JOUR231 Class

News Writing

JOUR 231 Instructional Syllabus, Spring 2011

Class Meetings:

Tuesday, 5:10 PM – 7:00 PM in Scripps 001

Thursday, 5:10 PM – 7:00 PM in Scripps 001

Instructor: Arman Tarjimanyan

Phone: (740) 249-5121

Email: at242607@ohio.edu

Office Hours: Tuesday and Thursday, 3:00 PM – 5:00 PM in Sing Tao Center, 106

TEXTBOOK: Associated Press Stylebook (any recent edition will be accepted)

You will also need:

USB flash drive (at least 2 Gigabytes)

Memory card for standard photo/video camera (at least 2 Gigabytes)

COURSE PURPOSE: This course is designed to help you develop and improve basic writing and reporting skills as well as to introduce you to some of the basic issues involved in reporting, such as ethics. Assignments will require that you gather, analyze, and organize information for presentation to a general audience on a timely basis. Although emphasis will be placed on a newspaper style of writing, the skills that you learn will serve you in all areas of mass communication.

COURSE FORMAT: Writing and reporting are skills that can be improved only through constant practice. Thus, you will spend considerable time writing stories, and then we’ll discuss what you have written.

COPY PREPARATION: All of the out-of-class assignments must be double spaced. Out-of-class assignments should be done on a computer, and you should keep a copy of what you do. Use a pencil for all in-class copyediting. Using anything other than a pencil will result in a lower grade on that assignment. Thus, get in the habit of always bringing a pencil to class.

GRADING:

The grading, which will not be curved, is based on performance. The amount of time or effort you put into a story will not enter into the grading – it’s possible to spend 10 hours and do a sub-par story or one hour and have something excellent. The criteria that you will be graded on includes: accuracy, completeness of story, newsworthiness and significance of information, reader interest, fairness, organization of the story, clarity, conciseness, precision of language, grammar, punctuation, spelling, and proper use of AP style.

All out-of-class assignments will be graded on a 20-point scale, and all in-class assignments and quizzes will be graded on a 10-point scale. The following components add up to your final grade:

Components of Evaluation:             (%)

Attendance and Participation 5

Current events quizzes 10

AP style quizzes 10

In-class assignments 20

In-class component of out-of-class assignment 10

Out-of-class assignments 45

Total 100%

Optional Final Exam 5%

A	94%-100%
A-	90%-93%
B+	87%-89%
B	83%-86%
B-	80%-82%
C+	75%-79%
C	71%-74%
C-	65%-70%

NOTE: Bring your AP style book and a pencil to class every day. Each time you misspell a person’s name (and that includes giving them a wrong middle initial), your grade on that assignment will drop one letter grade (for example, from an A to a B). Thus, four misspelled names (including the same name four times) is an automatic F even if the story is A quality – if it’s C quality, it only takes two misspelled names to get an F.

Deadlines are an inevitable burden for a journalist, and you will be penalized for late out-of-class assignments unless the lateness can be justified. For each day a story is late, three points will be deducted, and no story will be accepted later than one week after the due date. Failure to do an out-of-class assignment will not only result in a 0 for that assignment but 10 percents will be deducted from your final grade total for each incomplete out-of-class assignment.

ATTENDANCE: Class attendance is necessary if you are to do well. Class sessions build on what you have learned previously.  Information on out-of-class assignments will be given during class, and you will have frequent in-class assignments. In addition, it pays to arrive on time. All current events quizzes will be given promptly at the start of class, and questions will not be repeated if you are late.

READING: You must read and analyze AP top stories and The New York Times selected stories that will be posted on the blackboard (in the Content section). You will take the current events quiz on the reading materials each Tuesday.

ACADEMIC DISHONESTY: Cheating (which includes copying off someone else’s work) will not be tolerated. Anyone caught cheating will be given an F for that particular assignment and may be given an F for the course.

FINAL COMMENT: If you want to talk about the class, come and see me. If my office hours are inconvenient for you, make a special appointment.