"The Development of a Class in Electronic News Gathering"
Published in Feedback, Volume 34, Number 1, Winter 1993.

by Steven Daniel Anderson, Ph.D.

The direction of "broadcast journalism education" has long been debated (Kittross, 1989). For the most part, the debate is centered around the issue of whether curriculum and course content should be based more on "theory" or "practice" or perhaps some combination of the two.

The type of preparation students receive for careers as television journalists has been debated in both academic and professional circles. At a recent Radio-Television News Director's Association (RTNDA) meeting in Denver, NBC News correspondent Jane Pauley lambasted educational institutions and educators for what she called "putting the cart before the horse" (Thornton, 1991, p. 15). Pauley argues that campus TV stations and skills oriented classes only feed teen-age narcissism and fail because they are a distraction from academic coursework. Many educators would be able to point to instances where campus TV stations and skills classes have been justifiably subject to such criticism.

On the other hand, Whittaker (1991) points out that the people who actually do the hiring, are generally in a position to demand much more than a broad liberal arts education alone. "For example, they often request a resume reel of production segments" (Whittaker, 1991, p. 7). Furthermore, Whittaker (1991) points out that resume reels serve to provide a kind of proof of performance, allowing employers to quickly identify good applicants and reducing expensive on-the-job training.

Even news directors themselves seem to see some value in both hands-on and theoretical classes in the curriculum. Studies have found that broadcast news employers often prefer college graduates who have relevant and practical skills in gathering, writing, and reporting news, as well as video equipment skills; while at the same time giving high ratings to a broad liberal arts education. (Hudson, 1981, 1987).

No matter which side one takes on the issue, perhaps no one would doubt that entry level television jobs require a good quality resume tape if there is any hope of starting a career in the business. What is most at issue is not whether skills oriented classes should be taught, but how one should balance the curriculum to provide a well-rounded sequence of theoretical and applied classes, and furthermore, what form specific skills oriented classes should take. This paper addresses the latter issue.

The goal of this project was to be able to produce a professional looking, student produced, weekly half-hour newscast that would rival the quality of a small market news organization. From a pedagogical standpoint, the project would serve to provide students with an opportunity to learn in a controlled environment where an instructor provides feedback and criticism.

Furthermore, the project would attempt to involve students in such a way that they feel as though they are making the day-to-day decisions about what stories to cover, treatment and production elements. In sum, the project attempted to do three things: 1) to provide a meaningful opportunity to produce a high quality resume tape which could be used for job openings at entry level television markets, 2) to prioritize learning through experience, feedback and constructive criticism, and 3) to create a rewarding experience for students by allowing them to hold positions of responsibility with regard to news coverage.

By its very nature, a news production is an applied activity. However, this class is integrated into a curriculum already heavy on theory and is designed as a "capstone" course to tie together many of the theoretical underpinnings of earlier coursework into a senior level experiential learning setting.1

The process of the class is based on the concept of simulation. Part of any simulation involves creating an environment which is as close to the "real thing" as possible.2 Every attempt was made to create job titles, responsibilities, systems of accountability and the organizational structure as close to a working commercial television news organization as possible. Indeed, even the newscast format, rundown, and system of organization for scripts and tapes come from the industry and are modeled after a top-twenty market network owned & operated station where the professor was previously employed.

This "real world" nature of the class was imposed during the first class session when students were told the goal was the production of a weekly television newscast that looks and sounds like a newscast seen on a medium to small market television station. More than just students in a class, they were "employees" of a television news organization1.

The language and symbols of the class are important. Members of the class kept a log of hours and handed in a "time card" with a description of work done for a certain grading period or "pay period." Even the "payment" of grades were administered through "checks" distributed in their "mailboxes".

The organizational structure of the class is similar to what might be found at a typical broadcast news organization. The position of news director is held by the professor. Students were told that at most stations the news director would be ultimately responsible for news content, but that in many situations would try to stay out of the day-to-day news decision making process. (Many news directors today spend a majority of their time as administrators).

The top student position was that of "executive producer." Just as at a real television station, the executive producer was in charge of most of the day-to-day news operations. Duties included running the assignment meetings, overseeing the rundown, formulating story ideas, directing decisions on story types and angle, and general trouble-shooting along the way. The executive producer reported to the news director.

Other positions in the class were broken up into two tiers; a primary tier comprised of pre-newscast positions, and a secondary tier made up of technical and anchor positions for the actual production of the newscast.

Primary Tier Positions:

In the secondary tier, students held technical and on-air positions which were required to produce the actual newscast. While these duties were important, they were secondary to the primary positions. Those holding technical positions were also required to work in at least one of the primary positions listed above. For example, the newscast director may have held a position as a reporter or news photographer as their primary job. Secondary Tier Positions:

Anchor people were chosen by the news director/professor after a series of auditions. Those not selected initially were given a chance to audition again at a later date. Ideally, news anchors would be selected based on their performance as reporters. However, none of the students in the class had any previous experience as journalists. Anchors are told that at most stations, anchor positions are given to those who have proven themselves to be good news reporters. They were also told that since nobody in the class had any previous experience as a news reporter, the best we could do is require that news anchors become good news reporters while holding their positions. As stated earlier, those selected to anchor had other responsibilities in the class, mainly as reporters. There is no value on a news anchor as a performer alone and this value is driven home at various times during the semester.

