Describe your 'media dream job'

In the essay you read on the class website, college senior Jonathan Bach describes journalism as the "best job in the world," despite its low pay and the fact that a lot of people have a poor opinion of the media. Since most of you are interested in having a career in the media I want to know what you consider your "media dream job." If you could design your job in the media what would you do and where would you do it?
Keep in mind that no one starts at the top so please don't say that you want to be the host of the Today Show. If something like that happens to be your "media dream job" then tell me a realistic path to getting there and how long  you would be willing to wait and work to get a job like that.
Also, what kind of skills would you need to have for your "media dream job?" Be specific and describe what type of technology skills and other skills you would have to have to succeed in the media?
Please write more than 200 words on this topic and post it on your blog and then send me the link.

Why become a journalist?

EUGENE, Ore. — JONATHAN BACH’s dream job is in a profession that’s widely reviled, poorly compensated and often dangerous. A lot of people tell him it’s doomed to become obsolete. None of that seems to matter to him.

He still wants to be a journalist.

This summer Mr. Bach got his first taste of daily newspaper reporting, at the East Oregonian, a publication based in Pendleton. He covered rodeos, Native American tribes and the opening of a new bar called the Strip’n Chute. He wrote a lot, wrote fast — and earned minimum wage.

“It’s the best job in the world,” he said, with all the earnestness you’d expect from a 21-year-old college senior.

To enter journalism these days you have to be a true believer. If you can find an entry-level job — and newspaper staffs declined by 10 percent last year — you will more than likely take a vow of poverty worthy of a monk. Even in television, a news reporter can make as little as $18,000 a year.

In our polarized society, public trust of the media is at an all-time low, according to a recent Gallup poll. Across the political spectrum, some accuse us of spreading insidious liberal ideas, while others call us lackeys of a corporate, right-wing conspiracy. Worse yet, people think of us as heartless jerks who’d make a little boy cry or kick an immigrant in pursuit of a story.

The truth is that the best journalists connect with readers, viewers and listeners by being open-minded and compassionate. That’s one reason so many people remain in the profession, despite the poor pay and long hours. As Mr. Bach learned on assignments like interviewing a rodeo camp volunteer, empathy is a key part of the job.

“You get to share stories and you get to see things through someone else’s eyes every day,” he said.

I tell the young reporters I teach at the University of Oregon to ignore the gloom that surrounds the profession and its future. People will always have an appetite for true stories well told.

And they will never stop wanting essential information, delivered quickly and accurately. When a gunman opened fire on Oct. 1 at a community college in Roseburg, some 70 miles south of Eugene, several news outlets contacted our university’s journalism department and asked: Do you know a young freelance reporter or photographer we can hire? Right away?
Cameron Shultz, a graduate student who was hired by national television networks and local stations, took his camera and captured evocative images at an evacuation center and a candlelight vigil.

We’ve tried to teach our students that even the simplest story requires craft and discipline.
Consider the recent example of Alison Parker, a 24-year-old reporter for a Virginia television station. Like Mr. Bach, she’d started her career as an intern. Her last story was about Smith Mountain Lake, a local landmark.

The video that Ms. Parker’s killer posted of her murder reveals that he was pointing a gun at her, within her field of vision, for at least 10 seconds before he opened fire. Ms. Parker was interviewing the head of the local chamber of commerce. She was too focused on doing her job well to realize her life was in danger.

“When you go on television, you lose a bit of yourself,” said Rebecca Force, a veteran television news reporter and director who is now a professor at the University of Oregon. When a reporter is on live, as Ms. Parker was, Professor Force said: “You’re in the moment. You have little time. You’re on. There is no going back and erasing it. You have just one take.”

Ms. Parker and her cameraman, Adam Ward, died reporting the sort of everyday, unabashedly local story that is the bread and butter of news operations everywhere. She held the mike steady as her interviewee said, “This is our community and we want to share information that will help us grow and develop …”

Young journalists operate on a strange mix of adrenaline and idealism. They savor the rush that comes with making a deadline, or conquering the stage fright of a live broadcast. And they believe that if they master those skills, they’ll contribute something important to their communities.

“I don’t think that one photograph is going to change the world, but it’s a record of where we are,” the Mexican journalist Rubén Espinosa said in one of his last interviews before he was killed in Mexico City in July. He covered the drama unfolding in the Mexican state of Veracruz: official corruption, violent organized crime, disappearances, protest and resistance.

