Today’s editorial workshop was very lively, and I felt like everyone had a few helpful comments to make. I feel like the central theme of the class was how to make sure we find our angle and how so many other pieces of the editing process will fall into place through that. One comment from our discussion that I found really constructive was from Tony when he framed his suggestion with the opportunity for Evan to gain some more credibility with the addition of an interview with the Atheltic Trainer. Ideas like this one, with a few solid steps the writer can do, make the drafting process seem doable. Another comment or two that stood out to me was from Pheobe when she gave a great piece of personal experience and advice to Sarah Bo. in gaining the perspective of a student who is not in the GUST program but who has changed their major and might have some feelings on if they could have benefited from it. Phoebe also jumped in to answer Grace’s question regarding her word count and how to shorten her piece by making the vital connection that if she spends some time honing in on her angle, what is most important will become apparent, and some cuts can be made with other information not as relevant.
Month: February 2024 (Page 1 of 2)
Zak: “Is there a solution to Parking.”
Looking at your headline and sub-head, I know there is a clear, to-the-point issue you will delve into — which is, what are possible solutions to the parking problem at UNE, and is the current policy of allowing freshmen to have cars on campus a part of that? One minor observation on the headline is that it reads as a question, and you might want to add a question mark. But if you want to keep the sub-head the more question-based idea, you could always reword the headline. The lede has great information, especially with the data surrounding the number of residential students and parking lots available, which helps the reader know you have information to back up your story. As we get into the bulk of the story, I think you have a lot of good information and context, like mentioning other schools that don’t allow freshmen to have their cars on campus. There are a few places where you could make sentences/paragraphs a bit more concise – I’m thinking, “When looking at both sides of the debate, it is essential to look at both the positives and negatives of allowing freshman students to have their cars on campus.” – it could be easily implied that if you’re looking to both positive and negatives, that is both sides of the debate. There are some great quotes from the perspective of an upperclassman and two sophomores on their freshman experience. I might suggest that getting a quote from a current freshman in the middle of their first year might be interesting in weighing how strongly students feel. I also really like the angle of weighing the positives and negatives and allowing both sides of the argument. Still, I wondered if you have thought about getting some administrative response or maybe even someone from facilities or safety to give their side of the issue with parking.
Evan: “Danger on the field”
The headline is to the point, and as you are drafting, there may be room to add more context to the headline, but the sub definitely connects and lets me know that this story is about the playing surfaces for football. One suggestion I have for the lede since we are practicing a feature/soft news story is that you could use that space that hooks the reader into what your story is all about and save the information about the coach and his history later if needed. I like how you set up the second paragraph where “In an ideal world programs should make the switch.” – it helps reinforce your angle and support the stats you included where most players also feel artificial turf should be switched to natural grass. There are some minor sentence structure/grammar fixes, but there is plenty of time as this is just a draft. I think the quote from the recruiting coordinator helps set up the tensions between player safety on the field and the unique quality of the blue turf at UNE really well. I also noticed how it seems that the ultimate focus is not so much on whether UNE should switch but on raising awareness that this is a conversation happening on all levels, and there are pros and cons to both. This is a great start and raises many follow-up questions and ways to dig deeper into items like the condition of grass vs. turf upkeep; if you wanted to add another quote, I think that could be a great direction. Maybe ask students or community members who watch football if they would find any difference in going to watch games if the uniqueness of the blue field was gone.
Grace: “America’s Way to Mimick the Walkable City”
I really like your headline – I am immediately interested in how/why the walkable city should be mimicked and want to know more about how the U.S. is doing this. I know we are still in the drafting process, but I think a sub-head would help connect your headline to where your story will go. You have a broad claim in the headline, but it draws me in, and the sub-head could help center your angle. Your lede is also super interesting, and I like how you add some context to how it’s not just at college that people love the feeling of community, but it is something most people still crave as part of the adult world. I think it might be clearer if, again, in the sub-head, you explain that you are referring to the setup of most college campuses as akin to walkable cities. You have great information about the decline of walkable cities in the U.S. as car use became the status quo and how college campuses can be utilized as an example of how to get back to a more humane style of living. Your paragraph about European cities shows you have researched the success of walkable cities in other parts of the world and adds excellent credibility to your piece. The two students you interviewed and incorporated quotes from were very interesting. They have first-hand experience living on-campus in America and Morrocco, which one might think would be very different. The aspect of community and that walkable city feel you highlight are great ways to connect those experiences. I wonder, though, if you have thought of maybe adding quotes from UNE administrators or maybe other students who are from Ameircan cities, and they can add even more context to how college campuses can be a resource to better the layout of our cities.
