The Daily Plan-it / Dean of Students Blog, Columbia J-school

From: Larry Fried, Asst. Dean for Technology

Dear Students,

Please make note of the following technology items as we approach the end of the academic year:

Equipment and Fines:

All checked out equipment should be returned no later than May 15th.

Equipment fines must by paid by May 16th or you may have a hold placed
on your diploma. If you wish to dispute a fine, please email Craig at
ch2314[at]columbia.edu.
(more…)

Bill Wareham, managing editor of Minnesota Public Radio (one of the most influential news organizations in America) recently visited the school and had some nice things to say about our radio curriculum and Professors John Dinges and Rick Karr:

Both fellows have distinguished bios - John is a former managing editor at NPR (the full bio is here) and Rick has done stints with NPR, PBS and more (full bio). But these guys may be doing their most important work ever at Columbia, where they’re educating the next generation of radio journalists.

The heart of the radio workshop is the weekly webcast, which comes together every Friday during spring semester at 4 o’clock ET. This mix of daily news and features is a pretty good replication of what goes on daily at public radio stations across the country.

What impresses me every year is how good these students are, even if they’re still a little rough around the edges. We’ve had several graduates of the program come through MPR (the latest, Jess Mador, started a couple of months ago), and all have been strong journalists.

You will be hearing many of these voices on public radio in coming years, but if you want to hear them now, the workshop archives its programs here.

Read the full item, with links:
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/collections/special/columns/newsroom/archive/2007/04/hearing_the_fut.shtml.

Prof. Dinges, who is a terrific evangelist for radio, encourages all students to think about doing radio, even if they are not broadcast majors (we have courses of various lengths). He say, “Some students now seek out Columbia for radio, more each year as word gets out. But still the majority of our students discover the possibility of radio while here–including about half who started out with the intention of being print journalists.”

He’s right. Over the years, I have seen dozens of students had what I call their “radio epiphany” while taking a radio course here and go into careers where radio is their major outlet - or one of their major outlets. Increasingly, even newspaper reporters are asked to collect audio clips, make podcasts, etc. And when it comes to new media, radio and audio skills are especially invaluable.

If you are incoming student (or a continuing PT student): please do consider taking radio classes when you are here. More on radio at Columbia here: http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/studentwork/radio/

[ Another in our “Notes From…” series - short notes by volunteers summarizing various events around the school, to help those of us who didn’t/couldn’t attend. Watch for several other “Notes From…” throughout the year. If you have one, send it in! Or let us know in advance that you’d like to do one; or after the event, too. ]

Below, notes from a lecture by Prof. Bruce Porter on how to choose a Master’s Project topic. Many thanks to volunteer notes-taker Sheena Tahilramani, J2007. Feel free to drop her note or post a comment below (free, one-time registration required).

Notes From… Bruce Porter’s lecture: “How to Choose a Master’s Project”
By Sheena Tahilramani
E-mail: sat2127[at]columbia.edu

Prof. Bruce Porter, our resident Master’s Project expert (partly because he did one himself when he was a student at Columbia in the early 1960s, along with his classmater, Patrick J. Buchanan), gives annual talks on various aspects of the Master’s Project. On Wed., Sept.13, he spoke about choosing a topic. He will talk about writing one later in the semester. He gave students, in adavance, copies of his New York Times Magazine cover story on big guns, . At the end of this report, you will see a note listing some good PRINT Master’s Projects from the past that he mentioned in his lecture.

What is the Master’s Project?
It’s a rare event that you’ll be given so much time to explore a topic. The Master’s Projects are also a lasting moment of the school. You should start thinking of them as long magazine stories. Over the years, the contents of the projects have changed—from cosmic stories such as “Let’s Look at Contact Lenses” and “Can We Control the Weather?” to what was known as a ‘’live in experience'’ (i.e., immersion). You ought to learn something from your reporting, to really illuminate something for yourself. It shouldn’t be just to further a political idea or view, etc. Ideally you might want to strive for some kind of combination of the two, take a macro issue and focus on a micro part of it. It’s a story that is meant to convey something that you want to say in a powerful way. It’s something that becomes humanized—’’there are no issues, there are only people.'’

