On grad school

A master’s degree in journalism can help propel your career, but the degree itself won’t necessarily make you a good reporter. It should motivate you to want to become good, as well as communicate to people – potential employers – that you are serious about doing so.

A master’s degree teaches you theory behind journalism, which can include how to create better stories, but not necessarily just how to write them. To do that, use techniques found in previous posts and find a good mentor/editor to spiff up your stories. Grad school is discussions, case studies, research papers, and you end up reading about a book a week per class.

One of my favorite writers, Michael Lewis, rails against the usefulness of a J-school degree. And he is right . . . because he's Michael Lewis. On the other hand, another person who is right is Matt Brown, who said he couldn’t get a job in journalism until he had the master’s degree. After J-school he worked his way up and went on to become a foreign correspondent for a top-tier news agency (more on him in a future post).

An advanced degree is valuable to immerse yourself in the journalism-learning environment. If you majored in journalism as an undergrad and had a good class on media law, you may already have enough training. But I found at least three classes are helpful, and in this order:

1. Media law. You need to know your boundaries, and it’s comforting to know that you know your boundaries. You’ll also learn just how amazing the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is and how Supreme Court rulings over the years set prescient to protect people like you and me as well as allow the National Enquirer can get away with what it does. Discussions on Federal Communication Commission may seem out of left field or irrelevant when you're just trying to learn about reporting, but it’s helpful to know about the regulation of a nation’s airwave spectrum. Also, delivery systems (paper, web, chisel on clay tablet) change but the rules on publishing and libel still apply. When I was in grad school, blogging was the new thing and some students said our school should offer a major in the subject. Can you imagine how silly that would be today? It’s still just journalism and writing but with a different delivery system. Social media is the new delivery system today, but the same old media laws still apply. One other rant: people can talk about social media all they want, but much of it points back to content, and that is often a well-written news story. Others can pass around all the media they want too, but you’ll stand out if you are a good content creator.

2. Communication Theory. It may be kinda boring, but you’ll come across all kinds of scenarios from recent and long-past history that still apply today, even though some delivery systems are now different. Years later you may be surprised how some of these will apply to on-the-job scenarios.

3. Journalism/communication history. It’s helpful to know how this profession evolved along with advances in technology and human understanding. I wrote a paper on the history of black newspapers in the United States. One of the things I learned from this is that 150 years ago all newspapers were launched by a cause. There was no notion of objectivity. Each special interest group reported news that was of interest to them and they were not ashamed to say so – the women’s paper, the Negro paper, the Democrat, the Republican, etc… It’s an important lesson for today. And each of my classmates who did a different paper in this class came away with their own historical lessons that can teach us something today. My favorite part was presenting my paper and having classmates offer feedback, some even suggesting lessons from my own material that I hadn’t thought of. 

Of course you might learn all this stuff just by reading books on journalism – I like the personalmba.com, which is a great reading list of subjects you'd encounter in business school.  Still, I would rather tell someone I had an MBA than say, "I've read the 99 books on the personalmba reading list." 

Yes you might have to sit through some boring discussions or hear professors whine about how much better the glory days were. I remember one professor lamenting that there was too much information out there now and it was better when we all had political discussions based on the same information as reported in the local daily newspaper and the big three network news broadcasts (yea right, as if they were reporting everything that was really out there). Overall, though, most professors at a decently rated J-school are helpful.

If you are considering applying, check out the ratings of different schools and weigh them with the cost to attend each. FYI, there are no Adventist universities that offer a master’s degree in journalism. If one claims to, please contact me first and I’ll offer you my perspective.

I don’t recommend going to grad school directly from undergrad. You need to take some work experience to grad school. It’s different than undergrad, when you’re still doing more learning of what’s out there.

If you go to school, save all your papers both electronically and in print. You may not look at them often, but you’ll be an expert in a certain area of journalism and you don’t want to forget the material years later.

List of schools here: http://journalismjobs.com/journalism_schools.cfm

Writer’s block? Two tips on getting started, two more on keeping it going

If you’re having trouble getting a story started, try a “feature-y” lede and start with either the word “When” or “For.” If you’re stuck halfway through a story, try using the first word of your next paragraph with either “Indeed” or “Still.”

I see these patterns constantly and they’re often well used. Just don’t use them too much or you might end up on the November 9 posting about clichés (I once saw that the front of The Wall Street Journal’s Marketplace section had no less than three stories that began with the word “When.”)

