Sorry

I got back from my college visit trip almost a month ago, and I decided not to put the college visit entries up. Maybe when I have to apply to the darn things, I'll post something.

Road Trip: Days 1 & 2

I'm going to New England. For twelve days. To look at colleges. Once I get to the colleges, I'll tell you all about them.

Right now. i'm bored and trying to take pictures through the windshield.

It's not going too well..

I had to drag my brother along. And he hasn't let me forget it...

Actually, two days in the car has gotten to all of our heads...

But hopefully, we'll get to the first college soon.

Reporters = Storytellers

I had an epiphany today while I was getting ready for the party.

For over a year, I've been sitting around trying to figure out what makes or breaks someone as a reporter. The people who come to The Oak Leaf, mostly consider themselves to be writers, and some of them can adjust and become good reporters but most of them don't and I haven't been able to figure out why.

Until today. Here's my theory:

There are two main kinds of writers: Storytellers and Artists.

Artists write to express themselves- their emotions- their thoughts. They use their words to paint pictures, some ugly-some beautiful. They see writing as a beautiful artistic medium. They're all about carefully worded phrases, exquisite images, symbols, the innermost thoughts and emotions- detail stuff that most people don't even think about.

Storytellers, on the other hand, are more about broad strokes. They focus more on cool plots and interesting characters than on little details. Storytellers can and often are artistic, but a big part of why they write is because they love stories. They like to create their tales and share them with others, because it's fun!

Storytellers are the ones that have an easier time becoming reporters, because they focus on stories. You can find real world stories with real people as characters and tell them. Which makes sense to a storyteller's brain.

But it's harder for artists, because they're used to setting up irony, symbolism, and depth that isn't always evident in the real world. Or possible to include in a newspaper article without editorializing. People don't speak in elegant phrasings, and news style writing isn't kind to figurative language. The Artists are used to writing by themselves and for themselves. It's hard for them to turn their solitary art into a practical form of communication.

Whereas, Storytellers are used to performing for an audience and writing simple but fun stories without as much depth.

Of course, I'm making really broad generalizations, and no Writer is 100% Artist or 100% Storyteller.

But if you're going to be a reporter, you're going to have to start looking at the world through Storyteller eyes. There are limitless stories out there in the real world just waiting to be told.

And reporters are the ones that tell them.

Top Ten Signs That The Oak Leaf is in Trouble

One time David Letterman made a list of signs a newspaper is in trouble. Here's the link.

Another guy made a similar list.

www.billucey.com

Here is my list:

10. The September issue usually comes out at the end of October.

9. Not a single person in the class actually wants to be a reporter when they grow up.

8. Each page looks like it was designed by different person (And usually was.)

7. There are no photos or cartoons on the Op/Ed page.

6. There are no freelancers contributing.

5. Passive voice is used and not corrected by anyone.

4. The Op/Ed section is the best written section of the paper.

3. No one on staff wants to write about a club they're not already in.

2. The editor has to work through lunch day in and day out, fighting in a futile struggle meet deadline, and no one else on staff comes in and helps her.

1. No one writes a letter to the editor all year.

That's my newspaper nightmare. What's yours?

Is this the end of The Oak Leaf?

When I started this blog, I was determined to make it a negativity-free zone, but it's becoming impossible to keep that up. Because I honestly think that The Oak Leaf is on its last legs.

Everybody says they're in favor of having a school newspaper, but they're not willing to take any actions to make sure that The Oak Leaf continues to exist.

I was absolutely miserable last year because people didn't seem to care. Maybe they did. But they certainly didn't pay attention to deadlines. And deadlines are called deadlines for a reason. If you miss them, there's a good chance the paper won't come out. And it's guaranteed to kill your grade.

And now I can't help but sit here and think that this year is going to be last year all over again.

A few days I sent out an email announcing that I wanted to hold a meeting to talk about next year's Oak Leaf. So far only one person emailed me back to tell me that she probably couldn't come. 

And that's just not right.

Either people are out of town, not checking their emails, or blowing me and The Oak Leaf off.

If they're out of town, that's okay. But it seems kind of weird that everyone would be out of town at the same time.

If they're not checking their emails, that has to change. Journalism is based on communications. And email is how I do most of my communicating. Also it's how you send your notes to yourself so you can write articles at home.

But what I'm really afraid of is that they're blowing me off. Which means this year's Oak Leaf is going to be another failure.

The second you sign up for journalism, you're signing up for one of the toughest classes on the course syllabus, way harder than AP History or AP Environmental Science. Depending on the stage of the paper, it can be harder than AP English.

You can't just skate through it. Well, you can, but if you do, the paper will suck. To have a good school newspaper, everybody on staff has to try hard to put together a good paper. 

A good newspaper has soul. It's possible to have a personality without sensationalizing. And a good paper has a personality, a personality that's kind of like an amalgamation of all the people who contributed to it. But if you do a halfway job, then the paper will have no personality at all.

