Weblog for New Media Storytelling

Posted: 12:30 p.m. 11/26/01

Why J-schools need change

As journalism continues to evolve in the 21st century, what needs to stay the same in journalism education is far more certain that what needs to change.

Ethics are still ethics. The rules go across all forms of media, and they shouldn't bend for new forms. The same line holds for writing and storytelling. Spelling will never become SpELinGG, disproving worldwide teacher fears of language's death by instant messenger. Journalism educators need to keep teaching all of these skills. They must refuse to trade tradition for the latest wave.

Instead, educational institutions must expand their journalism offerings. For decades, journalism education has cemented its role as a supplementary educational field. Medill is a good example. Medill limits its students to taking about 11 classes within the school and has substantial requirements in the College of Arts and Sciences. The premise is that students need to build up a general body of knowledge because good writing alone does not make a good journalist. Journalists basically need to be well-versed in the world.

I agree with this assumption, but wonder if the ratio needs to change. Most majors at Northwestern number about 14 classes (an unscientific estimate on my part), and engineering majors require far more. These majors require more classes because their department heads feel their fields are broader and more in flux, I think.

Example one: An English major needs to know about all great writing, from Shakespeare to Robert Pinsky.

Example two: An Electrical Engineering major needs to use the latest tools in the field and understand the newest discoveries.

On Medill's side, I think educators have taken a far narrower view-a view rapidly becoming incorrect. They see journalism as a nearly static field, with a relatively small core knowledge base. They think: "Writing is writing, and reporting is reporting. It's what you cover that changes, and you can't prepare for that in a journalism school." But with the development of "new media" and Internet journalism, that doesn't hold true anymore. By utilizing the full extent of the existing media, the best Internet journalism is attempting to re-conceptualize storytelling in the field. These journalists ask the question, "Does the inverted pyramid work on the Internet, and, if not, what does?"

With a new plane in which to work, journalism is becoming more of a science. Why?

• The Internet has brought globalization to the journalism marketplace. Whereas people typically have only one hometown paper, the Internet has made media entities compete with each other and entertainment "nothin' but profit" media.
• Millions of new dollars are being invested as companies attempt to carve out their Internet niches. Jobs are at stake.

For the media, what works and what doesn't work is suddenly much more important. Newspapers have seen their circulations drop for years, and newscasts have seen their ratings erode. But the Internet-the Internet is a threat to their stability, their domination and their existence. If the field is to remain in place on the local and national levels, it needs to adapt to change. If journalism schools are teaching their students the same old skills, then journalism is as dead as the dodo bird.

Journalism schools like Medill need to expand their new media and news management offerings. These courses would be beneficial to all journalism students, whether they wanted to specifically become involved with these fields or not. For the first time in a long time, journalists will have to study and learn if their work connects with their readers. If it doesn't, they fail.

By suggesting this, I am not in favor of a reader-driven marketplace. Just read the Roman poets, and see how many times they refer to the "fickle masses." The journalist needs to be above the general interests and seek out what the public does not or can not see. But they cannot afford to abandon these readers as-newspaper satisfaction surveys show-they have done for so long.

Journalism needs change, now more than ever. Journalism schools need to answer this challenge and expand themselves to discover "what, when, where, why and how" change can happen.