JRN 300: Want To Pass This Class?

Then don't miss deadlines. Ever.

Many of you have been great in this regard. Thank you. I know it's not easy. But that's journalism. Some of you, though, have not been good at this. At all. And as we pass the halfway mark of the semester, that's a huge problem.

First, this is a deadline business. Your ability to get and keep a job in media will greatly depend on being super-reliable with meeting deadlines. Ever watch the 11 o'clock news and see the anchor start with, Welcome to the news! Give us a minute, we're still finishing a script? Of course not. The news always starts at 11, and they always have the newscast filled with news.

That's because anyone who gives off even a hint of not being 100 percent reliable with deadlines is either fired right away or never hired in the first place. Trust me, as a professional journalist I saw a new reporter get fired after she missed deadline on her first story.

At some point in a journalism career, we tell ourselves, I don't believe I'm paid to write or be on camera or whatever. It's soooo easy! Well, that's because that stuff is easy. The hard stuff is coming up with willing sources that say meaningful things to you by deadline so you have a story to write or a live shot to front. That's the skill we have to perfect here.

Second, we don't have many assignments in this class, so each assignment weighs heavily toward your final grade. Each weekly story is worth 7 percent of your grade. You will even be graded on your final project story pitches! and final project story drafts (please see syllabus for details)!

So really, any missed deadline and any missed assignment will cause damage to your final grade. And having multiple missed assignments will put you at serious risk of flunking this class.

I won't accept a bunch of make-ups at the end of the semester. The time to file your work is on deadline. Keep up with the deadlines, or don't be surprised at the end of the semester when things don't work out well for you.

Weekly Story #2: An Overview

Overall we did okay, but once again the biggest problem was range of sources.

Too often, we had one side of the story, but not the other. We wrote about something or somebody but then never talked to that affected person or group. And we were sorely lacking in neutral experts overall. So our sourcing was too narrow.

A good example of broad sourcing is this story (click below to see):

http://news.jrn.msu.edu/2017/06/virginias-chesapeake-bay-faces-environmental-issues/

The story only contains three sources, which was the minimum number. But the range is great: there is a subject driver (someone from a program working to protect the bay). There is an affected subject (a beach-goer). And there is a neutral expert (an environmental professor) to help contextualize what the others said.

There's also a range of mediums: we have pictures, and we have a chart.

Really, it's not necessarily the volume of sources that we are looking at. It's the range: are we deeply and broadly exploring the subject area?

Plus, please note ALL info was gained first-hand, from sources and such. There is no taking things from other media, which we should NEVER do. Media can't just take from other media; at some point, someone has to do their own reporting. It's okay that we look at other media, see who their sources are and then content those sources directly ourselves, but we should NOT be citing other media.

If you need some refreshers on soured and sourcing, see the earlier blog posts that are linked below:

Sources, we need a range

Neutral experts; WTF is that?

Neutral experts: imagine if ...

Hope this helps!

JRN 300: Deadline Reminder

Please make sure you are CAREFULLY reviewing deadlines from the publication schedule post. For example, this week we had TWO story pitches due, due to the upcoming Fourth of July holiday. Please look at the WHOLE calendar and make sure you know ALL due dates. There are other irregular due dates coming up, Make sure you know ALL of them NOW. "I didn't know" will NOT be an excuse for missed work.

Weekly Story #1: Watch Those Fatals!

Any sort of a fact error in this class is known as a fatal fact error; that is, is you have ANY fact error in your story, then your final grade for the assignment may be a 1.0, even if everything else is perfect.

That's because there is no such thing as a small error: even a small mismate gives a reader reason to ask, "If they got this small thing wrong, what big things are they messing up?"

In a recent assignment, someone who did an otherwise-fine story got a poor grade because of two fatals: in one instance, they misspelled a city's name, and in a second instance they said an incident happened in one city when in fact it happened in the city next door.

To avoid such problems, we need to be sure not to simply run spell check; we need to check out every noun (person, place or thing)m, every title, every number, every address, every date to make sure what we wrote was what we intended to write: is what's in my story matching what's in my notes?

Then, we must check all of that make sure what we intended to write was correct in the first place. Do a quick Google check of everything and make sure what was in your notes wasn't wrong info given to you, or info you noted incorrectly.

If you're looking for specific proofreading strategies, please refer to related blog posts from earlier this semester.

Either way, make sure you don't have any fatals. Journalism isn't about writing; it's about getting it right.