I guess I'm not making any sense.

And I know I'm blowing things out of proportion. I always do.

But if people aren't paying attention to their Oak Leaf emails, that's not a good sign. Answering an email and saying whether you can come to the meeting or not isn't a hard thing. Just about everything else that goes into making a newspaper is.

I just don't think this bodes well...

Oak Leaf Sponsor Search Update

I emailed Ms. (or Mrs., I'm not sure which it is) Yoakley-Terrel and asked her if they have any idea who is going to be the journalism teacher next year.

They've been doing interviews but haven't settled on anything yet.

"When we know, we will let you know."

But nobody knows anything yet.

Oak Leaf Meet 'n Greet

July 24- My House

The Thursday after my birthday, I'm hosting the first official Oak Leaf get-together. Sort of a cross between a party and a story meeting

Last year, we toyed around with the idea of having a wrap party every time we finished an issue, but we never got around to organizing one. But this year, I really want to change that.

So next Thursday, I'm going to have a meeting at my house. So we can meet each other, joke around, have dinner, and hopefully get a little bit of brainstorming done.

Be There!!!!

Some of the Stuff I Want To Do:

I really think that before we go in to the school year and have to start really working on The Oak Leaf we should decide what we want The Oak Leaf to be.

Serious or Funny? Brightly-colored or Black&White? Focused on Students or on the whole community?

So I want to have a discussion about that.

I also think it would be fun to have a newspaper/magazine slam, where we debate the merits of various newspapers and magazines.

I think we should work on Oak Leaf Do's and Don'ts lists (i.e. Don'ts would include: "Don't make your editor work in the newsroom alone until like 7:30 at night.")

But none of that's set in stone.

Mostly I just want to have fun at the meeting.

65th Anniversary

The Oak Leaf is turning 65 next year!!!!!

Most people don't realize that it's that old.

But you should. 

J-Workbook: A Work in Progress

Lately, I've been reading these journalism textbooks (yes, I am that much of a dork), and it's really kind of interesting. All history textbooks are pretty much exactly the same- except as you get older the font gets smaller and the books get heavier. But journalism textbooks are not like that.

I'm serious.

On the one hand, you've got The Radical Write. Which as its name suggests is pretty much all about writing. And reporting. It has very few pictures, long chapters, and lots of amazing works by high school journalists that you can read and be inspired by. 

And on the other hand, you've got Inside Reporting, which is written in snippets. It's graphic design heavy. And instead of featuring student work interspersed within the chapters, it has this whole huge clump of articles by very famous journalists. 

And then you've got the internet, floating around. It's got all kinds of sites like Poynter Online with all kinds of advice, forums, and other stuff to help us learn about journalism. 

All very different. All trying to teach the same thing.

The problem is you have to read them.

And journalism is one of those things you can't learn out of a book. You have to do it.

And even though journalism textbooks are actually cool, they're still text books. You're still trying to pick up a craft by reading.

So I've decided to take a whack at writing a journalism textbook. I was going to do it for my journalism honors project last year, but Ms. Webster and I never got around to setting a deadline. I'm going to go ahead and put it together, and I'll hand it out to you guys and the freelancers, probably.

Anyway, my textbook is going to be more of a workbook. It's going to have all kinds of spaces for you to write. To try to dig through notes on imaginary stories that I made up, to answer tough philosophical questions, to take goofy personality quizzes that I revel in writing.

Well, revel's probably not the right word. 

It's one in the morning right now, so I'm not exactly at the top of my writing game.

I'm kind of rambling.

So yeah. Gotta go sleep.

I WENT TO THE NATIONAL PRESS BUILDING!! I WENT TO THE NATIONAL PRESS BUILDING!! WOO-HOO!!!

Yeah. I know those photos aren't too good. I had a really crappy seats and it's really dark on the top floor, but who cares?

Actually, honestly, it wasn't all that exciting. As part of NYLC, we went there twice- once to hear a really boring guy speak and once to have breakfast and talk to a press panel. 

(A panel = when you get a bunch of important people, give them microphones, and then let the audience ask questions for them to discuss.)

I'm not going to go over all that the boring guy said, just the one good part of his speech: 

"In Washington, the longer your title is, the less important you are."

In other words, the President is much more important than the Assistant to the UnderSecretary of Education. or a National Youth Leadership Conference Scholar.

At the press panel, we had 4 people-

a moderator named Nancy Ambrose ("When I was your age, I couldn't stand when people would go on and on, and I hate even more now." was the interesting thing she said.)-

Tom Bowman (a British guy who was nominated for a Pullitzer for some reason I don't remember.)-

Susan Mulligan (or Milligan. She's a political correspondent for the Boston Globe)-

and Ken Strickland (NBC Senate News Director.).