Mr. Espinosa’s work had earned him death threats and the enmity of powerful people in Veracruz. Many American journalists working abroad have faced similar dangers from those who would silence them — including James Foley, a graduate of Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism.

“He gave his life trying to expose the world to the suffering of the Syrian people,” Mr. Foley’s mother said, after he was killed by his Islamic State captors in Syria last year.

As a kid growing up in Bend, Ore., Mr. Bach dreamed of being a foreign correspondent. He’d fall asleep listening to BBC radio reports from distant lands. India. Pakistan. Russia.
His goal now is to report from Eastern Europe. In addition to studying journalism, he’s in his third year of Russian language classes. And he’s already been to Ukraine and Azerbaijan to try his hand at freelance reporting.

“There’s nothing like dropping into a country for a week, and reporting a story, and getting it published,” he said.

Mr. Bach was also among the University of Oregon students asked to cover the tragedy in Roseburg. For The Daily Beast, he interviewed friends of an English teacher who died in the shooting, and a nursing student who suddenly found her class transformed into an emergency room.

I’m confident that Mr. Bach conducted himself professionally on this assignment. And that he remembered what we professors taught him and his fellow students when we sent them to cover stories on campus, at City Hall and at county fairs:

Be respectful to the people you interview. Double-check the spelling of every name. And always make your deadlines.

Héctor Tobar, an assistant professor in the School of Journalism and Communication at the University of Oregon, is the author, most recently, of “Deep Down Dark: The Untold Stories of 33 Men Buried in a Chilean Mine, and the Miracle That Set Them Free,” and a contributing opinion writer.

 

Haight Ashbury press release peer edit

Peer editing is intended to help other students improve and to help you improve your copy-editing skills. For the rough draft of the Haight Ashbury Street Fair press release, I want you to peer edit 10 other students' papers during class time. Use a separate sheet of paper for each student's press release and answer the following questions:

1. Does the press release have a short, engaging headline and is it all CAPS and boldface?

2. Does the lead paragraph do a good job of promoting the fair?

3. Are there any factual mistakes based on the event website or any grammatical mistakes and did you mark them on the student's press release?

4. Are there any quotes in the press release and are they used effectively?

5. Does the press release do a good job of identifying and promoting the key events of the street fair?

6. Which press release was the best one in your opinion and why?

In-class writing

Thoroughly explain why it's essential for a journalist working in media today to use social media such as Twitter and Facebook in order to stay connected with the audience, according to Chapter 8 in the textbook. Using your book explain why journalists today need to be tech savvy and have a variety of skills such as knowledge of photography, social media, web design etc.

Homework assignment

Critique the two student videos that are posted on the blog. Which news broadcast did a better job with the Haight Ashbury assignment? Which broadcast was more creative and why? What mistakes, if any, did the students make and how could these broadcasts have been better? Did the broadcasts have enough information for the viewer?

Write the answers to these questions and post it on your blog before 8 p.m. Monday April 25. Do this instead of the Newseum assignment. We are done with the Newseum assignments for this semester.

In-class press release

In-class work for Thursday April 21

Assignment: Write a press release in class today using the format we discussed Tuesday (the same format that is outlined in your textbook). Do the press release on a Word document so that you can format it correctly. Finish the press release before the end of class and email it to me. Let me see it before you email it. Be sure to include a headline and your contact information on the press release.

Instructions: Use the stories on page 49 of your textbook as the basis for your press release. Imagine that you handle media relations for the Bilford Community College District. Your supervisor asks you to write a press release in advance of Thursday night’s meeting to inform the media that the Bilford College board of trustees is considering a new regulation declaring the campus off-limits to dogs. The board will make a decision on the regulation at Thursday night’s meeting. The issue is on the agenda in response to the hundreds of complaints the board has received.

Be sure to include relevant information in your press release as well as quotes that you consider are appropriate to use. Also, conclude the press release with boilerplate information on Bilford College. The press release should fill one entire page and be long enough to include all of the relevant information.

Chapter 10 study guide

Know the differences of how public relations differs from journalism and advertising.

How is public relations defined and what are the two essentials that public relations is all about?

Be familiar with the differences in the goals of a reporter and a public relations practitioner.

What are the steps involved in planning a public relations strategy?

