This week’s #collegejourn chat resulted in a plan to help professors get on board with the 21st cenutry:

Who: Professors, students, journalists, professionals
What: “Bring a professor” chat
When: Sun., Feb. 22
Where:  www.collegejourn.com
Why: To discuss ways to modernize college journalism education 

Us vs. them

I hate to make this us vs. them, but to be honest, this is an us vs. them situation. Some would argue that “we’re all in this together,” both the professors and the students. But it’s not that way. The students and the industry are in this together. But the professors aren’t impacted directly. If they fall behind, they don’t see the direct consequences of falling behind and thus have no incentive to change. 

It doesn’t have to be us vs. them though. Professors can eliminate the us vs. them by taking the risks students are expected to take.  The classroom should foster that innovation, not hinder it. We can take the risks together. 

“Communication in a communication department would be a start,” said the Mustang Daily managing editor Giana Magnoli when the topic came up in our newsroom. And that’s what #bringajprof chat is about. Bringing that communication between staff and students to a national worldwide level. 

I recently wrote a blog post that sums up the changes I’d like to see in journalism education:

1. Scrap print as a track: There is no such thing as a purely print publication. Thus a solely “print” concentration is pointless. Replace it with a “multimedia” track and keep very minimal print aspects involved.
2. Make video a must for all concentrations: Public relations and news editorial both need to know video editing. Broadcast students who already know how to shoot/edit video need to know how to get it on the Web. All three need to know how to live stream and incoroporate a live chat. 
3. Create a class about social media: Not about platoforms or social networks, though. A class about the community, the conversation, the two-way dynamic of the Web. 
4. Create media business course. Joey Baker said it best in his recent blog post: ”What we need more than anything else is a business model for our industry that is sustainable. Why need students not only to be aware of the problem, but contributing to the brain storming that will eventually lead to a solution.”

Time and time again, student journalists in my college newsroom ask where the value is in Twitter. 

“It’s just another social thing,” one guy told me just yesterday. 

Then something like this happens and changes everything:

The photo was posted to TwitPic via Janis Krums @jkrums, a guy who happened to be in the right place at the right time. 

Along with his photo (in fewer than 140 characters) Janis tweeted: “There’s a plane in the Hudson. I’m on the ferry going to pick up the people. Crazy.”

And as our mobile phone picture-taking-quaility continues to improve, so will the value in on-the-go journalism. Janis’ photo, taken from an iPhone, is far better in quailty than the frame grabs taken from local news stations.  His photo was also the first to appear on the web — and, as usual, I found out about the crash on Twitter before CNN ever sent out my news alert.

There’s a lot of talk these days about whether Twitter, blogging and microblogging are the future of journalism. I’m not sure if I’m ready to make that claim, but times like these validate that it’s a hell of a supplement.

At the end of last year,  Emily Kostic (web editor of Rowan University’s The Whit) wrote a blog post about New Years Resolutions for college newspapers. A few things struck me on that list:

• #5 Get away from College Publisher
• #6 …and in the process go Web First

Getting away from College Publisher

That’s right: I said it.  After a recent conference call with Adam Hemphill and Miles Skorpen of CoPress, it’s official. The Mustang Daily is switching to WordPress.

The switch away from College Publisher is something I’ve wanted for the Mustang Daily since before I was even a student at Cal Poly. Not that College Publisher is bad; it’s a great starting point for newspapers who are trying to learn the dynamics of the Web. We used to be that paper. Now we get it. Now we’re ready for new things. We’re ready to generate our own revenue and move on.

Plus, WordPress is open-source. College Publisher is far from it.  If we want to make changes, we have a world of developers to turn to. With College Publisher, change comes in the form of submitting a query to their support team.  That makes it less than easy to be innovative.

This summer I started seriously considering WordPress as a CMS and built a mockup. But there’s a huge difference between saying, “This is what I want to do,” and actually doing it. 

Our former online editor created a Joomla mockup last year, just as I had done with the WordPress, and after getting the “Ok!” from our general mananger, his plans went nowhere.

Why? Fear. Fear of not being able to pass down an open-source CMS to future online editors. Fear of failing. 

That was the same concern that came up when I proposed the idea of moving to WordPress. 

To me, it’s a non-issue. If my future replacement doesn’t “know” the system, then he/she has to learn it.

We’ve all been new to it at one point. The fear of learning something new is possibly what got the journalism industry in the position it’s in now.

After news that CoPress would start hosting college newspapers, I had the final push the editor-in-cheif and I needed to convince our general manager that we’re done with College Publisher.

It’s really a great deal: cheap hosting (off-campus, so we don’t have to follow strict ADA rules and pay the school for space), a support network (so that we’re not relying only on me), and a solid relationship with leaders in college journalism. 

Tentative plans set our launch date for March 14.  Cross your fingers for us. We couldn’t be more excited. 