They got asked a really eclectic bunch of questions. Some people asked advice for how to become a journalist. Some people asked about the bloodshed in Zimbabwe, assuming that reporters must know everything about current events all over the world. Fortunately, these guys seemed to know a lot.

Anyway, here are THE VALUABLE LESSONS we gleaned-

Sunni= generally more educated       Shi'ites=generally more superstitious and religous

Iraq has all the resources it needs to become a powerful country- oil, land, US support- even water. But the problem is the people can't unite.

Journalism is a dangerous profession. Bowman met with a anti-US militia leader in a creepy empty warehouse in Baghdad. The scary thing was that the militia leader had initially been pro-US, but became frustrated that the US couldn't rebuild Iraq.

The situation in Zimbabwe is so bad that papers don't run the names of the reporters who report on the situation. Otherwise somebody might order a hit on the journalists.

Nobody in TV can do anything by themselves. All the people who work on a show or a story are spokes on a wheel, and the producer is the hub (the round thing all the spokes are attached to.)

Journalists work nights, holidays, weekends. 50-60 hours a week. (Oak Leaf Editors work 10-20 hours a week on the Oak Leaf alone.)

Ken Strickland says the Senate is the best beat in Washington. You can just walk through the halls of the office buildings and find the senators and their aids. Also you can easily find multiple sides to every story, something that's a lot harder to do in the White House.

Be aware of your backgrounds and views. They will shape whatever, you do or write for better or worse.

"The public sometimes sees politicians as cartoon characters, but as a reporter, you get to know the people."

Always have compassion.

The Internet is potientally a great thing for journalists. The problem is, there's no way to get any money, because you can access the websites for free.

WHEN TRYING TO GET A JOURNALISM JOB, EXPERIENCE IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN CLASSES YOU'VE TAKEN. Potential employers are interested in internships and what you've had published.

Holding out for a paid job/internship is not the way to break into the business.

So go over to the Oak Ridger office right now and ask if there's anything you can do. If not, try the Observer.

FYI

Just so you know, I have not fallen off the face of the Earth.

I've been stuck in hotel rooms without wireless internet.

For like two weeks.

NYLC Day 2

OMG. They made me a Republican. Apparently, they randomly assigned us to Caucuses, and I got thrown into the Republican caucus. Then I won two games of rock-paper-scissors and got into the Republican leadership role. Sometimes I wonder if that's how they pick leaders in real life.

But anyway, I guess pretending to be a Republican will be good for me. I'll hone my acting skills, learn to see the other side's view.

Which is something every reporter should be able to do.

Anyway, earlier today, we did this simulation where we had a president and everyone else was randomly assigned roles, like head of the CIA, senate committee leaders, ambassadors. I was the Speaker of the House, who wanted to use military might to resolve the situation (Russia claimed all of the seafloor of the Arctic Ocean so they could drill for oil. even though the U.S. had claimed part of it.) 

I really scared myself when I was coming up with ways to rationalize that position. This is what I came up with:

Peace would be ideal, but if the price of peace is letting the Russians control such a substantial portion of the world's oil sources, it's not worth it.

We're the only nation capable of standing up to Russia, and as such, we have an obligation to defend the interests of all the nations who also need oil.

In the past, U.S. has entered wars to help protect the oil sources. (i.e. The First Gulf War)

We will not fire unless they fire.

The seafloor we claimed is legally part of the United states and therefore, we should defend it.

This would not be another war on terror. The invasion of Iraq was based on speculation, but we are certain about what Russia intends to do in the Arctic Circle.

I almost had myself convinced. Maybe if it was a really situation and those ideas had gotten out, it would have convinced someone else and ignited a chain of events that would lead to WWIII. So as being world citizens, we all have power and we all have huge reponsibilities.

Gawwwd. I'm starting to talk like our coaches around here.

NYLC Day 1

I can't believe I forgot to tell you guys this. I guess I did. But I'm attending the National Youth Leadership Conference. It's this thing in Washington DC where we go to a whole bunch of seminars that will help America's best scholars develop leadership skills.

Apparently I'm a future leader.

I spent the last week trying to buy professional attire. Which is hard because nothing fits me and I hate dressing up.

I spent the last two days driving from Oak Ridge to DC. Which was not fun, because we couldn't leave until 5 yesterday and we had to be here by 3. And we had to stop and find a steamer, so I can unwrinkle my blazers. Haven't tried it yet. It looks like a little alien tea pot with wheels that emits jets of hot steam. I'm a little bit scared of it.

Anyway, we didn't do much today but unpack and listen to the keynote speaker. Those up top are the notes I took.

If you're lucky, some day you will produce a page of notes just as beautiful and random and detailed as that.

This is just a little bit of what those notes said.:

They had to cram all of us into the ballroom. The seats were so close together you couldn't twitch without bumping somebody else. Despite the fact that we're some of the nation's top scholars, the group is like any other group of highschoolers- noisy and restless.

