Research paper & presentation– (first draft & final draft) using the APA format, students must prepare and submit a typed, double-spaced 5-page research paper.
The topic must be on a concept covered in the class and/or text. This project allows students to examine in depth topics or material covered in the course. Student’s analysis and opinion should come from the text, as well as research.
Papers must include legitimate scholarly sources, 5 of the sources must be scholarly (i.e. journal articles) from the library databases. If you would like to use a source that are not from scholarly journals, you need to have Prof. Rodriguez OK those sources ahead of writing your paper.
Students are responsible for submitting two (2) papers (first draft and final draft). Hard copies of both papers are due at the start of class on their respective due dates. The final draft submission and the 3-4 minute presentation are due at the same time.
You will need a research topic that is not too broad. You can start with a broad topic and narrow it down by thinking of some of the issues associated with it. Then turn your broad topic and issue into a debatable argument.
e.g. News and Reporting:
Subtopic: Delivery Method (Print; Online; Cable; Social Media etc.)
Issues: Ethics; Censorship; Advertising; Revenue; Credentials; Credibility etc
Topic + Subtopic + Issue = Topic
Potential topics:
Can citizen reporters supplant the role of trained journalists?
How could shareholder concerns and advertising dollars affect reporting?
How can investigative journalism survive in the age of the internet?
Has the demand of a 24-hour online news cycle led to a decrease in journalism standards?
Digital Currents: how technology and the public are shaping TV news by Social media has irrevocably changed how people consume the news. With the distinction between professional and citizen journalists blurring like never before, Digital Currents illuminates the behind-the-scenes efforts of television newscasters to embrace the public's participation in news and information gathering and protect the integrity of professional journalism. Using interviews with more than one hundred journalists from eight networks in Canada and the United Kingdom, Rena Bivens takes the reader inside TV newsrooms to explore how news organisations are responding to the paradigmatic shifts in media and communication practices. The first book to examine the many ways that the public has entered the production of mainstream news, Digital Currents underscores the central importance of media literacy in the age of widespread news sources.
Deadlines and Disruption: my turbulent path from print to digital by A Top Editor's Take on the State of Journalism Today--and His Prescient Forecast of Its Future "This is a personal and insightful book about one of the most important questions of our time: how will journalism make the transition to the digital age? Steve Shepard made that leap bravely when he went from being a great magazine editor to the first dean of the City University of New York journalism school. His tale is filled with great lessons for us all." --Walter Isaacson, bestselling author of Steve Jobs "An insightful and convivial account of a bright, bountiful life dedicated to words, information and wonder." --Kirkus Reviews (Starred Review) "This is two compelling books in one: Shepard's story of his life in print journalism, and a clearheaded look at the way journalism is evolving due to electronic media, social networking, and the ability of anyone with a computer and an opinion to make him- or herself heard." --Booklist Shepard's book will resonate with many and should be read by anyone interested in the flow of information today and its simpact on society as a whole." --Library Journal "The book is in part a memoir, a tale of a life lived at the height of print journalism when print journalism itself was at its height. But it is also an analysis, an examination of the new challenges facing an old industry as it ambles and occasionally sprints its way into the digital age." --The Washington Post About the Book: "My personal passage is, in many ways, a microcosm of the larger struggle within the journalism profession to come to terms with the digital reckoning. Will the new technologies enhance journalism . . . or water it down for audiences with diminished attention spans? What new business models will emerge to sustain quality journalism?" Stephen B. Shepard has seen it all. Editor-in-chief of BusinessWeek for more than 20 years, Shepard helped transform the magazine into one of the most respected voices of its time. But after his departure, he saw it collapse--another victim of the digital age. In Deadlines and Disruption, Shepard recounts his five decades in journalism--a time of radical transformations in the way news is developed, delivered, and consumed. Raised in the Bronx, Shepard graduated from City College and Columbia, joined BusinessWeek as a reporter, and rose to the top editorial post. He has closed the circle by returning to the university that spawned him, founding the Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York. In the digital age, anyone can be a journalist. Opinion pieces are replacing original reporting as the coin of the realm. And an entire generation is relying on Facebook friends and Twitter feeds to tell them what to read. Is this the beginning of an irreversible slide into third-rate journalism? Or the start of a better world of interactive, multimedia journalism? Will the news industry live up to its responsibility to forge a well-informed public? Shepard tackles all the tough questions facing journalists, the news industry, and, indeed, anyone who understands the importance of a well-informed public in a healthy democracy. The story of Shepard's career is the story of the news industry--and in Deadlines and Disruption, he provides peerless insight into one of the most critical issues of our time.
Can Journalism Survive?: an inside look at American newsrooms by Journalists have failed to respond adequately to the challenge of the Internet, with far-reaching consequences for the future of journalism and democracy. This is the compelling argument set forth in this timely new text, drawing on the most extensive ethnographic fieldwork in American newsrooms since the 1970s. David Ryfe argues that journalists are unable or unwilling to innovate for a variety of reasons: in part because habits are sticky and difficult to dislodge; in part because of their strategic calculation that the cost of change far exceeds its benefit; and in part because basic definitions of what journalism is, and what it is for, anchor journalism to tradition even when journalists prefer to change. The result is that journalism is unraveling as an integrated social field; it may never again be a separate and separable activity from the broader practice of producing news. One thing is certain: whatever happens next, it will have dramatic consequences for the role journalism plays in democratic society and perhaps will transform its basic meaning and purpose. Can Journalism Survive? is essential and provocative reading for all concerned with the future of journalism and society.
Sources: Doherty, T. Total Number of Jobs in Each Industry. [Graphic]. Retrieved from www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/04/25/media-bubble-real-journalism-jobs-east-coast-215048
Shafer,J., & Doherty, T. (2017, May/June). The Media Bubble is Worse Than You Think. Retrieved April 10, 2018, from www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/04/25/media-bubble-real-journalism-jobs-east-coast-215048
Don't forget to cite your graphics/visuals in your presentation:
APA format: Lastname, FirstInitial. (Year, Month Day of publication). Title. Retrieved from URL
if you cannot find a createor/author:
Title. (Year, Month Day of publication). Retrieved from URL