To start: “For” and “When”

For

One of my favorite simple openers was last year in the Journal’s Money & Investing section. It was a fun story on the late-night negotiations of the auctioning of Blockbuster Inc.’s assets. The story chronicled the bankruptcy court shouting matches, competing bids and accusations of stolen pizzas as each side took the first pie that was delivered to their deliberating room, regardless of which party had ordered it. The lede was simply:

For Wall Street lawyers and bankers, it was a Blockbuster night.

Here’s one from the Associated Press as printed in the Jacksonville Times-Union:

For Northeastern farmers long used to coping with all sorts of cold-weather problems, this winter presents a new one: snow and ice that’s bringing down out-buildings, requiring costly repairs, killing livestock and destroying supplies.

Here’s one from the Journal’s A-head feature on the bottom of their front page (these are always great):

For New Jersey’s legion of tax accountants, boom times come once a year. But local taxidermists can wait for years at a stretch for their biggest money-maker: bear-hunting season.

When

From The Washington Post’s Style section in December:

When Gary Clark Jr.’s right hand hits the strings of his electric guitar, it’s almost always a downstroke – as if he wants gravity on his side.

Here’s one from the Post’s front page:

When Elaine Cioni found out that her married boyfriend had other girlfriends, she became obsessed, federal prosecutors say.

You can even imply “when” by starting with a comparison timeline (from the Journal in December):

Three years after Siemens AG reached a record foreign-bribery settlement with U.S. authorities, the German industrial conglomerate is capitalizing on business from an unexpected place – the U.S. government.

Come to think about it, the first story I ever had published in a newspaper began with the word "When." It was a feature about poetry. "When" a local librarian had hosted a poetry reading for teens, only a handful of people showed up. But when he turned it into a competition – a la American Idol – kids showed up in droves with mini-vans full of accompanying family members.

To continue: “Indeed” and “Still”

“Indeed”

This word actually shows up in another blog's listing of clichéd words in journalism, but I don’t care. If used well and sparingly, it’s effective. I picked examples where it appears within the first five grafs, but it works well when it appears later.

From the AP, as printed in the Washington Post: http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/romneys-florida-victory-aside-gop-nomination-fight-expected-to-for-a-while/2012/02/01/gIQAbetfiQ_story.html

Indeed, some 46 states have yet to vote and only 6 percent of the delegates have been won.

From USA Today: http://yourlife.usatoday.com/mind-soul/doing-good/kindness/post/2011/10/itzhak-perlman-says-we-are-this-close-to-ending-polio-for-good/141014/1

Indeed, since taking polio on in 1985, Rotary has helped to immunize 2 billion children in 122 countries, slashing polio rates by 99%.

Still

The word “still” helps you show more than just one side of the story. It also serves as going back to an original premise that was later challenged in the story. Here are a couple of examples, first from the Los Angeles Times:

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-economy-20120201,0,381501.story

Still, the construction industry remains weak. Spending on all building projects in 2011 was just $787.4 billion. That's 2 percent lower than the previous year and roughly half the level economists consider healthy.

And from the Miami Herald, this intellectually stimulating story of the 80s rock band Foreigner:

http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/01/31/2615723/rock-of-ages-band-foreigner-insists.html#storylink=misearch

Still, much of Foreigner’s recent recorded output has been to cut new versions of old hits.

Go away for a while

Study abroad for a semester or a year, or serve as volunteer overseas (if you’re Christian, this is sometimes known as being a “student missionary”). It will give you great life experience by offering maturity, better understanding of a culture that isn’t yours, and help develop in you a servant’s attitude. You’ll also meet great friends that you wouldn’t have met had you stayed in your current small environment.

In fact, if you’re on campus right now, go over to your Colleges Abroad office or Student Missions office and make an appointment to talk. Do this even if you think you’re not interested. At least find out more information. I’ve never regretted checking out leads that I didn’t end up pursuing. That itself is life experience.

I NEVER thought I would be a student missionary. That was something only weirdos did. And yes there are some weirdos who do it. That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t.

It was not a decision I made quickly. I had heard about other people’s experiences and talked to a LOT of different people about it for more than 18 months. Then, after my junior year of college, I spent the next year volunteering as a high school teacher on the Pacific island of Yap, part of the four-island nation of Micronesia.