Weekly Story #1: An Overview

Overall, we did okay with our first round of weekly stories, which you can see at the Spartan newsroom Web site here (and I do urge you to look around at some of the other stories being posted). The biggest problem -- besides getting used to the process in general and WordPress specifically -- was range of sources.

Too often, we had one side of the story, but not the other. We wrote about something or somebody but then never talked to that affected person or group. And we were sorely lacking in neutral experts overall. So our sourcing was too narrow.

A good example of broad sourcing is this story (click below to see):

Traffic jams today, smooth driving tomorrow in Virginia

The story only contains three sources, which was the minimum number. But the range is great: there is a subject driver (someone from the transportation department doing the road work). There is an affected subject (a driver affected by the road work). And there is a neutral expert (a civil engineering professor) to help contextualize what the others said.

There's also a range of mediums: we have pictures, and we have a chart.

Really, it's not necessarily the volume of sources that we are looking at. It's the range: are we deeply and broadly exploring the subject area?

Plus, please note ALL info was gained first-hand, from sources and such. There is no taking things from other media, which we should NEVER do. Media can't just take from other media; at some point, someone has to do their own reporting. It's okay that we look at other media, see who their sources are and then content those sources directly ourselves, but we should NOT be citing other media.

If you need some refreshers on soured and sourcing, see the earlier blog posts that are linked below:

Sources, we need a range

Neutral experts; WTF is that?

Neutral experts: imagine if ...

Hope this helps!

Weekly Story #1: Pointers On Filing Your Stories

Okay, so this was our first time doing our weekly routine. Like many things you do the first time, there are hiccups and headaches. Here, we will go over some of the more frequent ones and see if we can get things smoothed out for our second and subsequent weekly stories: 

• Your story and visuals need to be filed directly to the Spartan Newsroom WordPress account. Your source lists are the thing that gets emailed to me, not your actual stories.
• DO NOT write in visual mode on WordPress. It ends up leaving a ton of extraneous coding when I try to edit it, making it impossible to read. Here's a screen shot of what it looks like:

.. and this is what it looked like on visual (where I can't do all the editing I need to do):

Can you read the text version with all that coding (that DOES NOT appear when you write a story in the text mode)? I sure as hell can't. So, please make sure you are writing in the text mode, located on the tab in the upper right corner.

• Write headlines down style; that is, only capitalize the start of a headline and proper nouns. Write it like this: Man bites dog in Chicago; not this: Man Bites Dog In Chicago
• Add captions in the media library, not on the post page.
• With captions, don't forget to include a credit line: photo by your name here. And for graphics and charts, add a source of your information: chart by your name here. Source: name of source of information.
• Upload pictures and charts and fact boxes to the media library, and then insert them into your story in the visual mode.
• Before sending your story, be sure to update the status tab in the upper right corner to "Send to Omar." And only then email me your source list. When I see a source list in my mailbox and a story set to "Send to Omar," it tells me it is done and ready to be edited, graded and published.
• Your login can be found at http://news.jrn.msu.edu/wp-admin
• There, use your MSU email address as your login and your temporary password as your password.
• Directions for how to use WordPress are here: http://news.jrn.msu.edu/student-journalist-resources/the-wordpress-dashboard/
• Questions? Let me know ASAP.

Weekly Story #1: A Very Serious Problem

We are having a serious issue with some people not meeting pitch deadlines. Worse, we have some people missing weekly stories.

These are huge problems, people.

First, keep in mind there aren't many assignments this semester, so each weekly story (and your final project) are huge when it comes to your final grade. Half of your final grade will be based on weekly stories, with each weekly story making up 7 percent of your final grade.

That means if you miss one weekly story, you can get no more than 93 percent of possible points (which equals a 3.5) for this class, even if you 4.0 everything else. If you miss two, that caps your highest possible grade at a 3.0 (or 87 percent of possible points) even if you 4.0 everything else.

And odds are you won't 4.0 everything else, so you can drop those grades by at least 0.5.

The final project is 25 percent of your final grade, so missing the pitch deadline and/or the final project deadline will mean you at best can only get a 1.5 for the semester.

Story pitch deadlines will affect those grades as well. First, I will dock you for missing a deadline. second, you by missing your original deadline will give yourself less time to work on a story, and the thing we most need to do well in this class is as much time as possible to work on our stories and contact a broad range of sources.