Topic vs. Story
Another thing that you should think about or see the difference in is a master’s topic and a master’s story. For example, “AIDS: Are we Doing Enough?” is a topic. “Infected and In Love” is a story. The story sets the topic in motion.

Access
Access is like gold (see 2005 sous chef story - below). You have to determine early on what sort of access you have. We already know that public officials are impossible to talk to. So, you need to develop strategies on how you’re going to do this without relying on public officials. The solution with police, education and corrections is oftentimes to skirt them (i.e., talk to the inmates). If you want to visit a prison, sign in as a friend not a journalist. You won’t be able to take in a notepad but you can arrange to have the inmate call you and then you can take notes. It is possible to petition the Department of Corrections for entrance as a journalist, but there is a lot of red tape (not recommended). The same holds true for the Department of Education. Nobody can stop you from talking with the students, parents, PTA. You may have to use the information you glean from these sources to leverage an interview with the principal. Don’t limit yourself to advocates. There are a lot of advocates and many of them are compelling and have good stories, but you have to get something from the other side. Otherwise, it’s a one-way street and not a very good story.

How to Approach a Topic
In approaching the topic, avoid becoming hysterical. Take your time choosing a topic. Avoid something that’s a community issue in your RWI class that your professor thinks might be interesting. You’ve got to be interested in this, enthusiastic about your project. A good plan when you first arrive at an idea is to ask yourself, “Is this doable?” It looks like you have a year, but you don’t. Don’t do a big topic, do some small piece of that topic. If you’re doing the issue of homeless people looking for shelters, pick one homeless person! You can’t do them all. Next piece of advice is to work steadily and slowly. Every week, do what a journalist calls ‘’gathering string.'’ You should probably tape record this project because as time passes, your scribbled notes may lose clarity. Get a decent tape recorder and do an interview a week. Transcribe it then, don’t wait! The length of this is around 5,000 words or 20 pages. The process of developing an idea is going to occupy you for about a month. You’ll run into quite a few ideas that don’t seem doable. Look at your story and see if you can come in through a side door, something different.

o o o o o

PROF. PORTER’S LIST OF THE FACULTY’S FAVORITE PRINT STORIES
Prof. Porter asked faculty members for their favorite recent projects - the list is below, with the various professors’ comments (and some input on locations by Deborah Wassertzug, Journalism Librarian).

PLEASE NOTE: All Master’s projects from 2002 to present are in the Journalism Library.
From years earlier than 2002 - just go over to Lehman Library, located in the lower
level of the School of International Affairs building (118th St & Amsterdam). Master’s projects from 1957-2001 are housed on the lower level of Lehman Library.

An index by author of Master’s projects & theses can be found online at
http://www.columbia.edu/cu/lweb/indiv/jour/masters/index.html

You can’t check out any of the bound volumes, so please be prepared to
either sit and read the project or thesis, or put money on your ID to make
photocopies of it in the library.

Please be aware that the list compiled below by faculty includes both
Master’s projects by MS students, as well as MA theses. The MA theses
from 2006 (the program’s first year) are in the Journalism Library as
well, with the volumes bound in red rather than green.

1. My favorite thesis last year was written by Moises Velasquez-Manoff, in
the MA program. Moises has a rare congenital condition called alopecia,
which has made him bald since he was a kid. That’s a traumatic thing to
happen to you when you’re twelve. Now that he’s a science writer, Moises
decided to look into the science of the condition. His research led him
into a big and fascinating area of research that goes way beyond baldness
and that affects many more of us than you’d expect.
**MA THESIS - JOURNALISM LIBRARY**

2. Jill Bauerle, “Surviving the War in Berlin,” 2006.
**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - JOURNALISM LIBRARY**

3. I’ve got a bunch of faves from among my advisees. Off the top of my
head, Katie Baker ‘05 on sous-chefs (**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - JOURNALISM
LIBRARY**); Mark Fass ‘04 on the legal and personal aftermath of a
famous tabloid crime case from the ’60s (**MS MASTER’S PROJECT -
JOURNALISM LIBRARY**); Kelly Niknejad ‘05 on Iranian exiles in the US
(**MA THESIS - JOURNALISM LIBRARY**); also, Greg Gilderman on why cops in Philadelphia aren’t making more progress at reducing the murder rate (it has just been finished and won’t be in the library till summer 2007; Greg is a current PT student, so you can ask him about it directly).

