SoJ Web Report | Oct. 5, 2009
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| Early registration for spring semester begins Oct. 22. The school is introducing several new classes. |
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Students will receive an e-mail next week outlining the new offerings and process. Early spring registration begins Oct. 22, but until then, students may wish to explore some of these options.
One new course has an application and deadline because it includes spring break travel to the South by Southwest Interactive Festival in Austin, Texas, March 12-21. Assistant professor Hans Ibold will teach J460 Devices of Wonder: New Media, New Identities, New Social Movement and will lead students to the festival, one of the premier events that draws some of the top innovators in the world.
Applications are online on the Forms page and must be completed no later than noon Oct. 15. Cost for the travel portion of the course is $500, which will be applied to enrolled students’ bursar accounts upon enrollment and is nonrefundable. This fee covers tickets to the SXSW Interactive Festival, round-trip travel from Bloomington to Austin and accommodations.
Students will need additional funds, estimated at $200-400, to cover personal expenses, such as meals and souvenirs.
A new course for graduates students is J560 Nonprofits and the Media, taught by Ralph Winslow Visiting Professor Jim Bright and professor Les Lenkowsky of the School of Public and Environmental Affairs. This course will help journalism, public relations and nonprofit management students understand the challenges of the nonprofit sector.
Bright says journalism students will learn tools to report on this area while public relations students will learn the challenges of telling an organization’s story in today’s fast paced media environment. Study includes national research from the IU Center on Philanthropy.
Also new this spring:
J460 Sports Journalism Research: Money and Collegiate SportsInstructor: National Sports Journalism Program Director Tim Franklin
For the entirety of this course, the Indiana University School of Journalism’s National Sports Journalism Center will embark on an ambitious reporting project that examines the income and spending of the more than 200 Division I public universities in the NCAA. The findings of this research project will likely be published on the National Sports Journalism Center’s Web site and by a major news organization.
Students in this course will work not only with the instructor, but likely with professional journalists who will assist in the project. Therefore, this class is designed for serious journalism students who place a premium on thorough reporting, research and accuracy.
J460 Reporting War and Conflict
Instructor: Associate professor Steve Raymer
This course focuses on conflict and its effects as seen through the lens of journalism. Students will read and view the eyewitness accounts of journalists who have served on the front lines of conflict, analyzing how conflicts are framed and seeking the most effective ways for journalists to prioritize and organize their words and images for maximum understanding.
J360 Story Mechanics
Instructor: Riley Endowed Chair in Journalism Tom French
This advanced reporting and writing class will hone narrative skills through intensive coaching. In a workshop setting, French will critique stories in class and will meet one-on-one with students to help develop their stories for publication, either in print or online.
Due to the extensive amount of individualized coaching, this will be a small class, with room for only a handful of students. To apply, submit three stories published or written for another class and a brief (no more than one page) description of why you’d like to take this course to French by Oct. 12. You may drop this off in his mailbox in the Ernie Pyle Hall office (EP200) or e-mail materials to him.
J360 Audio Storytelling
Instructor: Adjunct lecturer Sarah Neal-Estes
This class is for students interested in learning to tell a sound story at a professional level. These skills are now required in all media fields with online publications. And this course also provides more experience to students interested in radio journalism.
Each student will spend the semester reporting and producing for one professional level story. The best of these stories will be put forth for publication.
J360 Informed Health Reporting
Instructor: Riley Visiting Professor Dennis Elliott
This course for junior or senior journalism majors looks at how informed health reporting combines the best of science insights and journalism art to benefit the public. The media and public relations practitioners fulfill an essential responsibility in reporting health information. Interpretation of health data, constructing appropriately framed reports, and providing accurate and potentially motivating reports to the public poses a significant challenge with highly meaningful consequences.
J261 What News Won’t Tell You (for non-majors)
Instructor: Associate Dean for Undergraduate Studies Michael Evans
We are bombarded by media messages. This course in news literacy will help students decipher those messages and make sense of them by examining who sends them, where they come from, and the intent behind them. (Note: This course is not for journalism majors.)
J261 Globalization and Media
Instructor: Associate professor Radhika Parameswaran
The first part of this course defines globalization and examines the economic, social and environmental aspects of a deeply linked world in which money, ideologies, images, food, diseases and people move with relative ease across geographic and national borders. The second unit of the course focuses on debates over America’s changed position in a new global economic order, one that appears to have been precipitated by the rise of China and India. After reviewing briefly major classic and recent theories of media globalization, the third and longest unit of the course takes up the boom in the media industries in China and India, outlining developments in consumer culture, print journalism, advertising, television news and online media.
Other topics courses:
J360:
Business Coverage and the Business of Journalism, Riley Visiting Professor Dennis Elliott
Narrative Journalism, Riley Endowed Chair in Journalism Tom French
J460:
Agency Practicum, Visiting Professor Craig Wood
Sex in the News, associate professor Lesa Hatley Major
Reporting the Arts, Professor Emeritus Peter Jacobi
Questions?
- Contact Director of Experiential Learning and Recruitment Kathleen Lee in the main office at Ernie Pyle Hall.
- Or, have your questions ready when you visit your adviser to plan your spring classes. Undergraduates may schedule appointments in the main office at EP 200.




