working here, and why? What excites you about living or working here, and why? What would you like to see changed here, and why? What do you want to never see changed and why? And what question or questions do you have about living or working here that you'd like to see answered, and why?
You may tell people you are MSU journalist students doing research for possible stories for a public news Web site run by the school. And that should be your standard identification throughout the semester; you're not just doing stories for a class; the stories we do will be posted to a news sites read by the public. This isn't pretend-we're-doing-news; we are doing real news stories that real people will really see.
3. A list of possible trend or issue story ideas, based on what you found from environmental observation and interviewing passers-by. Please list five ideas. I will not hold you to doing any of these story ideas (though you absolutely may do them), but I want to get a sense of what you're seeing and how your observations are helping you develop things we can actually report on in the heart future.
Then, email me your submissions to omars@msu.edu. Your deadline will be Friday, June 2 at 9 a.m.
There will be blog updates next week where we get more into what we'll be doing through the semester, and resources that will help you do that. So please do keep checking the blog every weekday for updates (but not Monday, due to the holiday).
Questions? Call or text me at 702-271-7983; email me at omars@msu.edu, or schedule an appointment to see me at my office in CAS 360.
Good luck, everyone!
Some of you will be assigned to cover the City of Lansing beat for the site, and others will be assigned to geographic areas in and around where you are this summer. Assignments are as follows:
Lansing staff reporters (covering the City of Lansing ONLY):
- Cassie Bondie, bondieca@msu.edu
- Dan Denova, denovada@msu.edu
- Kaiyue Zhang, zhangk24@msu.edu (also covering Xi'an, China for part of summer)
- Julia Tonionl, toniolo1@msu.edu
- Britney Vanderkodde, vande737@msu.edu
- Xavier Thompson, thom1487@msu.edu
Ingham County reporter (covering the county but NOT the cities of Lansing or East Lansing)
- Nick Tomayko, tomaykon@msu.edu
National correspondents (areas of coverage in parentheses):
- Alyssa Richardson, richa827@msu.edu (Flint, Mich. area)
- Simone Fenzi, fenzisim@msu.edu (Birmingham, Mich., Detroit, Mich. and Milan, Italy areas)
- Neena Rouhani, rouhanin@msu.edu (Rochester Hills, Mich. and Detroit, Mich. areas)
- Antonio Ferraro, ferraro8@msu.edu (Sheby Township and Detroit, Mich. areas)
- Chase Michaelson, micha151@msu.edu (Seattle Wash. area)
- Madeline Stamm, stammmad@msu.edu (Buffalo, NY area)
- Amy Davis, davisa85@msu.edu (Traverse City, Mich. and northern Michigan areas)
- Patricia Davis, davisp18@msu.edu (Traverse City, Mich. and northern Michigan areas)
- Kathleen Kennedy, kenne418@msu.edu (St. Clair, Mich., Michigan "Thumb" and Detroit, Mich. areas)
- Kayla Hinton, hintonka@msu.edu (Virginia Beach, Virg., Warren, Mich. and Detroit, Mich. areas)
- Trevor Toczydlowski, toczydlo@msu.edu (Grand Rapids, Mich. area)
Next week, we will have a number of in-person exercises designed to help us get accustomed to our beats, which in journalism is what we call our coverage territories or topics. Lansing, our beat is the actual City of Lansing (since you are students who are here in the Lansing area this summer). For our national correspondents, it's the area in and around where you are living this summer.
Before then, we have one online exercise for you to do: I want you to use Google and the U.S. Census Bureau Web site at www.census.gov to explore your beat, and come up with 5 interesting facts, figures and footnotes about your beat. It could be random facts or statistics or historical matters. But do see what you can find, and don't just rely on the Census, Wikipedia and the City Hall Web sites; do some exploring and see what you can find.
Don't use news articles from news sites to act as a cue; we need to find our own stories, and not ones that have already been reported on.
Then, I want you to write your answers in a Word document with the following heading:
Your name
Date
JRN 300
Your beat
... and then email it to me at omars@msu.edu. Your deadline will be Wednesday, May 31 by 9 a.m.
Next, I want your beat to meet together in-person or video conference via Google Groups or some other remote conferencing system. Please share what you discover and start helping each other out as needed regarding story ideas and sources and sharing resources like rides and such (there is one person in the Lansing group who does not have a car, so ride-sharing would certainly be helpful, though that beat can also be covered by using CATA to get around).
Also, going forward you will be responsible with knowing what story ideas your group is working on at any given time to ensure two people aren't working on the same story idea.
Then, on the week of May 30 I want you to make on-site visits to your beats on Tuesday, May 30; Wednesday, May 31; and Thursday, June 1. This will be our work for the week. The Lansing team may go as a group or groups if you'd like. Spend some time walking around your community and doing interviews -- at least 1-2 hours per day. You may also schedule and arrange meetings with newsmakers on your beats, like mayors or police chiefs or business leaders and such.
Then, there are three things I'd like you to submit to me, using the same format as the previously-disclosed assignment. (These have to be submitted individually with your own work and answers, separate from those of others, even if you go as a group).
They are:
1. A list of observations. Tell me five things you noticed about your community. For example, was its downtown busy or dead or booming or kind of sad? Why or why not? Great story ideas can come from simple environmental observation, so look for things that stand out and are crying out for an explanation.
2. Questionnaire responses. I want you each to interview five random people on the street and get answers to the following questions from each: what drives you crazy about living or working here, and why? What excites you about living or working here, and why? What would you like to see changed here, and why? What do you want to never see changed and why? And what question or questions do you have about living or working here that you'd like to see answered, and why?
You may tell people you are MSU journalist students doing research for possible stories for a public news Web site run by the school. And that should be your standard identification throughout the semester; you're not just doing stories for a class; the stories we do will be posted to a news sites read by the public. This isn't pretend-we're-doing-news; we are doing real news stories that real people will really see.
3. A list of possible trend or issue story ideas, based on what you found from environmental observation and interviewing passers-by. Please list five ideas. I will not hold you to doing any of these story ideas (though you absolutely may do them), but I want to get a sense of what you're seeing and how your observations are helping you develop things we can actually report on in the heart future.
Then, email me your submissions to omars@msu.edu. Your deadline will be Friday, June 2 at 9 a.m.
There will be blog updates next week where we get more into what we'll be doing through the semester, and resources that will help you do that. So please do keep checking the blog every weekday for updates (but not Monday, due to the holiday).
Questions? Call or text me at 702-271-7983; email me at omars@msu.edu, or schedule an appointment to see me at my office in CAS 360.
Good luck, everyone!
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