The reason we so strictly enforce deadlines is because missing even one deadline is unacceptable in the real world. Ever flip on the 11 o'clock news and have the anchor say, welcome to the news! Hold on a minute; we're still finishing up some stuff? 

Of course not. That's because anyone with even a whiff of missing a deadline is either fired right away or never hired in the first place.

Case in point: early in my career a sportswriter at the first real newspaper I worked at missed her deadline. She just froze up. I still remember the editor on the phone with her, calmly telling her that's okay; he would mail her final paycheck to her and she could just mail back her laptop; no need for her to come back in ever again.

Seriously.

You see, as long as you turn in something an editor can work with that. Massage it, breathe life into it. They may be angry at you for it being a piece of junk, but a piece of junk can be salvaged.

But an editor can't work with nothing. And in the real world, that TV news producer is counting on you to turn in something approximating your assignment so he or she can fill the 50 seconds of the newscast for which they are counting on your story. Or a newspaper editor is counting on you to fill those 15 column inches on deadline. There is no backup; they need your story.

That's the habit we need to get down pat. That's the standard we are going to enforce here. Please, no more missed deadlines. Or expect the worse come final grades.

JRN 300: Examples of Final Projects

Here are some examples of final projects from past classes of mine. The topics are trend and issue stories like the ones you are doing, but generally these were the best, most ambitious topics likeliest to have the most interest and audience reach.

One big difference between a weekly story and a final project is the depth of reporting. Please note these stories have no fewer than six people quoted and/or paraphrased, along with lots of data and multiple neutral experts.

Really, a final project is just a weekly story on steroids. An ambitious topic; lots and lots of reporting; and a deep dive into the subject matter.

For a peek, click on the links below.

Lansing's South Side struggling, but improving

Plans for express bus service in Meridian Township

"Schools of choice" in Meridian Township

Please don't forget that final project pitches are due no later than 9 a.m. Thursday, June 29 to omars@msu.edu! Your job shadow pitch is due then as well.

JRN 300: Story Publishing Note

Please DO NOT go back into stories once I have published them. The window for making changes is before I publish your story. Making changes after they are posted puts your story at risk of having errors and libel added to them without having been properly edited.

JRN 300: Patient But Persistent

Recently I received this email from one of youze:

Hey Omar,

So I have e-mailed my contacts multiple times and tried calling them, however none have picked up or responded. Should I just keep trying or wait for them to respond because I don't want to annoy them or feel like they have to give me a bs answer.

This was my response:

This is a common frustration for journalists. You should both keep trying to reach them, and at the same time start looking for backup sources to contact. The worst thing that happens in that situation is too many people get back to you, which is a good problem. It's not their job to get back to us, but it is our job to have something usable by deadline. So be polite but persistent, and seek backups immediately.

Best, Omar

That's the reality of the business. As professional journalists we aren't paid to write or shoot video or do stand-ups; that's the easy stuff. What we are paid for is solving the problem of finding relevant people to talk to and then actually getting them to talk to us before deadline.  That's the skill we need to refine here.

Is there a magic approach to get people to call you back and talk to you? No. It's very case by case, just like a first date approach with one person doesn't work with another, and it can be hard to predict what will work.

So, what we need to do is be polite but persistent with primary sources: don't just email; call them. Don't just call them; stop by their office. Don't just wait on a return call; make a follow-up call.

Then, immediately after we put out our first round of calls to primary sources; immediately identify and reach out to secondary sources. Don't wait for your primary sources to first blow you off; again, the worst thing that happens is too many people call you back before deadline, and you have a huge amount of material to choose from for your story.

It beats the hack out of the alternative: nobody calls you back, and you're staring at the clock minutes before deal dine with nothing to write.

JRN 300: Some Story-Filing Instructions

Just some things to keep in mind when filing your weekly stories:

• You will write and file your stories in WordPress
• Be sure to write in the text mode and NOT the visual mode (in the tab on the upper right corner of the writing screen). Visual mode is good for reviewing copy and tweaking visual elements, but if you write in visual you will add a bunch of distracting coding to the text mode, making it hard for me to edit your work.
• No need for a byline; one will be automatically generated from your profile.
• Make sure you have a strong range of sources, as noted in earlier blog posts. That should include people affected by what you're writing about, people in charge of the issue you're writing about, and neutral experts.
• Sourcing rules count regardless of medium. Videos, podcasts and ASFs must have quoted and attributed sources fitting the necessary range.
• Neutral experts can be from anywhere; they do NOT need to be from MSU. They just need to be expert in your subject, have no stake in the outcome and be able to helpfully contextualize the info you found.
• EVERY story MUST have pictures taken by you and some sort of chart/graphic/fact box created by you. The latter could be as simple as a locator map, so don't necessarily overthink it.
• Photos, charts and graphic should be uploaded to the media library, and then added from the media library to your story. Be sure to include credit lines (photo by .... information provided by .... ) and captions. Those should be added via the media library page.
• In visual mode, you can position and resize photos using the tabs on the page.
• Videos should be uploaded to YouTube or another hosting site and then embedded in a WordPress file. In WordPress include a 100-200 word text synopsis of the video and a screen grab from your video as your image.
• When finished, go to the pulldown menu on the upper right side of the page, go to the "status" tab and set it as "send to Omar." Then SAVE (or it won't send) and close the file. "Send to Omar" means it I finished and ready for me to edit, grade and post.
• Also when finished, send me an email with the first and last names, phone numbers and email addresses for all your sources. I will be randomly contacting sources for proof of accuracy and that you actually spoke with them. ALL sources MUST provide this info or they may not be used. No anonymous sources.
• Make sure your sources understand this is NOT just for a class; what they say can and may be posted to a public news Web site run by MSU that will be seen by anyone, anywhere and can be found by Google and can be seen forever.
• Questions? Let me know. And good luck! 

JRN 300: Weekly Story Reminder

Don't forget that your weekly stories:

• Should be about something in your beat area
• Should be about a trend or issue, and not an event or happening
• Must have a topic pre-approved by me
• Should have a range of sources, as noted in earlier posts
• MUST have at least three human sources who you interviewed
• Should be reported ENTIRELY first-hand, with interviews done directly by YOU and stats and data YOU found yourself. No citations of other media, articles, books, etc. 
• Should include pictures, charts and/or fact boxes created by YOU, and not some other source
• Pictures and charts must have captions and an attribution line: photo by Charlie Brown, illustration by Joe Schmo, etc.
• Will be published to a public news Web site! Make sure sources understand what they offer will be used for a public news Web site. This is NOT just for a class!

JRN 300: Ap Style Quiz Follow-Up

For that assignment, my intent was for you to get a refresher on some common AP style points and a reintroduction to your AP stylebook, to which I will expect you to confirm this summer.

Because that was the intent, if you turned in the quiz you got an automatic 4.0. If you did not, your grade is a 0.0. There will be no makeup opportunity, and that will damage your final grade in this class. As I noted earlier, we have so few assignments in this class and since journalism is a deadline business, we cannot miss ANY deadline.

Here are some key points I want you to take out of the AP quiz:

• Generally numbers one through nine are spelled out like that: one and nine. Ten and above n numeric form: 10, 11, 12.
• An exception to that is when a number starts a sentence. Then, numbers should be spelled out: Twelve days ago, I died.
• Another exception is ages. They should always be in numeric form: a 4-year-old.
• When you have a numbered street address, abbreviate direction and type of byway: Omar lives at 123 N. Sesame St.
• When there is no number in the address, spell it all out: Omar lives on North Sesame Street.
• Money should generally be in numeric form, led by the dollar symbol and not followed by the word dollar: Omar lost $10,000 at the casino.
• Punctuation goes inside of quote marks, like this: "Omar is dumb," said Omar's mother. "Why?" Omar asked.
• Do NOT use quote makes of italics around the names of periodicals (publications that come out on a scheduled basis, like newspapers and magazines). It's just The Detroit Free Press, not "The Detroit Free Press" or The Detroit Free Press.
• Do put quote marks around content pieces that just come out once, like books and movies. Again, not italics.

JRN 300: Our Summer Publication Schedule

So we're about to start our out-of-class story cycles, where you will have about 8 days per story, per week to go from approved idea to to final version.

Basically, most Mondays you will have a story idea pitch for your next story due no later than 9 a.m. And most Wednesdays, your story that you pitched the previous week will be due by 9 a.m. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR KEEPING UP WITH YOUR DEADLINES, SO PLEASE USE A DAY PLANNER OR WHATEVER WORKS FOR YOU TO KEEP TRACK! Also, please note adjustments due to the July 4th holiday, as well as final project pitch and draft deadlines that will be throughout the semester.