It's a lot more diverse than you would expect. Most of us are from the Eastern United States, but there's plenty from California, Puerto Rico, and everywhere in between. There's cute, bubbly girls who treat everyone like their best friend, outsiders who seem to be eavesdropping, artists doodling in the margins of the 360-page journal/handbook they gave us when we first arrived.

The first guy, a boring looking guy in a suit, walks up to the podium and tells us he's one of the event coordinators. "Good evening scholars," he says. A few people answer. He does the I can't hear you gesture. "What did you say?"

Even at special Washington DC seminars for super smart people, we still have to go through that ritual. I don't understand why.

Then he introduces the other event coordinator. Who is also a boring guy wearing a suit. He's way into alliteration. He makes a joke about our "fashionable, friendly, and functional" name tags and tells us the conference should be a "wonderful, widening experience." Then he introduces the keynote speaker.

Despite the fact that we all had to get dressed up in blazers, button down shirts, and heels (although the guys aren't wearing heels, of course), she walks up to the podium wearing a pair of jeans and a while peasant blouse. She kind of reminds me of Diane Farr, the chick on Numb3rs.

She's Heather Smith, the leader of Rock the Vote, an organization that goes around with celebrities pestering young people to vote. She throws some statistics us, like the fact that by 2012, people under 30 will make up a third of the electorate.

She's big on young people exercising people, as you'd expect from the leader of Rock the Vote. Most revolutions like the Civil Rights struggle were headed by young people. "If a difference is going to be made, we have to be that difference," Smith tells us.

She also shares with us a few nuggets of wisdom that her father drilled into her brain.

"If you aren't big enough to withstand criticism, you aren't big enough to be praised."

and

"Be mindful of your thoughts, as they become your words.

Be mindful of your words, as they become your habits.

Be mindful of your habits, as they become your character.

Be mindful of your character, as it becomes your legacy."

Then they have a Q&A session, when some of the students come up to a microphone and ask her questions about her views and such. Then some creepy looking suit guys come up to the girl and the microphone and tell her that her question is the last.

Smith closes with a quote from Bobby Kennedy: "It takes one blow against injustice to create a tiny ripple of hope."

So go out there and express your opinion. It'll make the world a better place :)

Story Behind the Story: The ESE article

Club reporting is usually relatively easy. You interview the teacher who sponsors it. You sit in on a couple of their meetings and interview a few members. Then you take the quotes you've gathered and write a nice little lead-quote-transition article.

ESE was not like that. For starters, Estudiantes Sirviendo en Espanol only meets for about 15 minutes in the morning before school a couple of times each month. And we only had two weeks to throw together the holiday issue before school let out for Christmas.

To make things even worse, I wasn't going to be able to tag along when they went to give out the presents. There's a gap between when we finish the paper and when the paper comes out, because we have to send it to the printers. Then they have to find time to print it, and someone has to drive the papers from Maryville back to Oak Ridge. All that can take anywhere from 2 days to a week. And they were going to go give out the presents right in the middle of that gap.

I knew I really wanted to open the story with a description of the kids recieving the presents, but it's almost impossible to do a good job with those unless it's something you've seen for yourself.

The only other way to do a scene-setter lead is to talk to the people who were there last year. And almost all of them had graduated.

So when I went in to this story I was freaking out. I wasn't sure I could pull it off.

Still, the thing to do when you're trying to write a story when the odds are against you, is to start simple. I got out of my second period class and interviewed Sra. Chialvo. Most of it was about going to give the kids the presents last year. I asked her for details. How did the kids react? What did the mother say? What toys were they most excited about?

Don't be afraid to ask your source for help. I also asked her who else was in ESE, who went to the give last year, and she was able to help me set up times to interview students in her fifth period class and one of the people who went the year before.

That still didn't solve the problem. Agie, Ima, and Neesha hadn't gone to the gift giving the year before, and didn't have much to say about the thing except "we're collecting toys and stuff to help the underpriveliged." Quotes that state the obvious really aren't very much help, so I changed the subject to something they did know about- the tutoring part of ESE.

Which wasn't something I was planning on, but it helped add another dimension to the story and paint a more complete picture of ESE.

The interview with the one person who had actually gone to give the presents happened before homeroom. Considering, it was a pretty good interview, but it's really hard to interview when there are people jostling past you on their way to homeroom. if you can, schedule an interview in a place where there aren't very many people around, like talking to teachers during their planning period.

Writing the article wasn't easy. I had two people's accounts of what had happened, but it was still kind of sketchy. And I wasn't that comfortable using my imagination to fill in the gaps, because what if I made something up and it wasn't accurate?

There was no time for follow-up interviews, so I just focused on the facts I did gather.

