How to seek truth from power
By Marina Hendricks
At the recent JEA/NSPA Fall National Convention in San Antonio, members of the Scholastic Press Rights Commission conducted open forums for students and advisers to discuss issues they are having with prior review and restraint.
One discussion yielded a gratifying display of peer mentoring, with students who freely practice journalism in their schools counseling others on how to build sounder journalistic relationships with their administrators. Reflecting on it later, I was reminded of how important it is for student journalists to develop the habit of questioning authority – not as rebels, but as reporters.
“When journalists don’t fully understand how power shapes language to serve its own ends, they inevitably become pawns to those who do. Power then takes the wheel of society, and drives it where it will,” writes Doug McGill, a veteran reporter and author of The McGill Report media blog.
The following lesson plan is designed to help student journalists become more comfortable with interviewing and holding sources accountable – particularly the sources who are considered “authority figures.”
Goals for Understanding:
Essential question:
How can we conduct effective interviews, especially with authority figures?
Critical engagement questions:
• How can we go beyond face value with our sources?
• How can we respectfully push for the information we need?
• When we don’t understand something a source says, how can we ask for explanations or elaborations?
Overviews and Timeline:
Activity 1 (one 50-minute class)
Students will read “A Syllabus for a Moral Journalism.” In small groups, they will review stories from the school publication (chosen in advance by the instructor and the editor) to identify cases where sources could have been more thoroughly interviewed. Groups will consider what information is missing, what information is not adequately explained, what terms are not defined, what points of view are not included, and so forth. For homework, students will read “Handling Tough Interviewees” and “Avoiding the Suits.”
Activity 2 (one 50-minute class)
Groups will present the results of their content reviews. Led by the editor, students will discuss how they would report the stories in light of the three readings in Activity 1. The editor will note key strategies on a board or flip chart, then will use those to create an interview tip sheet.
Activity 3 (one 50-minute class, plus advance preparation time)
The instructor will invite an “authority figure” from the school community to participate in an interview with the class. The editor will moderate the interview, and will work with students in advance to help them develop questions. The instructor may want to record the interview for future reference.
Assessment (one 50-minute class)
Led by the editor, students will discuss the interview with the authority figure. They will review the tip sheet from Activity 2 and update it based on their experience. Grading will be based on participation in group and class discussions, and demonstrated ability to analyze situations in a mature, logical fashion.
by John Bowen, MJE
While JEA condemns attack on the Capitol Jan. 6, it also urged journalism teachers and advisers to continue facilitating fact-based journalism, especially of locally-related issues.
To help students and advisers with that coverage, The SPRC highlights information and ideas that can assist in exploring current events or national issues.
JEA commended journalism educators, president Sarah Nichols, MJE, said, for finding ways to engage students in class and through coverage.
“Courageous journalism informs us all and serves as a historical record. The reporting during and after such events underscores the importance of the work journalists do based on shared values of truth and justice,” Nichols said …”Knowing these actions were largely related to deep-rooted beliefs of hate and intolerance makes the attack all the more critical for us to address.”
Students, Nichols said, students have the right to cover the news; doing so is also their responsibility.
“JEA stands behind journalists exercising their First Amendment right to report and inform the public,” Nichols said. “Journalists must be able to do their jobs without fear of retribution or harm.”
Activities | lessons | and more
• Legal issues covering protests
• If covering protests, note these points
• Riding out the storm should entail future planning
• Protest and the First Amendment
• Tools of truth/Sloppy reporting lessons
• Stories students can best tell: Reporting protests, walkouts and marches
• Covering insurrection: Covering Insurrection: News Frames, Word Choice, & Whose Story to Tell. (online, free workshop)
• State capitols brace for right-wing violence; D.C. locks down ahead of inauguration
• Pushed to the edge by the Capitol riot, people are reporting their family and friends to the FBI
• Texas insurrectionist asks Trump for pardon
One last point. Student media prevented from covering, or prior reviewed by anyone outside the student media staff, on Jan. 6 related issues, please let the Student Press Law Center and us (the SPRC) know. Use the SPLC link and the Panic Button.
Essential to find accurate information is … context
by John Bowen, MJE
The 2020 election looms less than two months away, and conflicting, sensational and hateful information force themselves into the news, the rallies and, sadly, people’s fears. Looking for information to help protect your reporters and audience alike from mis- and dis- information? We have some suggestions:
First, lessons and activities that already reside on SPRC’s site but for whatever reason have slipped off the top levels of our site. They offer a myriad of ways to offer some clarity to this whole year of political obfuscation and outrageous claims:
Read MoreCutting through the ‘New Normal’
by John Bowen, MJE
As the hours turn into days and the days turn into weeks, the amount of information piles up next to the growing stack of conflicting ideas and ways to deal with COVID-19. Will Chloroquine be the right type of medicine? How much time should people stay in homes? When, or if, does quarantine harm the American economy?
Although your journalism students might not tackle these topics, some will deal with the same real information, reporting on the local crisis and the dis- and misinformation attached to topics like this.
Read MoreBuilding on Student Press Freedom Day
A time for reflection on and commitment to journalistically responsible student media
Jan. 29, Student Press Freedom Day, is a good time to reflect on the importance of a unfettered student media, especially given the country’s claimed mistrust of and attacks on the media.
Commit to informing your various communities now, and throughout the next several months, about why they should support student journalists and learn ways to evaluate information from any source.
Read More