Any story that misses a deadline is an automatic 0.0 for that assignment. Even if it is 5 seconds late, as time-stamped by the email I receive. That's how it is in the real world; ever turn on the 11 o'clock "SportsCenter" on ESPN and see them say, "Welcome to SportsCenter! Give us a minute; we're just finishing a script"? 

Of course not. That's because in journalism, anybody who misses deadlines or even gives hints of being that type of person is fired right away, or never hired in the first place. That's the standard we have to get used to -- we will never miss our deadlines. Ever. Period.

Here's our out-of-class story schedule for the summer:

Story 1:

Pitch due: Mon. 6/12, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Pitch OKd: Tue. 6/13 by 9 AM
Story due: Wed. 6/21, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story posted: Sun. 6/25 by 6 PM

Story 2:

Pitch due: Mon. 6/19, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Pitch OKd: Tue. 6/20 by 9 AM
Story due: Wed. 6/28, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story posted: Sun. 7/2 by 6 PM

Story 3 (PLEASE NOTE CHANGES IN ROUTINE DUE TO JULY 4TH HOLIDAY):

Pitch due: Mon. 6/26, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Pitch OKd: Tue. 6/27 by 6 PM
Story due: Wed. 7/12, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story posted: Sun. 7/16 by 6 PM

Story 4: (PLEASE NOTE CHANGES IN ROUTINE DUE TO JULY 4TH HOLIDAY):

Pitch due: Mon. 6/26, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Pitch OKd: Tue. 6/27 by 6 PM
Story due: Wed. 7/12, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story posted: Sun. 7/16 by 6 PM

Story 5:

Pitch due: Mon. 7/10, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Pitch OKd: Tue. 7/11 by 6 PM
Story due: Wed. 7/19, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story posted: Sun. 7/23 by 6 PM

Story 6:

Pitch due: Mon. 7/17, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Pitch OKd: Tue. 7/18 by 6 PM
Story due: Wed. 7/26, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story posted: Sun. 7/30 by 6 PM

Story 7:

Pitch due: Mon. 7/24, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Pitch OKd: Tue. 7/25 by 6 PM
Story due: Wed. 8/2, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story posted: Sun. 8/6 by 6 PM

We also have our final project story, which should be your most elaborate, ambitious trend-and-issue story of the term. This story will also require a mandatory story draft you'll need to turn in ahead of the final version. Please note the idea is due at the start of July, even though the draft isn't due until late April. That's to give you a lot of time to work on this. Please don't wait until the last minute. 

While your weekly story grades will be entirely based on your final story, your final project grade will be split between your pitch (25 percent), your draft (25 percent) and your final story (50 percent). Here is the schedule:

Final Project:
Idea due: Thu. 6/29, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Idea OKd: Wed. 7/5 by 6 PM
Draft due: Mon. 7/24 by 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Draft returned: by Sun. 7/30 by 6 PM
Final version due: Tue. 8/15 by 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Final version posted: Sun. 8/20 by 6 PM

Plus, you will also have the chance to do up to two optional weekly stories that would replace the grades of up to two earlier weekly stories, giving you a chance to improve your final grade. Here are those deadlines:

Optional Stories 8 and 9:

Pitch due: Mon. 7/31, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu
Pitch OKd: Tue. 8/1 by 6 PM
Story 8 due: Wed. 8/9, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story 8 posted: Sun. 8/13 by 6 PM

Story 9 due: Wed. 8/16, 9 AM to omars@msu.edu

Story posted: Sun. 8/20 by 6 PM

Questions? Please ask me. And good luck, everyone!

Web News: How To Get Hits On Your Stories

By Joe Grimm

As more journalism is posted online, we have to change the way we organize our stories to take full advantage of the Web.

Regular readers of our Web sites will find our stories based on how and where they are posted. But there is a much larger audience possible, based on how well we organize our stories to show up in Web searches. Building Websites and content to help the largest number of people is called optimizing for search engines, or Search Engine Optimization (SEO).

Headlines are important, of course, and so is the way stories are named for the Web site, as well as the nature of the Web site itself.

But reporters have tremendous influence over the hits they get, just by following a few practices.

The largest search engine running is google, of course, and the recent launch of the google Chrome browser makes it seem likely that Google's importance will grow. Engineers at Google are constantly tinkering with the rules behind the Google search engine, trying to make it deliver the right story as high up in the results as they can.