Sarah Bourdeau: “Guided Undergraduate Studies; Beginning Undeclared in College”
One thing I noticed when looking at your feature story draft was the format – I think for news-style stories and not academic papers, we might want to keep the headline, sub-headline, and byline aligned left on the page – but this could be a good point to clarify in class through the workshop. Another minor formatting point is the organization of paragraphs, where we might want to get away from the essay style and into that journalistic style of shorter sentences and not indent for new paragraphs. I like the way you are opening up this story by giving the reader some context that the Guided Undergraduate Studies program is for students who have not declared a major without explicitly stating all that in the headline. Moving into the lede, I like how you can anticipate the reader’s next question and keep us moving along the story. The data helps give us context into how many students are undeclared, but if you wanted to, I think it could also be super helpful as context after the lede. Your quotes are also super helpful and provide great credibility with someone like Associate Dean Keirstead. Nearing the end, I feel like you really hone in on the impact of your story in highlighting how the rebranding of undeclared studies helps students not rush into majors they don’t want to be in and placing the importance in valuing students’ interests. One suggestion I have is that if you wanted to interview a student who is maybe an upperclassman and has more experience at UNE, it might be a nice point to showcase how the GUST program helped them get to where they are and offer a nice inspirational example to round off the freshman interview.
We had a great discussion in class for workshop #1, and on a more general note, working in a group to think through problems or highlight what is going well impacts my writing in such a great way. Everyone will have different struggles in their writing, and everyone has a different perspective on what is confusing or what speaks to them. Listening to the class weigh in on the other drafts, I gathered so much useful information surrounding citation forms, bylines, and mechanics of the feature story versus hard news just by paying attention to the group conversation. More specifically, a few comments from my fellow “editorial team” members that stuck out to me related to finding the story and thinking about what is missing. I believe it was Finn who mentioned finding the story, and I think it is so easy when we are drafting to get caught up in all the information we have gathered. Trying to construct a coherent piece of writing out of sometimes disjointed and surplus info can be overwhelming. Still, the beauty of getting all the information down is that you have so much flexibility and options to think about what you want to say. In a similar statement from Nick, I think, is this idea that once you have a solid draft, you can begin to think about what is missing. Techniques like taking the time to consider whether there are gaps in what you know you want to get across versus what is on the page. Both of these points relate to finding that focus and portraying it to your audience in the best and most genuine way possible, which I feel is essential in practicing writing like a journalist.
My feature story draft was one of the selections for our class workshop today, Friday, 2/23, and I definitely got some very helpful and constructive feedback from my peers. It was also nice to reflect on how the comments from the class made me feel that the story I have chosen to dig into is relevant to students on campus. After this workshop, I plan to incorporate my interview with Freshman Art Education major Kaylie Norton into the piece to provide that important understanding that new students coming into UNE under the current schedule change don’t know any better. There is nothing to raise concerns over to them as it is the norm. I will also make a few minor mechanical edits surrounding pronouns, some quote formatting, and re-work where my nut graph is. The only major piece I want to add is to interview Prof. Cripps to provide some context and authority to the mood/situation at the student forum back in 2022. As I am thinking about the central focus of the piece and how to provide the impact I am looking for, I also received a great suggestion from Prof. Miller based on the class’ feelings toward the silence mentioned is to add to the craft of the piece by incorporating that somewhere in either my sub-head or lede.
Checking in on what I have done for our Feature Creature assignment, I am on track. I saved my two pitches in a Google doc from when we would have our pitch session in class, so that was a quick upload to my ePortfolio. I also started to think of questions and a focus or direction I wanted my story to take while I came up with the pitch, so I had notes and a few questions to work off of as I started my first draft of around 300 words. I had a meeting with Dean Millen set up for Feb 5th for an unrelated topic, but as we chatted about my classes, I mentioned this project, and he was more than happy to answer a few questions. Those major quotes were a great start, and I posted my second draft of around 500 words. Since then, I have been fine-tuning my questions and figuring out what angle I want to bring to this story. At first, I wanted to keep it to whether students’ feelings about the schedule changed and why or why not. However, after meeting with Dean Millen, some of his points made me reexamine what I wanted to highlight. So far, I have conducted all of my interviews – I have quotes from a junior and two seniors to work off of. Before Friday, I will post my peer review draft, as it is pretty close to ready for that now.
Feedback Group #1 Peer Review Workshop
Phoebe: “RSLA”
From the headline, I definitely know that this story is going to have something to do with the Residential Student Life Association – but I think if I were a reader outside of the class, not knowing anything about your pitch, I might want just a glimpse more of the direction you are going to take us. Jumping into the lede, there are solid facts that help orient me to what this association is, what its goals are, and who it is for. One thing I might raise is that I know we are all UNE students, but if we weren’t, it might be helpful for the impact of your story to provide that fact of what campus you’re going to talk about. You have a very detailed and helpful nut graph that gives lots of great specifics to the RSLA. Still, I think it is only a paragraph later that I start to uncover the story’s angle or purpose – that engagement in RSLA has been down. From that, we then get into how you highlight some potential reasons and look for solutions to the issue through talking with members, former advisors, etc. I think it is a great story and one that really impacts campus life – it might be helpful to think of a way to draw us into it from the beginning since it’s not hard news, and we have more creative opportunities could be a great tool.
