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J202 Fall 2012

Final Project

Final project packet

Week 11:

No updates. Just prep your slideshow according to the tips below.

Week 10:

Tip Sheet: Web

Sample audio slideshows for Individual Story slideshow (due in lecture, Week 11):

Don't forget to keep posting the URLs for your IS pieces to the appropriate Google Doc.

Week 9:

Don't forget to:

  • do the mandatory online training for this week (use the "overview and dealdines" link at the left to find what's required)
  • review the IS assignment sheet for specifics on any assignment due
  • go to the master Google doc for IS and Engagement URLs and enter the URL for each of your IS pieces (layout, audio, ASFs, etc.)
  • check the overview and deadlines page for next week and note that you have release time for Lab 2

 

Week 8:

IS Info for the Week

For your IS assignment this week, you turn in an interview story and a complete set of typed notes. Details on this are available in the assignment sheet. We also would like you to submit a typed, one-page outline of how your main text story is shaping up to this point. The outline should be brief and include:

  • specific angle your story will take
  • structure you expect
  • information in roughly the order you think makes sense
  • angles you plan for your audio story and audio slideshow

You are not locked into this outline permanently. It's merely a prompt for you to keep your thinking organized and a guide for your TA to help point out potential problems.

Week 7:

Tip Sheet: Choosing and Using Quotes

Alternative story forms info

This week your Individual Story assignment involves creating "alternative story forms." Please refer directly to the assignment sheet for full details. Remember that these ASFs must be sourced entirely from documents, not interviews.

Types

You may choose from:

  • Infographic: charts or graphics illustrating important points or data related to your topic – minimum of three graphics (e.g., statistics on campus crime)
  • Timeline: plot key dates or developments on a timeline, emphasizing growth or change of an issue over time – minimum of 10 entries (e.g., a timeline showing key legislative and legal actions in student privacy rights)
  • Map: plot locations of events related to your issue – minimum of 10 (e.g., map of all incidences of a particular crime in the campus area)
  • By-the-numbers: visual representation (not simply text) of essential or illuminating statistics – minimum of 10 (e.g., violent and non-violent crimes in the campus area by time or statistics of crime commission by time of day)
  • Storify: pull together tweets, images and Facebook posts related to your story – minimum of 20 entries with introductory and explanatory text (e.g., social media reaction to a crime in Madison over the weekend)

Any ASF in a different form will earn a zero.

Tools

Inspiration

Some resources that might be helpful:

Important integrity reminders

Please note that your work must be original. You can draw data from sources, but you cannot do things such as simply recreating a chart in a previously published piece or taking text verbatim from a published source. This is plagiarism and will result in a failing grade for your entire IS segment.

Don't forget the importance of attribution. Your audience needs to know where your information came from. For instance, if I were creating a chart on how Dane County residents voted in the presidential election by age, I might put a label beneath the chart, reading "Data Source: Dane County Clerk Voter Analysis Fact Sheet, November 2011."

Keep it within reason

Please remember that you are just beginning. Do not attempt things that are too complicated because you'll spend a lot of time on the technology. You are graded on substance, more than you are on style. Think first and foremost about the content you want to provide. Then find an interesting way to display it.

Midterm Stories

You have a packet to prepare for next week's midterm stories. Please read it before lecture Monday, so we can discuss. At least one quiz question will cover the packet.

Background materials for midterm stories (please note dates and all the caveats we've discussed with previously published material)

Week 6:

Week 5:

Individual Story assignment

  • All final story ideas must be posted to our shared Google doc by the start of lecture Monday (if you are refining or repitching, just overwrite your original)
  • Don't forget to list UW sources of interest and go back in to see replies from the handful of media relations people helping us out this semester

 

Other helpful items

Week 4:

Online training for the week

Remember to see the Overview & Deadlines calendar.

This week you have the first four segments of Web Building Blocks (30 minutes of video, so plan to spend about 45 minutes to an hour working on it).

You also have a required ethics module.