4. Blacks for Bush, by Arin Gencer 2006 : A sophisticated piece of
explanatory journalism about what’s behind the uptick in black Republicans
for Bush in the last election.
(**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - JOURNALISM LIBRARY**)

5. Danielle Shapiro wrote her 2006 Master’s project on American Muslims
in the Military. It won one of our prizes.
(**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - JOURNALISM LIBRARY**)

6. Many Women at Elite Colleges Set Career Path to Motherhood-2005
Master’s by Louise Story that ran in the New York Times.
(**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - JOURNALISM LIBRARY**)

7. Alice Kenny (’03) had a terrific story on autism that the NYT ran as a
cover story in the Westchester section.
(**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - JOURNALISM LIBRARY**)

8. Alan Rappeport (’02) had fine piece on breakaway Hasidic teenagers,
using one kid’s story to illustrate a larger phenom.
(**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - JOURNALISM LIBRARY**)

9. Kevin Hoffman (’01) had powerful piece on committed couples living with
AIDS when only one partner was infected (both gay and hetero)
(**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - LEHMAN LIBRARY**)

10. Olivia Barker (’98) had a wonderful piece on tension among Russians in
Brighton Beach.
(**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - LEHMAN LIBRARY**)

11. Chris Nuttall-Smith (’99), profile of released sex offender in New
Jersey, picked up and run as cover story in New York Magazine.
(**MS MASTER’S PROJECT - LEHMAN LIBRARY**)

-30-

[ Another in our “Notes From…” series - short notes by volunteers summarizing various events around the school, to help those of us who didn’t/couldn’t attend. Watch for several other “Notes From…” throughout the year. If you have one, send it in! Or let us know in advance that you’d like to do one; or after the event, too. ]

Below, notes from an all-class lecture by Prof. Paula Span about the art of feature writing. Many thanks to volunteer notes-taker Jennifer Redfearn, J2007. Feel free to drop her note or post a comment below (free, one-time registration required).

Notes From… Paula Span’s lecture: “The Long & Short of Feature Writing”
By Jennifer Redfearn
E-mail: jtr2113[at]columbia.edu

Paula Span is one of the best-known teachers of feature writing in the country and one of the most popular professors at the Columbia J-school, where she teaches Techniques of feature Writing, among other courses. A former NY correspondent for the Style section of the The Washington Post and staff writer for The Washington Post Magazine, she is now a contributing writer to the magazine. [See her bio.] On Friday, Sept. 1, she gave an all-class lecture for new M.S. and M.A. journalism students - and several professors - about the art of feature writing.

Listen to audio recording here:
http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/students/class_lectures.asp

General Thoughts on Feature Writing
1. Feature writing at its best is transporting. It takes you out of your own existence. Away from the breakfast table. Away from the car. Away from the subway. It takes you some place you can’t go yourself.
2. Feature writing is becoming evermore respected and important.
3. It wasn’t until 1979 that a Pulitzer was given for feature writing.
4. It is the future of print and an essential part of the skills that you need as a reporter.
5. We’ve become a more visual culture. We’ve been trained to want to see things not just hear about them through a mediator.

Function of Feature Writing
1. We still convey information, but it’s a different style of story telling.
2. It fills the gap between headlines and what else people want to know.
3. The writer takes the audience to the story.
4. It can be varying lengths and media.
5. Feature writing is less concerned with what happened but why it happened- what is smelled like, what it looked like, who it happened to, why it matters that it happened.
6. Sometimes it’s even about what you think about what happened. Shhh.

Trends of Feature Writing
1. Study results of 20 newspapers by Professor Michele Weldon of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University: In 2001 the percentage of hard news on the front page was 65 % of the entire content, and in 2004 the percentage of hard news stories on the cover dropped to 50%. In 2001, 35% of stories on the cover were features stories and in 2004 features made up 50% of the stories on the cover.
2. This trend is filtering out into the entire MSM. Not just a NYT phenomenon.
3. In most cases, news magazines survive because of analyzing and contextualizing stories.
4. People (readers/audience) want to be behind the scenes and experience things directly.
5. There will always be a need for straight news stories and investigative reporting but we should prepare for more feature stories.

