Feedback November 2002 (Vol 43 No 4)

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CURRICULUMDISMANTLING THE SILOS: MOVINGTOWARD CONVERGED JOURNALISMCURRICULUM AT WASHINGTON AND LEEUNIVERSITYClaudette Guzan Artwick, Washington and Lee Universityartwick@wlu.eduWhen Ashley Tyson walked into her news editing class for its first meeting last fall,something seemed awry. The curmudgeonly journalism professor she expected to findwas flanked by four other faculty, broadcast and print types, all looking a bit anxious.She sensed uncertainty as she glimpsed her print pals and some students she recognizedas broadcast majors, all the time wondering, “What in the world is going on?”Within a week, Tyson found herself in the producer’s hot seat preparing a televisionnews program that would air in three hours. Even though a professor guided herthrough every step, she felt bewildered. “We didn’t know what we were doing,” saidTyson. “Rundowns, Avids, teases, it didn’t mean anything. It was a feeling of ‘I’m notgoing to be able to do this.’” But the unfamiliar didn’t stop there. A week later, Tysonbecame Web producer, culling and repurposing stories from print and broadcastreporters and writers. The rotation continued for 12 weeks, with Tyson trading roles asbroadcast and Web producer with seven other print majors. By the end of the term, aninitially resistant Tyson had turned around. “I’m glad I got the experience,” said Tyson,“I’m comfortable with it. I know more.”Her professors know more, too. This exercise in convergence merged five print andbroadcast journalism classes at Washington and Lee University for a twice-weekly cablenews program and website, the Rockbridge Report. While our department has beenbringing together broadcast and print students for several years, fall 2001 marked thefirst time print students took the lead in a broadcast lab. It also marked our first fullyoperational,regularly published website. All this took place in a modular building (e.g.trailer), in a makeshift lab and studio. We had cobbled together a converged mediaoperation while awaiting the real thing, a $2 million-plus, fully-integrated digital mediafacility. Department head Hampden H. Smith, III urged us to move forward with theconverged lab, ready or not. “It wasn’t perfect,” said Smith, “but it wasn’t going to beperfect if we planned it any longer anyway. I think the results were astonishingly good,even though it was the first time we did it.” Smith has been thinking digitally sinceNicholas Negroponte’s book Being Digital hit The New York Times’ Best Sellers List in1995. 1 He’s encouraged his faculty to embrace the concept of convergence ever since.The road to convergenceAs a work in progress, the converged lab didn’t happen overnight. We lay its foundationfive years ago, with the conviction that good reporting is good reporting, no28Feedback November 2002 (Vol. 43, No. 4)
matter what medium houses the final product. So, in the fall of 1997, print andbroadcast journalism majors found themselves together for a stint as beat reporters. Atthat time, colleague Brian Richardson and I met our reporting classes jointly forlectures and story budget discussions while maintaining our separate tracks; his print,mine broadcast. Students’ stories stayed in their respective media. Print pieces oftenwent to the campus newspapers, and broadcast reports to the department’s radio andTV news programs. But that began to change in November 1999, when we urged printstudents to volunteer for our local broadcast election night coverage. 2 I recall theexcitement in the newsroom as producers briefed their staffs and sent them out into thefield to file live telephone reports and interviews with candidates. The first call camefrom a print student at the courthouse, with a story on the sheriff’s race. “I’ve got aninterview with Pederson,” she said.“Is he standing by, ready to go on the air?” asked the producer.