This is what we know about Google searches today, and how reporters can use that knowledge:

Google searches work on the words typed in by users. Search terms and typically nouns. The terms used to find material about a football game between Michigan State University and Notre Dame, for example, would most likely be "MSU, Michigan State, Notre Dame, football" and perhaps the name of a coach or standout player. People would not search on terms like "blowout, awesome, afternoon or East Lansing."

When you write for the Web, write for your readers but organize your story so search engines can find you. Here is an outlining technique you can use:

LIST the top half-dozen nouns someone will use to find your story. Make sure the top one or two are in your lede (they should also go in the headline) and once again in the first 100 words of the story (that's as far as Google looks).

INCLUDE the remaining words somewhere else in the first 100 words.

SUBHEDS do not help search engines, but they help Web readers, who tend to scan. Write a subhead about every 4-6 grafs.

LINK to related stories or definitions that can help readers understand your story. Links can also raise our profile on search engines.

JRN 300: Reminder On Weekly Story Pitches

Our weekly goal for most of the rest of the summer will be to come up with a story pitch that we will then turn into a developed trend or issue story from our geographic beat. We will do this every week!

The exercises we have done until now have been to get you familiarized with your beat and the sorts of trends and issues percolating on the grass-roots level. Now, we need to take one of our ideas and start developing it.

Every week for our story pitches, we need to settle on a trend or issue topic; summarizing what you think what may be most interesting, relevant and/or useful about your story FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A READER WITHIN YOUR BEAT; thinking about what kinds of sources you'll need; and then sending a summary of all that to me. (Examples of story pitches are included in the next blog post here.)

Your pitches will be due every Monday by 9 a.m. to my email, with your actual story due the following Wednesday by 9 a.m. to my email. So, every week you will be turning in a pitch for the next week's story, and then turning in that week's final story version. Then I will publish your story publicly on your beat's Web site.

It's important that we make sure we don't work on duplicate topics, so I ask that each group work on some way to coordinate what topics you're each working on. That may be by emailing each other or forming a Facebook or Google group where you can keep track of who is working on what story idea. 

In the event of a tie, the topic goes to who turned it in first, so you have an incentive to turn in your pitch as soon as possible! 

Either way, I won't allow more than one person to do the same topic as another has done, or that has already been done by the group this semester. For the Lansing group, that means all pitches this summer have to be ones not done by others. For the Spartan group, you may only do one topic per town that is covered by the group. 

Be sure you're reviewing what stories are going up on your site this summer so that you don't duplicate what's already been done. But stories that update an earlier story with legitimate new information are allowed.

In developing a pitch, if you feel like you don't have a strong handle on a good topic, look at revisiting or even redoing the exercises we have done to date. That includes:

• Googling your community to look for good topic ideas
• Doing environmental observation by walking around your community, being curious and then acting on your curiosity
• Polling passers-by to try to get a sense of what the concerns are of the community
• Looking at Census data online to see if there are statistics that underscore a potential trend or issue worth exploring
• Reviewing earlier blog posts on how to develop story ideas

You can also supplement what you've done by scheduling meet-and-greets with civic leaders like mayors, city managers, police chiefs, chamber of commerce officials, and such. Ask them what are key issues and challenges facing the community and what is being done about them. For the Lansing team, many Lansing officials are already used to Listen Up Lansing teams from the past contacting them; don't assume they'll blow you off. They may, or they may not.

If you need any help; please contact me at 702-271-7983 or omars@msu.edu.

Good luck! 

JRN 300: Your First Story Pitch

Now, we will get to work on what we will soon be making a weekly habit: coming up with a story pitch that we will then turn into a developed trend or issue story from our geographic beat.

The exercises we have done until now have been to get you familiarized with your beat and the sorts of trends and issues percolating on the grass-roots level. Now, we need to take one of our ideas and start developing it.

So, you have this week to develop your first story pitch. That means settling on a trend or issue topic; summarizing what you think what may be most interesting, relevant and /or useful about your story FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF A READER WITHIN YOUR BEAT; thinking about what kinds of sources you'll need; and then sending a summary of all that to me. (Examples of story pitches are included in the next blog post here.)

For our first pitch, you must send me your pitch in a Word doc to my email at omars@msu.edu. YOUR FIRST PITCH DEADLINE WILL BE NO LATER THAN 9 A.M. MONDAY, JUNE 12. I expect to have your pitches approved and returned to you by the end of the next day; at that point, you may begin working on your first weekly story.