What Counts as a Feature
1. Length doesn’t necessarily define a feature story.
2. They have scenes that tell you what is happening in a place on a particular day.
3. Profiles of people or spotlights of organizations and communities.
4. “Not stories that break but stories that creep,” said legendary editor Eugene Roberts, who was specifically talking about trend stories.
5. Issue, disputes, controversies can be presented in a feature style.
6. Essays are features if they are reported.
7. Memoirs are features if they are reported and factual.

What Distinguishes a Feature
1. Observational, descriptive, they take you there, cinematic, reporting with your senses.
2. Good feature writing borrows fictional techniques.
3. They have scenes like a play or novel.
4. They usually have characters with dialogue. The people in the story are not just talking to you but talking to each other in a way they would do if the reporter was not there.
5. They have action—not just talking heads like Ken Burns’ documentaries.
6. They incorporate narrative.
7. They are vivid and transporting.
8. They have narrative elements that move the story forward.
9. The intent remains journalistic even if the style is different (comic, stylistic)
10. The intent is still to convey information, maybe a different kind of information, but the journalistic values apply- balance, fairness, and accuracy.

Opportunities for Feature Writing at J-School
1. Feature Writing
2. Magazine Writing
3. Narrative Writing
4. Art of the Profile
5. Literary Journalism
6. Personal and Professional Style
7. Book Seminar
8. Science Narratives
9. TV & Radio documentary
10. Photo Curriculum
[Dean Sreenivasan adds: New Media Workshop;
Prof. Solway adds: Cultural Affairs Reporting & Writing]

Downside to Feature Revolution
1. If 50% of stories on front page are bad features then there is no gain for the feature revolution. In some ways, features have to justify themselves more than a straight news story.
2. There is the risk of embroidery. There is a temptation to insert details where they don’t exist. Don’t do it.
3. There is the risk of cliché. We all to work at ways to keep our writing fresh, simple and engaging.
4. Feature writing infiltrated by blogosphere voice.

-30-

Another in our “Notes From…” series - short notes by volunteers summarizing various events around the school, to help those of us who didn’t/couldn’t attend. Watch for several other “Notes From…” throughout the year (if you have one, send it in - or let us know in advance that you’d like to do one).

Below, highlights of the Sig Gissler’s talk about how to cover a beat. Many thanks to volunteer notes-takers Sheena Tahilramani and Irene Liu. Feel free to drop them a note or post a comment below (free, one-time registration required).

Notes From… Prof. Sig Gissler’s lecture: “How to Cover Your Beat”
By Sheena Tahilramani, J2007; e-mail: sat2127[at]columbia.edu
and Irene Liu, J2007; e-mail: ijl2105[at]columbia.edu

Listen to audio recording here:
http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/students/class_lectures.asp

[Introduction by Dean Sreenivasan]

It is my honor to introduce Sig Gissler, professor and administrator of the Pulitzer Prizes.

Sig Gissler is one of my favorite people at the J-school and one of this University’s treasures. You are all very lucky to have him as a professor - either in RWI or in sesssions like this. When I was a student here, we weren’t lucky enough to have Prof. Gissler on the faculty. But he has been a teacher and guide to me ever since his arrival here in 1994. I have picked
up tips on reporting, on editing and how to be a better professor - but I feel like I am always trying to catch up. He came to the school after a distinguished career as an editor in Milwaukee and brought with him decades of journalism experience - and a bucketful of midwestern, Scandinavian aphorisms. Those aphorisms and a unique teaching style that encourages you
all to “go there” have inspired generations of students and colleagues alike, resulting in his being named the school’s Teacher of the Year in 1998, and his winning Columbia’s highest teaching award in 2003.

[ Despite his folksiness, he has a geeky side. He was one of the first professors here to edit stories with the “tracking changes” in Word and he embraced digital photography, wireless networking and similar technologies long before most of the faculty, as has his wife, the wonderful Mary Gissler, who offers his students brownies and invaluable advice of her own.]