Early in the semester, sessions were devoted to instruction on story types, writing style, and visual storytelling. Workshops for news photographers and editors were held as well. Once the organizational elements were in place, the production of the first newscast began.

There was no assignment editor position within the class. The lack of an assignment editor speaks to the stress on a reporter- centered model for the class. At many stations assignment editors are responsible for most of the story ideas generated for a newscast. Often, reporters simply show up at the assignment desk each morning and are handed their assignment for the day. It was the goal of this class to make each student in the class responsible for generating story ideas. The concept of enterprise reporting was reinforced by making every student, not just news reporters and producers, turn in "story submission forms." The story submission forms indicate a story slug, description, and possible contact names and phone numbers. Special credit was given to those story ideas classified as "enterprise ideas," or original ideas not taken from the newspaper or a television newscast.

A story meeting was held each week where every member of the class was in attendance. The executive producer in the class was in charge of the meeting. Even technical personnel were expected to contribute to discussion about coverage for the coming week. The meeting was used to go over the story submission forms, to discuss other potential or late-breaking news, and to decide which stories would go into the rundown. Stories were given a preliminary slug and story type (i.e. VO, VO/SOT, VO/SOT/VO, Package etc) and were assigned to reporters. In general, a story was assigned to the person who submitted the story idea.

Although we produced just one show a week for broadcasting/ cablecasting, the development of a second show was undertaken to give others the opportunity to gain crossover experience and to generate material for their resume tapes. The second show used the same rundown, scripts and taped material as the primary show, but used different people in many of the on-air and technical positions. The show allowed those who were not chosen to anchor or direct the primary show to benefit from these elements of the class.

The Critical Process

Although much has been made of the "real-world" approach to instruction within this class, one important distinction deserves elucidation. That distinction has to do with a "critique of work done." At many television news organizations there is a tendency, often due to deadline pressures, to move immediately from one function to the next without much consideration for a critical analysis stage. At the larger stations, news consultants may serve this function. At smaller markets news managers and fellow employees may offer a few informal comments. However, much of the critical analysis has to be generated by a self-critique of tapes.

Because this was a class, programs were viewed during a class session and each area was sharply critiqued by the professor in charge. While watching the program, the instructor would pause the tape and comment about such elements as writing, shooting, editing, and producing. Instead of critiquing each story only in the presence of the individual involved, the group critique allowed all members of the class to benefit from the discussion and to learn from the mistakes of others as well as their own mistakes. As much as possible, references to specific individuals were avoided to keep from embarrassing students and creating the impression that the instructor was making a personal attack. An attempt was made to comment on the work, but not the specific individual who contributed to the work.

Individual meetings between students and the professor were also encouraged to provide more extensive performance evaluation and feedback. Grading was based to a large extent on these performance evaluations and the amount of improvement shown from one evaluation period to the next.

Conclusions

While it is not the goal of universities to train people in simple technical competencies, it is part of our responsibility to provide students with some of the tools necessary to gain access into what is now one of the most highly competitive industries in the country. A "simulation" model of teaching broadcast news may give students the opportunity to gain skills which will allow them to compete for those all important entry-level employment positions. Failure to take into account such considerations could lead to a number of qualified theoretical problems solvers with no place to go.

Furthermore, the two considerations (theory and practice) are not mutually exclusive. In fact, it could be argued that theory becomes more meaningful when placed in an experiential context. That was the case with respect to several episodes that occurred in our function as news gatherers. Instead of talking about legal and ethical predicaments from textbook case studies, the class generated its own series of case studies which provided several meaningful discussions and self-assessment.

There could be a tendency to see this model as a prescriptive formula for an entire program in the area of broadcast journalism, however, that is not the intent of the model presented herein. As a capstone course this heavily applied or practice oriented course would follow a series of classes devoted mainly to theory. The course is made available to seniors and only as an elective.

The goal is to achieve a degree of balance in a program which is heavily laden with theory. The experiential nature of the class allows students to practice what they have learned and to test some of their notions while still harbored in an atmosphere of reflection and constructive criticism.

As might be expected, student reaction to this class was overwhelmingly positive. Not only did the class allow students to acquire some of the skills they desired, but the opportunity to explore both pragmatic and ethical problems in a real world context was also beneficial. Overall, the newscast production quality was judged to be high and there were benefits for the department in recruitment and outside relations.

Hudson, J. C. (1981). Radio-TV news staff employers prefer broadcasting degree strong liberal arts foundation. Journalism Educator, 36:2, 27-30.

Hudson, J. C. (1987). Broadcasters want experience, skills and liberal arts. Journalism Educator, 42:4,36-38.

Kittross, J. M. (1989). Six decades of education for broadcasting...and counting. Feedback, 30:4, 30-42.

Thornton, R. (November, 1991). Too much "how-to" in schools. Communicator, 15.

Whittaker, R. (September, 1991). The last page. VFP Newsletter, Mayfield Publishing Co., Mountain View, CA.

1All of the students had completed coursework in visual communication and journalistic writing as well as a number of lower level introductory research and theory classes (Introduction to Communication, Communication Research, and Speech Communication). Many had also completed either, or both, a television production class and a class in broadcast writing emphasizing broadcast journalism writing skills.

2From a technical standpoint, this "reality" might seem difficult to impose. The technical facilities utilized by the class were not extensive and certainly not industry standard. However, due to tremendous advancements in low cost consumer and industrial video and computer equipment, a television newscast with moderately high production values can be produced for a fraction of what might have been required several years ago.