And it worked! I actually got several compliments on this article, which is pretty unusual for a news-feature. Sra. Chialvo said she loved it and that she was going to put it in her scrapbook. 

so THE MORAL OF THIS LONG AND VERY BORING STORY: is that in journalism, no matter what the obstacles are, if you keep trying, you'll wind up with something. Even if it's not the story you started out with. The only way to fail journalism is to give up.

Crazy Ideas for Next Year Vol. 2

1. DRESS UP ON NEWSPAPER GAME DAY. The sports teams do it all the time. Why not us? Except of course, for journalists, game day is the day the papers are handed out in homeroom. It'd be a good way to call attention to ourselves that day.

2. SELL SUBSCRIPTIONS. Credit, where credit is due. This is Ms. Webster's idea. She was talking about maybe selling subscriptions to parents and other outside people like alumni and community members who might want to see the paper. It could be a good way to generate some extra revenue if we find enough people willing to pay.

3. GET PUBLISHED IN LARGER PAPERS. Maybe we can talk the Oak Ridger or the Oak Ridge Observer into reprinting some of our highlight articles. The wider community might notice us more and it would be wonderful for our portfolios. :)

4. SURVEY THE STUDENT POPULATION. A common problem in newspapers is that the Newspaper tends to be the newspaper of whoever's-on-the=staff instead of representing the school as a whole. We could do an official survey and ask the students of ORHS what they want to see in their paper. Like the stuff I put in the polls. Only we would give it out to about 200 students and then someone would have to count it...I'm telling you now. That someone is not going to be me.

5. NEWBIES SHADOW EXPERIENCED OAK LEAFERS. Interviewing is really different from anything you do anywhere else in school, so on the first issue, maybe each of the first-year staff members could go out and report with an older staff member, so they could kind of see firsthand how reporting goes instead of groping around in the dark.

What do you think?

Awesome Journalism Quote #5

"News is what matters, what gets into the bloodstream, what counts." -David Loyn

Should We Have a Forum?

Setting up a forum on MySpace would be a great way to share ideas and get to know each other before the year starts. It would be great. We could have actual conversations instead of me just idly blogging into cyberspace.

The Thing is nobody ever reads the blog. Or at least they never post comments and hardly ever vote in the polls. 

So if we started a forum, would people actually post comments and stuff?

Because if nobody ever posted comments, then that would just make me all frustrated and demoralized. And that would not be a good way to start the year.

So what do you guys think?

Awesome Journalism Quote #4

"Thou god of our idolatry, the press...

Thou fountain, at which drink the good and wise;

Thou ever bubbling spring of endless lies; 

Like Eden's dread probationary tree,

Knowledge of good and evil is from thee." -William Cowper

ok, so not exactly flattering. But I'm a journalist. I show all sides.

Becoming a Reporter

They show up in newspaper every year. Those doe-eyed teenagers with clothes that don't quite fit and dozens of pencils, who show up at the newspaper for one reason and one reason only: They want to write. I know. I was one of them. 

These young and talented but unpublished writers know that they have something to say and are determined to say it. They're weird, whacky, and wonderful and their many varied voices make the Editorials section one of the hottest in the paper. 

The problem is most of these writers are divas.

Divas and journalism just don't mix.

While writers can rock the Op/Ed page, the rest of the paper is about reporting. And the majority of writers I know make horrible reporters. They're used to spending lots of time, writing away, going wherever their imaginations taking them. They're used to being the source of their own creativity. 

They're not used to walking up and down the hallways of the school looking for sources. They're not used to quoting other people in their works. And they're not used to writing in a totally objective tone. And since most young aspiring writers have spent their entire lives aspiring to be young writers, it's hard for them to shift gears into reporting.

This is how I did it:

1. Visualize.

This is going to sound stupid, but stay with me. Think about your mind as if it were a computer. What would its desktop look like? Once you've picked out a background, open up the Creative Writing program. It can look like whatever you want it to look like. Mine looks like the most minimalist word processor in the universe. Nothing but a blank page that I can fill with whatever I want.

Now close out of the writing program. And open up the Journalism Application. It's not related to the Creative Writing program at all. Made by a different company different color scheme. Journalism Application is more like a browser. You look at different sites that were put up by other people and collect the information you need.

I admit it's a dumb exercise. But it's crucial to make sure that you know journalism and creative writing are totally separate entities. Never mix business with pleasure. Never mix reporting with creating.

2. Drop the Snobbery.

Everybody's a snob sometimes, whether they realize it or not. The stereotypical snob is the pretty rich kid who sneers at anyone who's not as pretty and rich as he is. But snobbery is broad and pervasive. A kid who hangs out with junkies all the time but refuses to talk to jocks is still a snob. Just kind of an upside down one.

Snobs don't want anything to do with anyone outside of their ideas about what is normal and/or acceptable. Most people who show up to work on newspaper don't think of themselves as snobs. But it becomes evident when we're assigning stories that most people won't volunteer for anything that doesn't involve them or their friends.