As administrator of the Pulitzers, he has been given stewardship of one of the journalism’s most imporant institutions and he has taken that to another level as well.

Everywhere in the world I go, his former students, friends and colleagues ask me to say hello to him and many of them say to me what I started my introduction with: You are lucky to have him.

Ladies and gents, Sig Gissler…

WHAT IS A BEAT:
It’s a topical or geographic area assigned to a reporter for regular coverage.
Examples of topical areas are education, politics and business. Examples of geographical areas are a city, county, neighborhood.

ATTRIBUTES OF A GOOD REPORTER:

• Works on the three fundamentals–sources, story ideas and execution plans (the “trifecta”)
• Works rigorously on three levels — short range, medium and long — juggling a mix of ideas
• Serves as a watchdog — accountability journalism
• Shows good organization
  - Organize your sources by affiliation
  - Get contact info: mobile, work, home numbers, email
  - Have these numbers so that if you have to, you can call late at night; you can say that you are “calling in the interest of accuracy.”
  - Cultivate sources
  - Keep a running list of story ideas, compiled by topic and subject.
• Stays in touch with editor (without being a pest) “Don’t interview the city desk, interview the city.”

“BEAT NOTES”
Make the best use of your time in August. This is an opportunity to put “hay in the barn” (if you are from the midwest), or “nuts in the nest.” Use this month to find sources, issues, story ideas.
Step 1: See what has already been written
Step 2: Make some initial contacts.

ATTRIBUTION:
All you know is what you’ve been told. Attribute everything, over attribute.

HOW TO APPROACH YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD:

• Attitude and appearance: Have a positive attitude, one of “joyful entitlement”. Build sources one at a time; don’t get bogged down by the enormity of the work. At the end of a meeting/interview, always ask for additional sources. Polite persistence. Don’t be needlessly confrontational. Be a sponge. We reflect the university and our profession so it’s important to maintain a professional appearance. Men should carry a tie wherever they go because you never know when you may be assigned to cover a funeral or other somber event.

• Good start: U.S. Census, “community district needs” handbooks (books created by the 59 community boards that identify “greatest needs” of each neighborhood. Take with a grain of salt, but a good starting resource. RW1 professors have copies), website for Department of City Planning.
  
• Libraries: Libraries provide back issues of community newspapers and other great sources that can be used to learn about this history. The histories of your neighborhoods are important to investigate. Look for defining moments in the history of your community…for example, the burning of the South Bronx. 
• Community Boards: 59 districts, largely advisory bodies. Try to talk to the district manager. However, don’t despair if you are rebuffed. The community board is not the golden fleece.
• Museums in boroughs
• Local historians: Residents who serve as informal historians to the area. Can give you a sense of the history, changes in the neighborhoods over time. The burrough presidents’ offices may be able to point you to them.
• Elected officials: Know the elected officials in your area… city council members, district attorney, congressmen/women, assemblymen/women, etc.
• Police: “Destined to be a murky relationship”. “America’s only fully-armed minority group.” Start at the precinct level. Talk to a community affairs officer or youth officer. Crime statistics by precincts will give you a sense of crime patterns. If referred to the Deputy Commissioner of Public Information, be persistent and you might get lucky. Cops really do like to talk.
  
• Firefighters: Firefighters can be a wonderful source. They’re considered heroes in NYC. They see a lot, they know a lot and they’re often gregarious characters. (if you are a freelancer, see
  http://www.nyc.gov/html/nypd/html/dcpi/presscred.html
• Mayor’s Management Report
• Churches, mosques, synagogues: “Havens in a heartless world.” Churches are a safe haven in the community. Be sure to talk to leaders and members. 
• Community Based Organizations: They are everywhere. Some have storefront offices, many are connected to umbrella groups.
• Schools: Try to meet the principal, PTA, Parent Coordinator (a staff liaison to parents), union reps, etc. Getting inside may be difficult due to “bunker” mentally, so you might have to report from the outside in. You might need a “passport” but you need to keep pushing.

• Hospitals: A good source on neighborhood health issues. Walk in and just wander around, better to beg forgiveness than ask for permission. 