I learned I was a decent teacher. The fact that I could hold my own in front of rowdy high schoolers and even excel at it was better communication training than any communication class I could have taken. I graduated college knowing who I was and what I could do because I had been pushed. Otherwise I might have graduated thinking, “Yikes, classes are over, time to go test the real thing.” Yap is also where I found out I wanted to be a writer.

(Also, I still draw lessons from teaching expert Harry Wong. We had taken a day off school for teacher training and the last thing I wanted to do was sit around and listen to a 10-year-old cassette tapes series of a Chinese guy with an afro whose name was “Harry Wong” tell me how to be a better teacher. I was already doing fine. But wow, he improved my teaching 100 percent, particularly by empowering both students and teachers with excellent classroom management methods.)

Years later, in grad school I wasn’t that jazzed about a summer class in Thailand, but over time it increasingly appealed to me (mainly because it was worth extra course credit). I took it and that ended up being one of my best experiences, both fun and eye-opening.

These kinds of experiences also look good on a résumé. Potential employers may appreciate this kind of experience when looking over your experience, especially if they also spent time overseas.

Some people are eager to get out of school as if they’re in a rush to keep up with others. I’m telling you, taking a year off to serve others is worship to your Creator and it develops you faster. And there’s nothing wrong with wanting to be efficient about school. That was certainly me in grad school.

On a financial note, being a student missionary doesn’t cost anything – your friends, teachers, parents and church members will donate the money for your plane ticket.

Even U.S. Senate Chaplain Barry Black talks about the benefits of this type of experience in his excellent book “The Blessing of Adversity.” Imagine a kid from inner-city Baltimore taking a year off of college in Alabama and finding himself in rural Peru for a while.

While some people tout their experiences of short-term mission trips – which are good and offer great experience – I recommend a longer term, such as a semester or a year somewhere. A short-term, few-week trip doesn’t allow you to watch community life unfold over time. That’s where you learn the most.

I’ve never had anyone say, “I wish I hadn’t been a student missionary/Peace Core worker/studied abroad,” even from people who had more difficult experiences. Moreover, while in college I heard from people who hadn’t gone as a student missionary – several mentors, professors and business professionals would say they wish they had done something like that. This kind of talk made an impression on me all through my sophomore year: “Why is it so unanimous?” I thought. Now I know why.

And I want you to know why, too.

Take that first step. At least go and find out more information. Do it right now.

First five words

If you’re too chicken for last week’s post, at least try this one for a couple weeks.

Go through an entire news story that you like and just read the first five words of every paragraph. Do this with a new story every day. You’ll start to learn how good writing should start with punchy, clear words that move the prose along.

You don’t have to read the first five words—you could do the first four words, or first six words, or the first line of each paragraph on the printed page. But do something so your brain can regularly absorb what good writing is supposed to be. Over time, your own paragraphs should start off as punchy and clear.

Try it for a couple weeks.

(And then give last week’s post a try. If Stahls can do it, so can you!)

The BEST tip

Pal Stals Kinborg says this is the best tip I’ve ever given him. This, he says, transformed his writing the most.

Sometimes it’s not enough to just be familiar with good writing but to actually have it in your head. Remember how in the November 16 post I asked you to compare the sentence and paragraph structure of your stories with stories in top news agencies? In that posting I urged you to take an honest look to see if your story appears as if it belongs beside professional stories. In this post, I’m going to teach you to honestly examine if your words, thought flow and sentence structure match up with those in top-tier news stories.

Try this: Get a news story...

--Sunday: memorize the headline.

--Monday: memorize the sub-head (also known as “deck” or “bank-head”)

--Tuesday: memorize the first paragraph

--Wednesday: memorize the second paragraph

--Thursday: memorize the third paragraph

--Friday: review what you have memorized that week (headline, subhead and first   

  three paragraphs) several times throughout the day.

--Saturday: take the day off.

Do that with a new story each week for a few months, and, like Stals and I have found, your writing will be taken to the next level. Your thought patterns will be shaped and influenced by what you have memorized. What you then take to the keyboard will be tighter and more articulate.

This is about reality and honestly assessing if your own writing makes the grade.

I realize some personalities will take to this exercise more readily than others. Still, I’ve heard every excuse in the book about why people can’t do this. “I’m slow at memorizing,” (I guarantee I used to be slower than you), “I don’t memorize things…”  Yet these same people will finish the song that I start singing in front of them: “NOW-this-is-a-story-OF-about-how-my-LIFE-got-flipped-turned-up-side-down…”

My point is, we can remember what we want to. And if you decide you want to do this, you can.

