Greg Treadwell

BLOGS BOTHER ME

This paper grew out of the authors’ interest in updating the journalism curriculum at AUT (Aukland University of Technology) to better reflect the impact of online media, including social media, on the work of journalists. The challenge for journalism educators is to remain relevant in rapidly changing news and education environments. Our study suggests that while the vast majority of students have some engagement with social media, particularly social networking, and are aware that it can be a powerful tool for journalists, they are still not entirely comfortable with its techniques and they are not experimenting with social media as a production platform as much as we first thought. In short, it appears that they do not have command of professional fluency with social media tools. In response to these findings we have begun to introduce some social media tools and processes directly into the units we teach, in particular: digital story-telling techniques; the use of Twitter and location-based applications; encouraging the ethical use of Facebook etc. for sourcing stories and talent for interviews; podcasting, soundslides and video for the Web, Dreamweaver, InDesign and PHP-based content management systems. We do not see the work to date as the end-point of the changes that we know are necessary, but we are acutely aware of the limitations (structural, institutional and financial) that suggest we should continue with this small-steps approach for the foreseeable future.

A Numbers Game: Two Case Studies in Teaching Data Journalism.

Influenced by the practices of social scientists, data journalists seek to create stories that frame social reality through quantitative data analysis. While the use of statistics by journalists is not new, exponential growth in available data and a desire for source material unmediated by political and public-relations framings have seen data journalism increasingly embraced—to varying degrees—by newsrooms, and editors increasingly seek reporters who can think in computational ways. Journalism programs keen to incorporate data journalism in curricula face a unique set of issues, including a lack of scholarship on data journalism education and how to teach it. This article reports on both the pilot of an international postgraduate collaboration in data journalism education in 2015, in which postgraduate students at two universities investigated state-run gambling in Aotearoa–New Zealand, and the introduction of an undergraduate semester-long paper in data journalism at one of the universities. A visiting Fulbright specialist supported both initiatives, helping to develop staff and student data skills, kick-start a joint investigation by students, and lay the groundwork for future international collaborations. Thanks to his visit, New Zealand educators and students were able to seek support from, a global community of journalists and journalism educators working in data journalism. Set against a literature that predicts an increasing role for computational journalism, this article explores the successes and challenges of these cases of experiential journalism education. It explores the complex but not fatal issues of data competency among both instructors and students, collaboration between geographically distinct programs, access to sensitive datasets, and publication of student work.

Blogs bother me : social media, journalism and the curriculum

This paper grew out of the authors’ interest in updating the journalism curriculum at AUT (Aukland University of Technology) to better reflect the impact of online media, including social media, on the work of journalists. The challenge for journalism educators is to remain relevant in rapidly changing news and education environments. Our study suggests that while the vast majority of students have some engagement with social media, particularly social networking, and are aware that it can be a powerful tool for journalists, they are still not entirely comfortable with its techniques and they are not experimenting with social media as a production platform as much as we first thought. In short, it appears that they do not have command of professional fluency with social media tools. In response to these findings we have begun to introduce some social media tools and processes directly into the units we teach, in particular: digital story-telling techniques; the use of Twitter and location-based applications; encouraging the ethical use of Facebook etc. for sourcing stories and talent for interviews; podcasting, soundslides and video for the Web, Dreamweaver, InDesign and PHP-based content management systems. We do not see the work to date as the end-point of the changes that we know are necessary, but we are acutely aware of the limitations (structural, institutional and financial) that suggest we should continue with this small-steps approach for the foreseeable future.