Know the 10 tips in the textbook for writing a better news release.

What steps should be followed in writing a news release?

Be familiar with the differences in distortion, spinning, doublespeak and lying.


What is "damage control PR" and "crisis PR"


How much hyperbole is allowed in a press release and how can a PR practitioner improve the odds of getting a press release published by the media?

Sometimes a press release is very bad

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

April 13, 2012

Media Contacts:

Adam Alberti or Stephanie Reichin

O: 415.227.9700

E: Adam@SingerSF.com or

E: Stephanie@SingerSF.com

TJPA, Webcor Attend White House Celebration of Joining Forces Initiative

First Lady & Dr. Jill Biden Invite TJPA and its Contractor Webcor to Celebrate the First Anniversary of Initiative to Support, Recognize and Honor Veterans

San Francisco, Calif. (April 13, 2012) – On Wednesday, Maria Ayerdi-Kaplan, Executive Director of the Transbay Joint Powers Authority (TJPA), and Webcor-Obayashi Joint Venture, General Contractor for the Transbay Project, were invited by First Lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden to attend a White House event celebrating the First Anniversary of Joining Forces, the initiative to recognize, honor and support veterans and military families.

Late last year, Mrs. Obama and Dr. Biden launched an initiative to recognize and celebrate citizens, communities, and organizations who have demonstrated a deep commitment to service focused on improving the lives of military families and veterans. The TJPA has been an enthusiastic supporter of the Joining Forces Initiative since its inception.

Since the launch of the initiative, the Transbay Joint Powers Authority has entered into an historic Project Labor Agreement (PLA), which includes a provision to assist National Guard, Reserve, and transitioning active-duty military members with career training and employment opportunities through the Helmets to Hardhats and Wounded Warrior organizations. To date, the Transbay Project’s construction workforce includes nearly 2% of workers who are veterans. We are working with veteran organizations to continue to hire our service men and women.

“It was a great honor to be at the White House amongst those who feel as strongly about the Joining Forces initiative as we do at the TJPA,” said Maria Ayerdi-Kaplan, Executive Director of the Transbay Joint Powers Authority. “We are proud to support our veterans with employment opportunities and new career paths as they transition back to civilian life. As we move forward into the second year of this initiative, the Transbay Project, along with Webcor-Obayashi Joint Venture, has made the commitment to increase our veterans program substantially.”

Another Haight Ashbury broadcast

Check out this link to a student's Haight Ashbury broadcast:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a_IH-m5W9Mo&feature=youtu.be

Starbuck press release homework

Homework: Due -- posted to your blog by 6 p.m. Monday April 18. Do this assignment in lieu of the weekly Newseum assignment. Imagine you are a public relations practitioner for the Starbucks Corporation. Write a "damage control" press release based on the facts below that will be sent to the media. Imagine this press release is being put out by Starbucks after the embarrassing incident happens with the San Jose customer. The press release should be at least four or five paragraphs long and should put the company in the "best possible light." Read Chapter 10 on press releases before completing this assignment.

Instructions: Your boss tells you to rewrite this San Jose Mercury News story for the Monday evening news broadcast. Rewrite the story in broadcast style using correct grammar, punctuation, etc. for broadcast.
A Starbucks customer in San Jose wasn't too pleased to see something printed in place of his name on a freshly made grande frappacino white chocolate mocha: "DIABETES HERE I COME."
Jorge Morales man had a personal reason to be upset about the incident Monday morning.
"That first word just automatically brought the picture of both sisters in my head, and I was taken aback," said Morales, who has two sisters with Type 1 diabetes. "Just the struggles they went through and all the doctor appointments they had." After having the coffee drink delivered to his office (an employee did the coffee run), the man went down to the St. Augustine-area Starbucks himself.
"Two of my sisters are diabetic, so ... not funny," Morales wrote on the cup and returned it. He's not seeking an apology, he says, just a promise that no one there will do it again.

The store's manager, shown photos of the cup, told the San Jose Mercury News that he will "find more about this" and "talk to my boss." And Starbucks corporate headquarters says it is "disappointed" by the incident.

 "We are working directly with the customer to apologize for his experience, and with our partners (employees) to ensure this does not happen again," it says. At 16 ounces, a $4.50 grande frappacino white chocolate mocha made with 2 percent milk contains 470 calories.