But the best thing to do is to try reporting on things that are new to you. Instead of using newspaper as a chance to showcase your friends and all the awesome things they do, use it as a change to explore and investigate the world around at you. There is more going on at the high school than you think there is. 

3. Think of yourself as a reporter.

Reporting is not a profession. It's a state of mind, a way of looking at the world. Keep telling yourself that you are a reporter. 

Look around. Eavesdrop. Think about what's important to you and to the people around you. How can that be made into a story.

Sorry About Not Updating Things

I haven't written anything in the last couple of days because I felt like no one was reading the blog. I mean there haven't been any new votes in the polls in the last few days, which is how I gage whether or not anyone's out there.

So if you're there, VOTE!

I create a poll like every ten seconds, so there's plenty of stuff for you to weigh in on.

And I didn't want to add a whole bunch of stuff every day, because honestly, if I kept adding stuff at the rate I was last week, you wouldn't have read all of it anyway.

BUT THAT IS A LAME EXCUSE. 

Because I'm sure that I have one or two loyal readers who check the blog almost every day and read everything they haven't already read yet. And I shouldn't let you guys down.

That's the thing about being on a school newspaper. No matter how well you write or how spectacular the graphics, at least half the school is going to ignore everything you do. But you can't let that demoralize you. 

Even if you manage to inform and/or entertain just one person, then you've done your job as a reporter. 

Awesome Journalism Quote #3

"It is wonderful how much news there is when people write every other day; if they wait a month, there is nothing that seems worth telling."- O. Douglas

Anyway, Back to the Newspaper

There are so many things going on in high schools. It's kind overwhelming. Especially when you're on the school newspaper trying to figure out what's important, what's relevant, what's entertaining. But fortunately, in newspaper, we have categories for articles to help sort it out. These are the ones we use in the Oak Leaf:

     News: The front page. The News section is made up of the lead stories the newest stories, the stories that have the biggest impact. Most major changes in the high school will be reported on the news page. We also usually have a collection of news briefs that cover the national headlines. But not everything on news is earth shattering. Sometimes we put featurey things there like personality profiles of new principles and stories about club events.

     Features: The line between news and features is blurry and hard to find. The general rule is that feature articles are longer and more soulful. They generally include more quotes and show a lot more personality than news articles. It's the most random section of the paper, with everything from clubs to personality profiles to graphs showing the results of national polls.

     Sports: Sports is fairly self-explanatory. We try to cover all of the school-sponsored sports and a few of the non-school sponsored ones as well. The important thing about sports stories is to try to capture the energy and fun of the sports, because sometimes sports tend to become lists of stats, and sometimes reading stats tends to be a little boring. 

     Arts & Ent: This is the section of the paper where the reviews live. Movie reviews, book reviews, restaurant reviews, and pretty much everything else you can review appear here. Also this is where fun stuff like comics and madlibs. I'd also like to see more full articles on this page, like features on students in bands and in art classes and stuff. 

     Opinions/Editorials: This is the section where we the student journalists get to say what we want. It's a fair tradeoff. In return for letting everyone else know what's going on and putting in the hours doing research and layout, in this section we get to say what we think about whatever's going on. It's the only section where there is an "I".

      Most subjects are fair game, everything from politics to personal anecdotes can appear in the Op/Ed section. Of course, the more controversial the subject, the more carefully you have to tread. All the press laws and journalism ethics still apply. Op/Eds are the most likely to be censored.

      Fashion?? I was thinking that in the coming year, we might want to add a fashion section.I know Boyd would like to do it, and I really want to use more color and more pictures, so Fashion would be a good place to do that. Obviously fashion would be about clothes, trends, and stores. 

Awesome Journalism Quote #2

"Journalism- an ability to meet the challenge of filling space."- Rebecca West

Raid on Blogthings

This is off-topic, but I love this website called blogthings.com. It's awesome. It has zillions of funny little personality quizzes. So I figured that now that I have a blog to actually post them to, I should post some results:

Your Blog Should Be Green 

(No way! My blog is blue and I like it that color!)

Your blog is smart and thoughtful- not a lot of fluff 

(except when I'm posting blogthings results).

You enjoy a good discussion, especially if it involves picking apart ideas. 

(Well, that is true).

However, you tend to get easily annoyed by any thoughtless comments in your blog. 

(Don't listen to them. I'm dying for someone to post some comments, thoughtless or otherwise.)

Your blogging type is the Private Performer.

(Is it just me or does that sound kind of dirty?)

Your blog is your stage- with your visitors your adoring fans.

(Yeah. I'm sure all three of the people who read this blog would agree with that.)

At least, that's how you write your witty one liners.

(OMG! Blogthings is psychic!)

And while you like attention, you value your privacy.

You're likely to have an anonymous blog or turn off comments.

(No freakin' way! I would never turn off comments. I like arguing with people!)

You are Scissors (as opposed to Paper or Rock)

Sharp and brilliant, you can solve almost any problem with that big brain of yours.