Structural changes to the Mustang Daily

With our big redesign come huge structural changes. With College Publisher, we were limited to posting stories based on the date of our print issue (although, to be fair, CP5 has improved).  With WordPress, we’re ready to move to a 24-hour news cycle where we’re posting news continuously.

Even if your newspaper isn’t planning a major overhaul, you should still consider ending your shovelware methods. 

It’s what your readers expect from you. Most students are getting their news online from the local paper, CNN, NYTimes, etc. They’re used to getting news updates all day long, and it shouldn’t be any different with a college newspaper. News doesn’t stop during the day just because the print issue isn’t done.

Of course, the change isn’t as simple as posting news updates throughout the day. The way our process is structured requires copy editors to come in around 5 p.m. to start reading over stories. With their red pens, they sit at a table and edit stories that have been printed out.

Hours are wasted between the first Word Doc printout and the flat printout. Copy editors aren’t done with the final changes until 10 p.m. each night (which is when I post the stories. That’s just wrong). 

 I have a few problems with this method:

• Why are the copy editors only coming in at night? Future (meaning this spring or summer) structural changes to the Daily will require copy editors on duty all day long to edit stories as they come in.
   
• During a time when the Web dominates the news industry, why is it our last priority? The web should always be the number one priority on every editor’s list. Not a place to dump stories that don’t fit in print or an after-thought at the end of the night. And while most editors tend to agree, they sure have a hard time putting it into practice.
   
• Why do copy editors need to use a red pen on a printed Word Doc? What about a little thing called a computer? Editing on paper seems so primitive.  Slowly, the Mustang Daily staff has started using Google Docs for assigning article and photo assignments. And WordPress makes editing articles online even simpler.
  As Greg Linch wrote on the CoPress Blog, stories can be edited on WordPress, rather than through multiple Word Doc revisions. This means the copy editors don’t have to come into the newsroom to copy edit. All they need is a computer and internet access.
   
• Also, as Greg notes, when print designers are ready to layout their pages, they simply pull the already-copy edited versions of the articles from the CMS.  It saves time and everyone wins.

Breaking an age-old tradition

Another way the Mustang Daily is breaking the rules this quarter is through implementing a “track” system for our reporters.

Because the Mustang Daily reporters are enrolled in a class (taught by student editors), they get credit for writing. So the syllabus is structured like any other class: you do a little of everything so you can be “well rounded.”

Traditionally, it’s always (and I mean forever) worked this way– Each quarter (10 weeks) every Mustang Daily reporter writes:

• Four news stories
• Four arts stories
• Three sports stories
• One feature story (1,000+ words) 
• An opinion piece
• + four miscellaneous (from any section) 
• Last year, we added a multimedia requirement to that list. Starting in summer 2008, it jumped to two multimedia pieces.

But now we’re breaking the rules. We’re switching it up. Reporters are now on a track system, which works like beats. We have sports writers, news writers, arts writers and general reporters. Each reporter will do two multimedia pieces for their respective tracks.

The system is seemingly common-sense. Reporters build up their contacts in their tracks and get story leads. They get the kind of experience they’d have in a real newsroom.

We made the switch because we had crap stories for our sports section. Reporters who knew/understood sports couldn’t write for the section because they had to fulfill news/arts requirements, and news/arts writers who knew nothing about sports were trying to cover soccer games. It doesn’t work that way.

Yet somehow, for uncountable years, the system continued. Not because it worked, but out of fear of change. Because the world supposedly wanted journalists who could cut out diverse clips to paste into their portfolios.

Well the industry is changing. Physical clips don’t exist (or at least they shouldn’t). Students need experience that reflects the real industry as close as possible. College newspapers need to mirror those industry changes, or even better — come up with innovative changes the professional industry hasn’t yet.

I challenge you to look at aspects of your newspaper that have always been the same, and ask yourself if those strategies still work. And even if you think they do work, come up with ways to make them work better.

Change is the only way to win. Are you up for it?

I’ve always learned that e-mail interviews are an absolute last resort. The criteria: the interviewee has to be on the other side of the world, on a spaceship or in jail.

But as e-mail and other web-based networks (Twitter, Facebook) become such a huge part of the communicative landscape, e-mail interviews don’t have the same “unprofessional” vibe they used to.

I’m not suggesting that an e-mail interview should entirely replace a phone or face-to-face interview, but it’s a great supplement.

Freelance journalist Kim Lisagor said in a recent conversation that she was shocked when reporters e-mailed her regarding her book, Disappearing Desinations. As a traditionally-trained journalist, she always saw e-mails as a last resort too. 

But she made an interesting observation:

“The only articles that were accurate were the e-mail interviews,” Lisagor said.

The great thing about e-mail interviews is that you can pull quotes directly from the e-mail, verbaitim.