It's important that we make sure we don't work on duplicate topics, so I ask that each group work on some way to coordinate what topics you're each working on. That may be by emailing each other or forming a Facebook or Google group where you can keep track of who is working on what story idea.

Either way, I won't allow more than one person to do the same topic as another has done, or that has already been done by the group this semester.

In developing a pitch, if you feel like you don't have a strong handle on a good topic, look at revisiting or even redoing the exercises we have done to date. That includes:

• Googling your community to look for good topic ideas
• Doing environmental observation by walking around your community, being curious and then acting on your curiosity
• Polling passers-by to try to get a sense of what the concerns are of the community
• Looking at Census data online to see if there are statistics that underscore a potential trend or issue worth exploring
• Reviewing earlier blog posts on how to develop story ideas

You can also supplement what you've done by scheduling meet-and-greets with civic leaders like mayors, city managers, police chiefs, chamber of commerce officials, and such. Ask them what are key issues and challenges facing the community and what is being done about them. Don't assume they'll blow you off. They may, or they may not.

Later this week, we'll post more examples of previous stories done by 300 classes to give you a better sense of what you need to be working on, along with some helpful tips on how to put together your stories and a publication schedule for the summer that you'll be responsible for following.

But for now, let's get rolling on our first story pitches. If you need any help; please contact me at 702-271-7983 or omars@msu.edu.

Good luck! 

JRN 300: Good Story Pitch Examples

... from a previous 300 class of mine.

Story idea #1: St. John’s percentage of people 25 or older with a bachelors degree is 8 percent lower than the national average and I’d like to explore why that is. I want to talk to some people and find out if they went to college and some people who might be at the age where they are considering college and what might persuade them not to go. I’d like to know where the people who are from that area go to college if they do chose to get a higher level education and whether those same people stay in the St. John’s area or move away. I would talk to people in the city, specifically some who didn’t go to college to find out why, and also some who did and where they went. My neutral expert could be a social studies professor who is an expert specifically on how where you grow up can shape how far you go on in your educational career. 

Story idea #2: My second story idea is I’d like to explore the issue of soil erosion being a hazard to water sources. With the amount of farm land in Clinton County there is plenty of space for development and the county has a lot of rules in place made by the zoning board so that soil erosion is under control and doesn’t pollute lakes and streams. I would talk to someone from a construction company to see what they do to avoid erosion and also talk to someone from the zoning board to find out how those rules are enforced. A neutral expert could be someone who studied water supply and how construction and development can affect water sources. 

JRN 300: Your Friday 6/2 Homework

Time for an AP quiz! This will serve as a refresher from what you learned about AP style in JRN 200. You will be expected to conform to AP style rules in all JRN 300 assignments going forward.

Please cut and paste these sentences to a Word document and then fix the following content as needed to conform with AP style. THIS IS AN OPEN-BOOK EXERCISE; DO USE YOUR AP STYLEBOOK TO LOOK UP ANSWERS AS NEEDED! But do work alone; no sharing of answers, please.

Then, please email the document WITH YOUR NAME AT THE TOP OF THE DOCUMENT via email to omars@msu.edu under the subject line of AP QUIZ. Your deadline will be no later than 9 a.m. Wednesday, June 7. Good luck!

1. 32 tourists from the state of Ark. lost two thousand dollars at the casino on August 13th.

2. 60 percent of last Summer's tornadoes killed twenty-three people.

3. Meet me at 123 North Sesame Street in Detroit, Mic. at 10 pm.

4. I read in "Sports Illustrated" magazine that the F.B.I. spied on fans at Ford Field last Winter.

5. I drove down interstate 75 to Detroit on December 12.

6. The Juniors all quit school and joined the US Army after the sgt. convinced them to do so.

7. Should I major in english of french? Either way, I need to drop my Sociology class.

8. I need to call my realtor to see if I can buy that house for five thousand dollars.

9. The President lost the election to Doctor Joe Schmo.

10. The eight year old child was kidnapped by a man driving a ford S.U.V. at the corner of Main street and College avenue.

11. I joined N.A.S.A. when I was thirty years old, after I retired from the U.S. navy.

12. Tuition will cost me $12000 this year.

13. The book, "I Was A Teenage Zombie," was awful, Sergeant Sally Smith said.

14. I am 100% sure that is correct.

15. I looked on the Center for Disease Control website and it says you must have alzheimer's disease.

16. The Jury found the nazis guilty of starting world war 2.