People fear your cutting comments- and your wit is famous for being both funny and cruel.

(Are they talking about me or Simon Cowell?)

Deep down, you tend to be in the middle of an emotional storm. Your own complexity disturbs you.

(So does the complexity of this blogthings analysis. Seriously. They got all this out of a 5 question test!)

You are too smart for your own good. Slow down a little- or you're likely to hurt yourself.

(Webby used to tell me that all the time. "Calm down, Diana. It'll work out"...)

You can cut a paper person down to pieces. Only a rock person can ruin you.

(duh)

When you fight: You find your enemy's weak point and exploit it.

If someone makes you mad: You'll do everything you can to destroy their life.

(Gosh. Now I'm scared of myself.)

You Should Have Been Born Under: the Year of the Ram.

(Actually I was. What a coincidence.)

You're most comfortable inside your own head often daydream the day away.

(I usually watch TV instead of daydreaming. But close enough.)

You have an artistic temperament that makes you seem creative to some, eccentric to others.

(That's an understatement.)

You avoid conflict at all costs,

(But I love to bicker!)

And you have a difficult time with relationships.

(Gee. I wonder why.)

Attractive and with good manners, you tend to shine in social situations.

(If only I had good manners.)

So now you probably know way more about me than you wanted to. Oh well...

BURN THESE INTO YOUR BRAIN

Last year, we had a textbook called The Radical Write by Bobby Hawthorne. It's a really good book. You should read it if you can find a copy of it.

Anyway, Ms. Webster had a devious plan to make us read it for summer reading. But obviously that plan is off.

So I'm posting this assignment I had to do last year that lists the main points of the book. Read them and try to remember them when you're out writing stories.

     Being a teenager is anything but boring. It's full of stress, heartbreak, homework, laughter, hope, apathy, fatigue and passion. But for some reason most high school publications are bone dry and boring without a drop of soul in them.

     That shouldn't be the case. Every high school's newspaper should be as unique as the students it writes about. The Oak Leaf should be clearly identifiable as the ORHS newspaper without us ever using the words "orhs" or "wildcat".

     Focus on people, not statistics. Nobody thinks numbers are more important than people.

     Good writing is fun to read, partly because it's fun to write. A forced article won't be any fun for anybody to read. Even when you're writing about something boring, you have to find something that's fun or interesting or significant about it and latch on to that. Make it the focus of the article.

      Good writers know the rules of writing. They also know when to break them. Good writers are confident with their abilities and don't use unnecessarily long words or try to make themselves seem smarter than they are. They do the research they need to make sure their articles are entertaining, informative, and true to life.

      NO TWO ARTICLES SHOULD ever SOUND ALIKE.

      Focusing on an event like "a test" is not telling a good story. We call our articles stories for a reason. They're stories! They're meant to be told in an entertaining way, complete with an interesting main character and a unique voice.

      Reporting takes time. It takes time to gather facts, interview people, and figure out what the essence of a story is. Then it takes time to write multiple drafts. And deadlines come toward you fast. So journalists can not afford to procrastinate.

Journalism 101

Let's start at the very beginning: What is journalism?

You'd think journalism would be a relatively simple concept. It's the stuff you put in newspapers and on CNN. It's non-fiction (or it's supposed to be anyway). It's meant to inform and entertain. It's an incredibly complex entity and you have to go through an incredibly long and complex process to produce good journalism.

That's why I get so mad, when I try to cajole someone into taking journalism next year (It never works, but you can't blame me for trying), and they just look at me and say, "Gee, Diana, I would but I already have English class, and I don't have room for another writing class."

Journalism is NOT a WRITING class! (Neither is high school English, but that's another rant for another day.)

It's true that you do write a lot in journalism, but it's not the point of the class. What distinguishes journalism from other forms of writing is the subject. In poetry, you usually writing about your own feelings. In fiction, you usually write about imaginary people, whose thoughts and feelings echo your own. In journalism, you write about REAL PEOPLE and the things they did. It has nothing to do with you.

As the reporter, you are supposed to be the invisible recorder of events. Your medium in a newspaper is either words and/or pictures. You do get a byline, but the focus of the newspaper isn't on you. It's like movie credits. Everyone who contributes to a movie gets their name in the credits, but while you're watching the movie, you're not supposed to be thinking about all the cameramen and the editors who had to sift through months of footage and all the guy in charge of getting the stars' water bottles. You're supposed to be focused on the story and characters onscreen.

That's the way it is with reporters and their articles. You're the cameraman. Frame your subject to the best of your ability and don't you dare call attention to yourself.

Journalism at its most basic level is telling the story of the real world, which is full of things that are dramatic, weird, and wonderful. To be a journalist, you don't have to be a writer. You have to be a human being who's interested in what's going on in the world around you

Because in journalism, empathy and observational skills are worth a lot more than being skilled at stringing words together.