Ways to effectively use e-mail interviews:

• As an introduction: If you have some time to work an a story, shoot your primary sources a quick e-mail. Let them get the gist of your story. Tell them to be expecting a call from you. I’ve found that this makes my sources a lot more comfortable, and that means a better interview. You can do this introduction through Twitter or Facebook too.  Example: “Hello Mr. Doe, I’m a student reporter at the College Daily and I’m just giving you the heads up that I’ll be calling you soon to talk about an article I’m writing. I’m interested in investigating faculty salaries and I know you’ve been vocal about the topic in the past. Looking forward to talking to you. 

• To get the basics. Names, places, times, etc. If you have this in an e-mail, you can always resort back to it, directly from the source.
   
• As a fact-checker: Are you unsure about a few statistics or a sequence of events? Rather than finding the time to meet in person again or facing the difficulty of trying to sort out details over the phone, e-mail can be the best way to see the facts straight-forward.Example: Hello, Ms. Doe. I am the College Daily student you spoke with earlier. I want my story to be accurate, and I was hoping you can confirm a few facts:
  • CSU employees will maintain regular pay until the budget is passed
  • The support budget consists of federal money remaining from the 2007-08 school year
  • When that money runs dry the CSU will pay employees from student fees Thanks in advance for the clarification!
    -Student journalist 

When you shouldn’t use e-mail interviews:

• Really hard news. If there is a scandal with the mayor, it’s likely that an e-mail response would be written by a PR person. To get to the root of it and fish through the BS, phone and in-person will produce the best results.
• Really fluffy features. If you want to capture the sparkle in someone’s eye or tone in someone’s voice, e-mail just won’t do the trick. That doesn’t mean cut it out all together. You can still use the e-mail to do an introduction to your subject, then after the interview, send an e-mail to get clarifications you need.

E-mail may last forever. Once sent, it can be forwarded to strangers. So keep it professional at all times.

Identify yourself as a reporter.

Apply the same critical thinking and fact-checking skills that you would to any other information source.

Verify your sources and their online identities. Remember, e-mail addresses can be faked.

Steve Enders, Cal Poly alumnus and senior product manager at Yahoo! News, gave a keynote lecture Thursday at Cal Poly’s journalism week and shared some interesting perspectives.

A few things Steve emphasized:

“I never thought I’d be where I’m at today. I graduated with an interest in newspapers. I wanted to be a reporter and editor.”

If you’re going to get into journalism, you need to be ready to change. It’s a constant evolution, and if you’re stuck in your ways, you’re not going to last long. Have an open mind. Accept new challenges. Steve’s career path is a perfect example of flexibility:

• He graduated in 1997 with a journalism degree
• After graudation, he worked at Metro, a newspaper
• After Metro, he switched gears to Click, a magazine
• Made a huge leap to television, working for Tech TV
• Finally made the jump to the web with Yahoo

• World’s No. 1 news Web site in terms of unique users to the site each month
• Only 10-15 employees on the editorial staff
• Processes 13,000 pieces of content every day
• About 10 percent is original content, the rest is aggregated

“Now we’re starting to care about, ‘Well, if you’re interested in a story, I probably am too and I’m going to read it.’”

Promote yourself using social networks that most people are already using and familiar with. It will drive traffic to your site, (it’s something I’ve previously blogged about; it’s good to know a professional agrees)

• Put your newspaper on Twitter
• Start a Facebook page for your publication
• Upload your video to YouTube

While Steve as a speaker did very well overall, I was disappointed with the low student turnout. Instead, random guests of the older generation (people who aren’t impacted by the changing industry) showed up and asked questions like “Can you track searches directly back to my name?” or, my favorite: “So, is it like deadline all the time?” Um, duh?

Students should have taken advantage of the opportunity to make an industry connection and get a glimpse into what the industry is like right now (what it’s really like, not what we learn about in class).

On a happier note, I had somewhat of an epiphany during the lecture. Although I’ve recently been pessimistic about journalism as a whole, something Steve said stuck with me:

“What an exciting time to be getting into this industry.”

That statement goes against a lot of sentiments I hear from professionals and peers. A fellow journalism major with a public relations concentration told me yesterday, “I’d be terrified to be in print journalism right now.” It’s the general attitude most students at Cal Poly — and the industry as a whole — have.  Sure, we’re going through a tough time, but it’ll come around, and aspiring journalists are going to be the people who fix it.

The industry isn’t dying. It’s changing. And the upcoming generation of journalists gets to redefine news and its delivery.

Guru: Teacher of wisdom, literally, one who takes you from darkness to light.

Richard Koci Hernandez seems to fit that description in the realm of multimedia.

I first met him at an ACP conference in San Francisco last spring. It was the most inspiring seminar I’d ever witnessed. He talked about breaking the rules and going against the grain. He shared his views on the future of HDV instead of DSLRs. His message was sincere and presented in a fresh way. Since the conference, I’ve kept a close eye on his blog and am always interested in what he has to say.

The following is the result of a recent e-mail interview with him:

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