Molly: “An Icy Start To the Rookie Season”
I really like your subheadline – it draws me in and lets me know that you are taking the story even further than just recruitment but that there is something to be said – whether good or bad – about strengthing and maintaining the team as well. The lede tells me what I should pay attention to regarding where we are, UNE, what the hockey team looks like, when it started, and who runs it. I think it’s a smart move to begin with a credibility/authorial position from the coach’s statement and then give the reader some information on the recruiting process and the realities of running a somewhat new team. I like the line, “It is easy to see the amount of work and time that goes into recruiting new players. However, come game time these typically aren’t the players in the line-up.” I think it does a great job of wrapping up the business side of the team and transitions us to hear from the students’ perspectives as well. The conclusion flows nicely for me, and I can see how you are taking this in a way right of passage that freshman playing time is often a major point of complaint and highlighting a new perspective on the strategic element that could be more appreciated and change the mood of the team. As for the structure, feature stories are longer and less confined by the fast, hard-hitting news, but I do think that there could be a few spots where, if you wanted to break up the paragraphs, you definitely have the content and ideas to support some of those being on their own and might keep the reader going a little easier. I think your piece also raised a question for me in terms of citation, and I wonder if, after you have already introduced who you are quoting, we also need to include parenthetical citations.
Kayleigh: “The Living shoreline project is giving students opportunities to take positive action in the face of climate change”
I like the headline a lot – it has some great keywords that provide insight into your story’s tone and goal. Highlighting student opportunities, taking action – and positive action at that – and within the scope of globally recognized efforts toward climate change solutions makes me want to continue reading. I’m not sure if ePortfolio may have compressed some of your paragraphs, but what I think looks like your lede gives necessary information on what school and students you are referring to – being UNE – and what professor or person of authority we can look to for credibility and also providing some specifics like the course students are in and the strategies and unique situation of our “picturesque campus.” I also think there is so much great information regarding this project’s mission and good evidence in terms of climate change that makes me, as the reader, see the connection between our unique experience at UNE and being able to test what might occur globally. The quotes from Morgan and Faraday provide some nice context and give a sense of urgency that I think is always needed when looking into climate solutions. The ending does a lot in providing the amount awarded to UNE and shows the tangible impact this project can have – although I would love to have heard directly from a student in this program or maybe to provide some thoughts on the new opportunity.
Everything Edits: Potential Communication Department Hire Demonstrates Digital Media Class
Biddeford, ME – Last Friday afternoon, the University of New England’s Introduction to Journalism class participated in a teaching demonstration on Premiere video editing with candidate Dominic DiPaolo, Professor of Digital Media.
Students and faculty members of the School of Arts and Humanities await Jesse Miller, associate teaching professor of Writing and Communications, to provide a quick rundown of the teaching demonstration and an introduction to DiPaolo. Jumping right in, DiPaolo then takes the helm.
DiPaolo begins with a finalized hockey video edited with Adobe Premiere, showing what a post-production editing class might look like. Then, he runs through the essential elements of the site, such as source panels, project screens, effects, controls, timelines, and audio, ensuring the students are provided with context. No detail was left uncovered as DiPaolo seemed to anticipate students’ questions and swiftly address any complex aspect of the process.
Not only did DiPaolo explain the technical process of video editing with the transitions from a rough cut, refinement, and final cut, but he elaborated on the craft of the editor in giving shape and meaning to a video. He said, “You have control over what your viewers see. You have the narrative.”
In demonstrating his capabilities and classroom persona, seeing how he would react to the inevitable technical malfunctions was essential. However, DiPaolo confidently reassured the classroom that he is a patient and approachable resource when technical frustrations arise to find a solution.
Later, when asked if Premiere handled graphics and captions and editing rather than simply stating an answer, DiPaolo jumped to another screen and made the question a learning experience for everyone. Similarly, when Sophmore Communications major Kayleigh Duncan (she/her) asked whether “Premiere is better than DaVinci Resolve?” DiPaolo’s reply of Premiere was backed up by examples from lived experiences working in video editing and digital media.
While teaching demonstrations with their heightened stress levels are not exactly the same as a day-to-day classroom experience, DiPaolo covered a comprehensive lesson with a humble and relaxed demeanor that is sure to help in future decisions on his candidacy as a UNE professor.