“Standing by? No, he’s gone. I’ve already interviewed him, and I’ve got some greatquotes,” the reporter responded. She had applied a print interview model to a broadcastvenue. Instead of interviewing the candidate on the air, she filled her notebookwith quotes, and then read them as we broadcast live. While not ideal, the experiencetaught us a valuable lesson: we had a long way to go.Since then, we’ve moved closer to a converged media operation, with the linesbetween print and broadcast continuing to blur. For the past year former newspapereditor Pam Luecke has guided our print students through beat reporting, with veteranbroadcast journalist Bob de Maria leading the broadcast counterpart. Together, they felttwo professors for eight students was “a bit indulgent,” and separate textbooks andgrading authority made the distinct yet converged courses cumbersome to teach.Luecke will now teach print and broadcast students, with de Maria consulting on thebroadcast-specific aspects of storytelling. This arrangement might be impossible if notfor de Maria’s rare attitude.“I’m an old guy, but on the other hand, I’ve always been open to change,” said deMaria. “Change in and of itself is something positive. If you do something and it fails,you know not to do the same thing the same way. Do you remember the song HighHopes? I have high hopes.”Luecke is also optimistic. While she admits she’s “biased,” because she believes asolid background in print reporting is “essential for Internet and broadcast reporting,”she recognizes the strengths of broadcast journalism methods. A recent mid-termassignment requiring both print and broadcast students to conduct an on-camera interviewwith a newsmaker is a case in point. “It was a wonderful pedagogical device,” saidLuecke. “There is something about knowing you’re going to be talking on camera thatfocuses attention and energy in a way a print assignment on interviewing skills wouldnot do. So I was thrilled with that.”She’s also enthusiastic about the prospect of assigning print stories to broadcaststudents, moving us closer to true convergence.Working in one another’s mediaThe cross-platform opportunities continue to grow for our students both before andafter they take beat reporting. My neophyte electronic media students still learn thebasics of broadcast writing, shooting, and editing. But, they also write short pieces forBEA—Educating tomorrow’s electronic media professionals 29
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Page 4 and 5: CommentSWOT Analysis: Disney Consid
Page 6 and 7: without adding enough people to do
Page 8 and 9: his favorite questions for prospect
Page 10 and 11: The intellectual satisfaction you
Page 12 and 13: Finding qualitative evidence via te
Page 14 and 15: 2 Using a two-tailed Pearson Correl
Page 16 and 17: • We need to expand digital editi
Page 18 and 19: Two final points: While this paper
Page 20 and 21: 1. As elsewhere in the profession,
Page 22 and 23: EvaluationThere will be approximate
Page 24 and 25: CLASSROOMEMPHASIZING ETHICS: PROMOT
Page 26 and 27: “Avoiding Plagiarism” ( http://
Page 28 and 29: CLASSROOMMULTIMEDIA FOR MORTALS: RE
Page 30 and 31: Video files come in a variety of di
Page 34 and 35: the Web on deadline and conceptuali
Page 36 and 37: CLASSROOMADAPTING DIGITAL LEARNING
Page 38 and 39: strategies. Unfortunately, most tex
Page 40 and 41: Figure 2. Good Practice and the Enr
Page 42 and 43: CLASSROOMSTUDENTS TACKLE SUPER BOWL
Page 44 and 45: Usually, I urge students to use the
Page 46 and 47: aggression with intelligence, when
Page 48 and 49: e lost in sole reporting of undiffe
Page 50 and 51: COMMENT“SCHOOL DAYS, SCHOOL DAYS,
Page 52 and 53: CLASSROOMSWOT ANALYSIS: DISNEY CONS
Page 54 and 55: analysis. SWOT is an acronym for St
Page 56 and 57: Disneyland ResortDisney Vacation Cl
Page 58 and 59: CURRICULUMDON’T ISOLATE E-BUSINES
Page 60 and 61: mention implications from legal and
Page 62 and 63: viable media alternative to televis
Page 64 and 65: management are needed to deliver th
Page 66 and 67: Humboldt, Chris (2000). How E-comme
Page 68 and 69: editing is a place of influence. St
Page 70 and 71: COMMENTYO, YO, YO! THIS IS THE HIP-
Page 72 and 73: REVIEWSchroeder, Sheila E. (2002).
Page 74 and 75: ANNOUNCEMENTS2003-2004 Scholarship
Page 76 and 77: ANNOUNCEMENTSBroadcast Education As
Page 78: NEWSJohn Mark DempseyUniversity of

Feedback November 2002 (Vol 43 No 4)

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