Boring Blog Syndrome

For some reason, every time I try to read a blog, I get bored. I don't know if that's because most people can't write or don't have anything interesting to put in their blogs, but I swear, I have never found a blog that didn't bore me to death. Has anybody else noticed this?

I promised myself that my blog wouldn't be like that, but I was reading back over it, and it is. It's boring. Which is probably why no one's reading it.

Awesome Journalism Quote #1

"A good newspaper, I suppose, is a nation talking to itself." -Arthur Miller

Crazy Ideas for Next Year Vol. 1

#1 THE PAPER: OAK LEAF EDITION. So this year MTV decided to make a reality show about the a school newspaper. I don't really like it, because it makes all the people on the staff like like morons, and it doesn't really show how much talent and effort it takes to put together a paper. 

But it is a good PR stunt. So I was thinking that next year we could make little behind-the-scenes videos on putting together the Oak Leaf, showing the work we put in and how much fun it is and then have them play it before or after the announcements. I think it would help call attention to the stuff we have to do on the paper. If we could get enough interesting footage...

#2 START AN OAK RIDGE CHAPTER OF QUILL & SCROLL. Quill & Scroll is the journalism honor society, the same way ITS is the honor society for theater. Basically dedicated student journalists pay the membership dues, then they get a pin and one more impressive thing to put on their college resume.

#3 PRINT ON MAGAZINE PAPER INSTEAD OF NEWSPAPER PAPER (fyi: The official term for newspaper paper is newsprint.) I can't think of any local printers that can print magazines, but it would be awesome if we could print as a magazine. Pictures just look better on glossy paper and maybe we'd get less ink on our hands when we handled the fresh Oak Leafs.

#4 JOURNALISM INITIATION RITES. I'm still working on trying to figure out what these should be. But there should probably be something about having to walk up to a stranger and ask them a question. We've had people who wouldn't talk to anyone they weren't friends with, which is a cardinal sin in journalism. If you're a reporter have to be able to talk to lots of different people, even people you dislike. 

#5 FREELANCERS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Since the Oak Leaf gets stuck with notoriously small staffs, I think we should try to build up a thriving community of freelancers, people who aren't on staff but contribute stories and photos and stuff anyway. I think they should have to endure initiation rites also. It would make them feel more like they're on the staff and it would scare away people who aren't willing to spend the time.

So yeah, as you've probably figured out by now, I have all kinds of strange ideas about newspapers and Oak Leaves. I'll probably come up with a whole bunch more over the summer. 

please feel free to comment on these or post your own crazy ideas!

Journalism Scouts

Someday I want to start an organization where local kids work together to investigate stories, take pictures, and all the stuff that goes into putting together a newspaper. I'm going to call them Journalism Scouts until I can think of a better name for them.

I want to help them learn to ask questions, to look at the world with open eyes, and share what they learn with everyone. That's really what journalism is about- gathering information and insights and sharing it with the world.

Which is why it's so sad that everybody's gotten so cynical. The media tells us not to trust politicians; politicians tell us not to trust the media. The paparazzi take over more space every day, and nobody cares. Nobody likes to read the newspapers anymore.

I think that the major media outlets need to spend less time doing 30-second long "up-to-the-minute news flashes", which don't make any sense unless you've been watching all of the previous 30 second updates that came before it. They, I mean, we need to spend more time telling actual stories and capturing more people's voices.

Current news is usually coming from things like CNN that are marketed to a huge national, or worldwide audience. All the news stories seem to be about far away places that have nothing to do with where I am. Journalism is meant to inform, but in order to inform someone, you have to get them to read it. That means making people relate to it and entertaining them.

That's the challenge. Are you up for it?

For more dribble about ideal journalism check out the link to "Principles of Journalism" on my Journalism Link list.

Browse this Website!

highschooljournalism.org

If you're going to be on a school newspaper next year, you definitely need to check out this website. It's got helpful advice, links to sites where you can read other school's papers, and way more stuff than I can list in this blog.

Whatever classes you've taken in the past doesn't really matter in journalism. Journalism is a totally separate department, and the rest of school doesn't really prepare you for it. 

That's why I started this blog, to offer advice, experience, and hopefully some entertainment, to help next year's group prepare for being on the paper next year.

The Current Situation

       Hey. My name's Diana, and I'm going into my second year as editor-in-chief, and at the moment, I'm slightly miffed. And a lot nervous.

        Ms. Webster, my journalism teacher of the last two years, just sent me an email announcing that she was going to take a teaching job at Webb. (I am not making that up. Webby is going to Webb.) So that leaves me and the rest of the staff hanging over the summer.

        Will we still go to CJI? Who will be our sponsor next year? Will the staff have a chance to meet each other before the school year actually starts? What does all of this mean for the Oak Leaf?

         So far the answer to all these questions is *shrug*. Time will tell.