Kudos, hodge podge, and tearing apart the structure of the class

This post is about the editing and reporting courses in the convergence sequence at the University of Missouri's School of Journalism.

The convergence department is still working out kinks in the system. There are three foundation courses: Fundamentals, Reporting, and then Editing. The editing course edits the stories from the reporting course. In the following post, I point a possible restructuring of the course that I believe will be beneficial to everyone's education.

Kudos to Jordan in the reporting class.
My kudos for this week goes out to Jordan in the reporting class. Jordan was not Cham's partner for the week, yet he gave her a ride to assist her in her reporting duties. Jordan went out of his way to drive Cham out into the country to a location that was 40 minutes away from campus. I am writing this as part of my blog, because I wanted to make sure that Jordan got the recognition that he deserves for doing such a good deed.

Editing this week
There wasn't much to do. Kevin and Nan took care of themselves by going straight to Sarah Ashworth, and Cham, who is flying solo this week, is still working. We will be working together tomorrow afternoon/evening in the lab.

Restructuring the class
For this week's blog, I am going to pitch a reconstruction of the class. As a student editor, sometimes I feel that my job bypassed. There is tension between the reporter trying to get the story in on time and the editor actively playing a roll in the process.

I propose that reporters have until 5 p.m. on Thursdays to turn in their unedited stories. At that time the editor has the ability to take the story and pump some life into it where it is lacking. This being said the editors should have from Thursday at 5 p.m. until Tuesday at 5 p.m. to work with the reporters, news outlets, and professors to polish the story.

Pros:

• Students would have better clips and so would news outlets. Students are throwing work together. Sometimes they are coming in with rough drafts at noon on Thursday. It is difficult for an editor to get them to go back out an do more reporting, when the reporter has other obligations. This is not the real world. In the real world, reporters would only be reporting, not going to classes, studying for tests, or working jobs that interfere with reporting.


• Editors could exercise their editing skills. If a student turns in an edit of their story Thursday, the editor would be given more time to make the story a solid story.


• Editors would see the "rough", and try to sell it to a particular outlet as a piece slated for a certain date. It is difficult to go to the Missourian, KBIA, or KOMU to discuss publishing a certain story, when that story has no form yet. In the real world, we would know the work of our reporters. We would know what to expect from them, which includes quality and depth of a project. Often there are other elements that could go along with the story, that the reporters are not able to do. We could pursue a more developed piece by adding extra elements, such as graphics or photos, if they were not produced by the reporter or if it needs to be reproduced either by the reporter or a specialist.


• The professors would not have to give a lower grade in hopes that the reporters improve upon the story. We often say, "Give them a B+ or a C+, so they go out and do more reporting. This could be a good piece." Let's stop saying "could" or "would". The words "could" and "would" express probability. The words "will" expresses a prediction. Either say that they will or rework the deadlines so they will.


• This opens up the possibility for a different kinds of stories that the editors turn down because of time restrictions.

Cons:

• This messes up the structure of the class. No body likes change, but that is what this industry is about now. We should all get used to it.


• There is a chance that reporters might push their deadlines further. Solution? When reporters turn in their story ideas, they also turn in a due date on their story pitches. Let's throw away the set date of Thursday at 5 p.m. I think this could open up the doors for a lot of stories that "could" have been good, but were rejected. This means turning over stories that have a shorter deadline or long deadlines.