• The Old: “Wallpaper of the human existence.” Senior citizens are the “eyes of the neighborhood.” They can provide you with a sense of history and context, they’ve witnessed the history of the community. They also have a lot of time. Can be found on the porch, in senior centers. 

• Shopping Areas: Show a good cross section of humanity and are good places to spot fashion trends among the young. Oftentimes, people are more willing to talk while shopping. 

• Community newspapers: Give a sense of what is going on it the community, issues, etc. Talk with editors and reporters; they can give you a sense of the problems and issues in the neighborhoods. An opportunity to pitch articles and get clips. 
• Parks: Look for places, like parks, where people slow down. People may be more willing to pause and talk to you. 
• Colleges: There are colleges all around the city. You may find story ideas. For example: welfare mothers trying to get an education to get out of their situations, innovative efforts to include minority kids in education.
• Sanitation workers: Rarely get interviewed, but are great sources, as are janitors, custodians, building superintendents. 
• Real estate offices: People in the real estate industry watch/are aware of trends in the area. 
• Bus depots: Drivers go up and down the street day after day, they know what’s going on. It is also a good place to catch cops coming home from work. 
• Coffee shops, bodegas and bars: Don’t forget the bars.

A LITTLE ABOUT TECHNIQUE:

• Review safety tips.
• Take a list of professors and phone numbers in case you get in a bind/trouble.
• Build up your comfort level and go with your gut.
• Don’t get complacent; it’s still a big city. The buddy system is a good option.
• Get a map.
• Don’t wait for phone calls…go there, go there and go there!
• Look up…look at the signs, second floors. We are constantly seeing things at eye level but, if you look around, there is so much more.
• Subway life is fascinating. A parallel of the world above. 
• Talk to strangers.
• Try the back door when stymied by a source. If you cannot talk to the principal, talk to the PTA.
• Get the Green Book: http://www.nyc.gov/html/dcas/html/features/greenbook.shtml
• Find the “mayor” of the neighborhood or the block. Every neighborhood has a self-appointed know-it-all.
• Think of creating your own “board of directors” made up of four or five people that are connected in the community, people you can go to get quick information.
• Establish “listening posts”; find your places to go and get info.
• Never burn a source. If you say you won’t include a quote, don’t include it. If you make a commitment, keep it.
• Nurture your sources; you can learn a lot from them. Show them your “published” story. This helps future Columbia students.
• Finally, learn to treasure the indomitable spirit of New York City.

Q&A:

• Q:Do you recommend tape recorders?
  A: Tape recorders can be useful, especially if a confrontational interview/story, but one of the problems is transcribing the tape. It is a tool and you should use it depending on the circumstances. 
• Q: How should we deal with translation?
  A: Maybe try to find a young person that can translate or help you communicate with a subject. Beyond that, you have to try to deal with it. 
• Q: Is there anyone that you we should not talk to on our beat?
  A: As a class or kind of person, everyone is fair game. 
• Q: What if you’re interviewing and the person becomes uncomfortable with a certain topic or wants to take something off the record?
  A: You can go on and off the record…people have a right to wall-off portions of the conversation that they don’t want published. 
• Q: How do you deal with a source that provides you with great information but wants to remain anonymous?
  You need to set some ground rules at the beginning of the interview. If you do this, the source knows that what he/she says is fair game. If you leave the situation very murky then it can be much more of a contentious situation. Clarity, clarity, clarity! 
• Q: Offering and accepting things from sources?
  In a professional setting, you don’t want to be accepting things from sources. But don’t worry about accepting a cup of coffee.

SOME GISSLERISMS:

• “Keep an open mind, but don’t let your brain fall out.” 
• “Taking information off the Internet is like taking food off the street. Be careful.” 
• “Sometimes you’re the windshield and sometimes you’re the bug.”
  

On Tuesday, Aug. 22, 2006, Martin Smith, a distinguished producer at Frontline on PBS, spoke to the class in a session moderated by Prof. June Cross.