Contact me if you want an exclusive tip of how to most effectively memorize something thoroughly and quickly.

Another excuse: “it takes too much time.” It’s actually less than 20 minutes a day. Besides, what else do you have to do, watch TV? If you’re a writer, why not sell your soul to the profession and make yourself the best writer you can possibly be.

Your growth on this will occur over months, not weeks. But it’s worth it. The cheap onion grows quickly, but fine olives come from trees that take decades to mature. Look to the future and think in the long-term.

Similar to other posts, I suggest beginning this exercise with USA Today and The Washington Times. Both offer stories with short, clear, punchy sentences. Use stories from these two sources several times before moving to more advanced writing as found in The Washington Post or The Wall Street Journal. Also, start with hard news, especially local stuff in your local major-market daily – police and fire beat. Then you can mix it up with national, world, style, business, sports, etc.  Later you can pull from your favorite magazines.
 

On Sundays you’ll come to find that memorizing a headline is easy and you’ll spend the extra time reviewing older memorized leads. You’ll find you can repeat with ease half a dozen or so story ledes.

I came up with this exercise out of both embarrassment and what I determined was necessity. I had written a play review while working as a younger reporter at a local paper. I was young and had no business writing a play review. The seasoned editor said, "This story sucks.” He was right. Then, with me sitting nearby watching over his shoulder, he took more than 20 minutes to think and punch up certain portions of the story. I watched him lean back and think, mutter to himself, write, think more, mutter more, write more, search through a thesaurus and each time exclaim as if he’d hit gold: “'UNFOLD!' that’s the word I want.” When he was done – angry but with a twinkle in his eye – he barked, “Now study those changes because those are 'A plus' edits.” I was so embarrassed, and I had never wanted a man’s approval more. 

I was impressed with his rewrites and admired two sentences in particular. So I memorized them. Two days later I went back to that editor and told him I had studied his changes. I repeated the two sentences word for word.

He knew his time hadn’t been wasted. I proved I was a person who cared about learning.

I found that exercise so rewarding that I decided to do it regularly on my own.

Memorization isn’t as popular as it used to be. Too bad. Elementary kids used to be required to memorize poems in order to ingrain into them words and descriptions so they could better express themselves. Today, professors require young artists to study the masters. Aspiring photographers also study the greats. Perhaps it’s time to memorize some of the type of writing you’d like to emulate.

Don't start your story with the date

Never start a story with the date. It’s like putting a speed bump at the beginning of the race track.  Certainly the date is important--one of the 5 Ws. But the date should come later in the first sentence or in a later sentence.  A news story should start out with Who or What, not When.

Developing your vocabulary; to use or not to use the thesaurus…

Reporter Elizabeth Lechleitner is great with words. She wasn’t a communication major in college. She was an English major … which means she’s smart. Her use of words is precise, and that precision comes from the depth of her vocabulary.

Here are some of her stories:

http://news.adventist.org/en/archive/articles/2012/01/09/reintroduced-law-again-jeopardizing-status-of-some-churches-in-hungary

http://news.adventist.org/en/archive/articles/2011/04/05/in-bermuda-adventist-ministers-to-gang-community-enlists-support-of-area-ch

http://news.adventist.org/en/archive/articles/2011/05/25/further-definition-on-tap-for-adventist-fundamental-belief-on-creation

She often uses words in her ledes that I wouldn’t have thought to use. I have searched her stories and placed at the end of this posting some examples of her well-placed words. Copy some of these onto a list, and find words in news media ledes that you like and add them to your list. Once in a while you’ll be able to employ a word from that list.

Or even better, just read a lot. That’s what Lechleitner did growing up.

In his book On Writing, author Stephen King says to throw away your thesaurus. He says if you couldn’t think of a word, then you shouldn’t use it. 

I see his point that we should develop our vocabulary naturally by reading lots of good stuff. Then again, I’ve watched an editor make magic happen with a couple of uses of a thesaurus to make a piece shine (more on this in the next posting).

So I see both sides of the [use thesaurus/don’t use thesaurus] issue. For now, here are some of Lechletiner’s great words, many of which were used in the first or second sentence of a news story. You can invoke these when helping readers understand the significance of the news you’re reporting (for more on this, see the September 6 post on Report What Happens and What It Means):

Bolstered

Spurious

Tags

Allay

Corralled

Belies

Embroiled

Would saddle

Could infringe

Swath

Tenuous

Saga