Archive for December, 2008

Merry Christmas, everyone!

December 21st, 2008 by Jack

All done with the enterprise stories, so this is my last post of the year.  A couple more congratulations are in order…

Maya Pope-Chappell had a News Service package on a Brooklyn youth marching band.  Maya was also a winner in Chuck Schumer’s inauguration ticket lottery.  Say “hi” to Mr. Obama!

Igor Kossov had a story and slideshow on rezoning in Brighton Beach published in City Limits.

Have a good vacation.  See you in the spring!

More credit where credit is due

December 15th, 2008 by Jack

We have a bunch of stuff getting in under the wire as the semester comes to a close…

Nicole Turso wrote about a Balloonatic in the Queens Courier.

Karina Ioffee also had a byline in the QC about a Sari maker.

Collin Orcutt and Michael Preston are still on the case of the newest Villanova Wildcat.

On the New York City News Service, Nicholas Martinez and Brian Winkowski produced a video on the battle to save Admirals’ Row.

Geneva Sands-Sadowitz took on the dirty topic of urban composting.

Last but not least, Kate Nocera provides a great Christmas laugh.  (See where a little self-promotion gets ya, Kate?)

Hey online media folk, think big!

December 11th, 2008 by Jack

You can now win a Pulitzer.

More (sports) bylines

December 8th, 2008 by Jack

Better late than never, congratulations to Kristen Joy Watts for a Law Times story on Toronto’s Fatboys in the New York City Marathon.

Michael Preston and Collin Orcutt also produced a video on high school baller Dominic Cheek.

Last but not least, Hoops Orcutt continues to stand by his Lakers prediction in his latest entry on the Men’s Fitness blog.

(Almost forgot, the teacher joined in the fun too!)

First take on the research quiz

December 7th, 2008 by Jack

I’ve now done my first run through and determined that Steve’s class attempted answers on an average of 15 questions while Tim’s crew averaged 13.41.  I’ll base the individual grades in each class on those separate averages, rather than on 20 questions.

Although I didn’t intend any trick questions, it appears that question 16 about the Barack Obama headlines turned out to be the trickiest.  I didn’t submit this query so that you could show me you know how to navigate Obama’s web site, which several of you did and came up with headlines other than the ones I sought.  The question was meant for you to show me you understand the value of the Wayback Machine (world’s greatest copyright violation) and how to use it.  Congrats to those who did.

Kudos also to Robert Voris, the only student to get full credit on question 18 about Nexis search formulation.  Actually, I was most disappointed by the lack of answers to this question.  Very few even made an attempt.  That may be in part because it was one of the last questions, but since many of you skipped over it to answer question 20 correctly, it basically tells me you aren’t using Nexis very often or very effectively.  I plan to hammer on this point in Craft II.

Lastly, my greatest level of frustration came on questions 7 and 11.  Several of you obviously knew the correct sites to use, went to them and copied some of the information, and then didn’t answer the part of my question asking for the date.  Ugh.  Come on, my peeps!

I’m aiming to return the graded quizzes Tuesday or Wednesday.

Another good example

December 4th, 2008 by Jack

This is a little late for Tim’s class, but Steve’s class in particular may want to take a look.  AM New York had another good research-inspired enterprise story on Tuesday.  Cover story on page 3.

Notes from this morning…

December 2nd, 2008 by Jack

First off, thanks again for a fine semester.  I know we’ll all be in touch via e-mail for at least a while longer, but except for possibly a few of you next semester, we won’t be sharing class time together.  It’s been a pleasure.  (And yes, the blog will stay up!)

Regarding the quiz, don’t expect to get it back as quickly as I’ve turned around the research-inspired stories (in Tim’s class) thus far.  Those I could grade as I went and send each one back immediately.  In this case, since few or none of you completed all 20 quiz questions in the allotted time, I’ll review them all first and probably grade on a bit of a relative basis (curve?) before returning them.  In other words, the ones with the most correct answers will get the best grades.  The “5 points per question” deal is likely out the window.  It’s a learning process for me to figure out the appropriate number of questions for a given time frame.  I have a feeling my next attempt will be 15 in an hour, which I considered for this go round.

Lastly, for those in Tim’s class wondering about the Barry McCaffrey story I mentioned this morning, here it is.  Not research related, but definitely of interest to any journalism student.

Social networking as a reporting tool: part 2

December 1st, 2008 by Jack

Remember the social networking readings I posted way back when?

Here’s another recent story, involving one of my employers.