You can listen to an audio recording:
http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/students/class_lectures.asp

Here is a report, by Doree Shafrir, J2006, of CJRDaily.org:
http://www.cjrdaily.org/behind_the_news/for_frontline_producer_katr.php

Excerpt:

His November 2005 report for Frontline on Hurricane Katrina was unlike anything he’s ever worked on, Smith told an audience of new students at Columbia’s Graduate School of Journalism Tuesday evening.

That film, The Storm, tells the story of the government’s missteps in the days leading up to and directly after Katrina. “I was affected more by Katrina than Iraq, by the vastness of the devastation,” he said.

The film’s unsparing scenes of mothers crying out for food for their children, looting, police brutality and other bits of mayhem in the days following the storm do indeed make for powerful television.

Read the entire report.

Another in our “Notes From…” series - short notes by volunteers summarizing various events around the school, to help those of us who didn’t/couldn’t attend. Watch for several other “Notes From…” throughout the year (if you have one, send it in - or let us know in advance that you’d like to do one).

Below, highlights of the opening day lecture by Deborah Amos, NPR foreign correspondent. Many thanks to volunteer notes-taker Allison Bourne-Vanneck, J2007. Feel free to drop her a note or post a comment below (free, one-time registration required).

Notes From… Deborah Amos Opening Day Lecture
By Allison Bourne-Vanneck, J2007
E-mail: apb2119[at]columbia.edu

LECTURE HALL, Aug. 21, 2006–More than 220 students, faculty and staff gathered for the J-school’s official opening day lecture on Monday morning. The speaker was Deborah Amos (see her bio), a star foreign correspondent for National Public Radio, who had just returned from an eight-week reporting trip to Lebanon, Jordan and Syria.

Dean Nicholas Lemann, who introduced her, said that for many people like him who are “chained to the ground” in New York, she was living their “fantasy life” - that of a foreign correspondent. He said, “It’s a strange but wonderful way to live and one of the most profound services a journalist can provide to the rest of the world.”

Speaking from prepared remarks, she gave a thoughtful, funny, inspirational talk and answered several questions from students.

You can listen to the entire talk at http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/students/class_lectures.asp.

Here are some of the highlights:

• It’s goals, not roles, that matter in journalism.
  Her goals:
  Be a good journalist; accurately report the news; get as close to reality as possible.

• On covering war:
  Cover a war in your career
  - It will teach you about humanity.
  - You will see the best and worst in people, including your colleagues.

  Don’t cover too many wars
  - Know when it’s time to go home.
  - War is an addictive beat that can dry you up and make you cynical if your not careful.

• On foreign reporting:
  - Learn a foreign language if you can.
  - You are dependent on translators, and you really can’t get it all
  - It’s tempting to rely on English speakers, but you are limiting yourself to a particular class of people.

• On being a war correspondent:
  - Immersion is key to understanding the country.
  - You can move up in your career covering a war.
  - Best way to break into covering a war is to pick yourself up and go there.

• On the Middle East:
  - It’s what happens to civilians that’s important.
  - We need to concentrate on what happens in those communities
  - Hezbollah was an outcome of the Israeli invasion in 1982, and there will be an outcome of this one again, perhaps people more radical than Hezbollah.

• On journalism school:
  If you learn only one thing, learn how to write a clear sentence.

• On breaking into the radio industry:
  - It’s difficult, but not impossible.
  - Local stations over the years have developed large news departments
  Certain stations, such as WNYC, WBUR, as well as those in Portland, Seattle, etc, are great places to work and from their newsrooms you can pitch stories to NPR.

She is now concertrating on covering Islam. She said, “I have come to believe there is no clash of civilizations; there is a clash within a civilization… After all this time it’s the thing that I take the most satisfaction in learning a little bit more about.”

-30-

Thanks to our AV and web staffs, audio recordings of two of our recent speakers are already online. How recent? How about Prof. Bruce Porter’s talk on writing a news story from THIS morning(!) and yesterday’s opening lecture by Deborah Amos, NPR foreign correspondent, just returned from a reporting trip in Syria.

I am listening to Prof. Porter’s advice right now…

You can catch these - as well as future recordings off the Student Resources page (look for “Recordings of Notable Class Lectures”) at http://www.jrn.columbia.edu/students/class_lectures.asp