Chapter 10 in our textbook covers the techniques of features and storytelling in journalism. This chapter had many interesting points, especially as an intersection between crafted reporting and narrative storytelling. For example, the chapter made the point on page 188 where the author says, “Narrative writing combines show-in-action description, dialogue, plot, and reconstruction of an event as it occurred”(188). I also noticed the chapter mentioned one of my favorite writers and thinkers, Joan Didion, who I have been thinking a lot about during this class. The ability she and others mentioned have in what the chapter calls “reading to write” is super important – appreciating the techniques through reading other works and analyzing tone, characters, scenes, etc., can help storytelling in the news or magazines take on that novel-like feel but is entirely factual. Another section within this chapter that I found helpful was the structure of the feature or the story, which has more choices than hard news arranged chronologically. A feature or a narrative story could be topically or even a literary structure with a plot form of beginning, middle, and end. The bullet points on page 194 helped me to visualize this form I know so well in other forms of writing but less so with journalism, such as connecting to the lede or nut graph and looking to the future at the end of the piece, which hones in on the significance of the story.
Story One: “BC Files Defense Against Sex and Pregnancy Discrimination Lawsuit Made by Former Professor” By Lucy Freeman
The first story I reviewed this week was on BC professor Hristina Nikolova’s lawsuit against BC’s Board of Trustee’s regarding gender and pregnancy discrimination. Nikolova raised a muiltitude of issues from breach of contract, retaliation, sex and pregnancy discrimination, parental leave, and family and medical leave. The answer from the Board was that none of the arguments Nikolova raised have standing for relief and that BC’s denial of tenure was based on legitimate non-discriminatory and non-retaliatory reasons.” Starting at BC in 2014 and on the tenure track, the tension between her accounts and the Board surrounding her excellent job performance and family life became and area of interest for both parties. A battle of who said what ensued with Nikolova claiming multiple gendered remarks were made about her pregancy during tenure reviews in which the university denies on all counts. Ultimately, a severed contract, no job, and a refusal for damages is what Nikolova is left with. The 1.7 million in damages Nikolova has brought to the university has thus been rejected.
Story Two: “BC Law Professor Investigates Court-Mandated Programs Forcing Victims to Work With Their Abusers” By Annika Engelbrecht
Another story from BC’s The Heights this week looks to the work of Claire Donohue, assistant clinical professor of Boston College Law School, regarding court-mandated parenting program therapy, which requires both victims and alleged abusers to complete the program. In examining these high-conflict cases that result in parenting classes, Donohue notes how there are vital misunderstandings surrounding family dynamics and says these sessions create “a rigid definition of what it means to be a good parent, and its assignments created an unsafe environment for anyone escaping an abusive relationship.” Above even the specifics, she and her colleagues also bring into question the effectiveness of court mandates, especially in family matters, and how beneficial being entangled in the court system is for prolonged periods of time when people, even with their best efforts, won’t comply to forced requirements that they feel are at odds with their values or children’s best interest. Donohue and Margie Palladino, BC Law Alum and co-founder of Mass Family Advocate Coalition (MFAC), also raise concerns on how these mandates affect nuanced and dangerous situations of domestic abuse where in efforts to remove themselves and their family from an abusive partner, victims are then forced to go through a highly confrontational and emotionally charged program with them.
The Enduring Battle Between Students & Universities: Journalism Class Asks Why?
Biddeford, ME – In last Friday’s Journalism class located at the University of New England’s Marcil Hall, students conducted a newsroom-style pitch session for their upcoming feature story assignment, and an unmistakable theme emerged.
For one semester, these students are tasked with stepping into the shoes of a journalist. The semester is just beginning to ramp up from conversations on the role and importance of journalism to now attempting the hands-on craft themselves with a feature story pitch session. However, the conversation soon turned to that age-old clash between students and their institutions. Whether it’s Aristotle complaining about Platonic Academy’s facilities in the 4th century BC or a 2024 UNE student trudging from the Forum parking lot to Decary Hall, you have grievances to air. With no topic requirements for this feature, the classroom began picking up on a recurring theme of just where UNE’s money is going. Whether sports, residential halls, staffing, or bookstore prices, students are adamant about transparency and accountability on behalf of the administration.
As associate teaching professor Jesse Miller, M.F.A (he/him), a cornerstone of UNE’s writing and communications program for 15 years, said, “The complexities of higher education systems begin when the business of education meets the academic.”
Never without an element of humor, the class can understand the role of a journalist in those very instances they discuss through their pitches with some moments of casual riffing. Junior Environmental Studies major Brady Spring (he/him) adds “Bummer of the Century” while discussing potential headlines about school safety issues. Nonetheless, the interactive circle regroups with news-room style quickness and is off on the next pitch.
The students of Introduction to Journalism have gotten a taste of the stories waiting to be detected all around them and hit the core of those timeless tensions within higher education. In maintaining the goal of the class to balance both theory and practice, the class will now set out to find the essential facts and unveil the significance of their stories with the artistry of a true journalist.