Trainings must always be completed by lecture Monday and are thus quiz-eligible.

Individual Story Assignment

I will return your IS story pitches in lecture Monday. You will have a note of:

  • "OK" (ready to get started on reporting)
  • "Revise" (see Mitchell or me to narrow or define your focus)
  • "Repitch" (see Mitchell or me with a brand new story idea)

We will announce walk-in hours for these meetings in lecture.

If you have to repitch and don't have ideas, I recommend a few specific steps:

  • read through our Google doc to get a feel for other people's stories (but remember you can't repeat any ideas)
  • check out press releases from UW-Madison, which highlight interesting people or issues that you might follow up on
  • check out the Journalism Reading Room guides on finding story ideas, posted on the video tutorials page
  • talk to other professors, TAs, coworkers and friends about interesting things they would suggest writing about

All final story ideas must be posted to our shared Google doc by the start of lecture in Week 5 (just replace your old pitch).

You'll also notice a column in the Google doc regarding sources within UW administration. If you'd like to talk with someone from the chancellor's office, Division of Student Life, etc., please enter that info no later than noon Wednesday, Sept. 26. University Communications has generously agreed to help speed the process for you. This doc will help all of us enormously.

Quizzes

Be sure to check the quiz section for the PDF and video keys for the first quiz to help you prep for the second.

Materials related to lecture Monday and lab assignments

Week 3:

Please note: You have the first of your mandatory online trainings this week, a very simple session on setting up a Dropbox account. Other trainings begin in earnest next week. They must be completed by the start of each lecture for the week.

All trainings are on the Video Tutorials page in the left navigation.

Story samples for lecture:

 

Story pitches for Assignment: Individual Story

Weekly Tip Sheet

Weekly quizzes

Sample J202 quizzes and quiz keys: These will help you study for our quizzes, which begin Monday.

Keys for group assignments

Please note: You have the first of your mandatory online trainings this week, a very simple session on setting up a Dropbox account. Other trainings begin in earnest next week. They must be completed by the start of each lecture for the week.

All trainings are on the Video Tutorials page in the left navigation.

Week 2

End of Lecture

Sorry for the nutty finish in lecture today. Here's a short video with what got left off.

Personal Engagement and Participation Sites

Enter information and a link to your site in our shared Google Doc.

Please remember you are encouraged to make this public, but that is not a requirement. If you choose to make it private, you must add Katy and your TA as users. Katy's WordPress login is kathleenculver and email is kbculver@wisc.edu.

 

Materials for lecture

Weekly Tip Sheet

Online Language Primer

Don't forget this is due by 5 p.m. Friday. You will complete three assessments in the NewsU Language Primer

  • this intro and refresher on language and grammar counts as a grade for you
  • it costs $12.95 (we killed a $50 textbook and replaced it with this ... so it's a deal!)
  • you can take just the assessments, but we strongly recommend doing the prep quizzes first
  • the assessment grades are averaged and count toward your 202 final grade in Segment A
  • deadline 5 p.m. Friday, Week 2

Weekly quizzes

Sample J202 quizzes and quiz keys: These will help you study for our quizzes, which begin in lecture, Week 3. Also remember the Grammar and Style Tip Sheet

Keys for group assignments

Week 1

Course Intro – Welcome

The J202 TAs and I would like to congratulate you on your admission to the J-School. You succeeded in getting into one of the toughest and best mass comm programs in the country. Now for the real work!

We'll do our best to guide you through all the challenges this course brings. You'll find yourself pedaling fast, but think of us on the back seat of the tandem, helping you climb when the hills feel insurmountable.

Tell Us About You

  • fill out the J202 student survey – This is not optional. It really helps us get to know you and make the class run smoothly. Complete by noon Wednesday, Sept. 5.

 

Course Materials

Google Docs

Link to upload your engagement and IS site URLs.

Administrative stuff

The work in 202 builds week upon week. We'll use this course site to post PDFs of items you'll continually need. Here's a good first set:

Grading stuff

These guides should help you better understand how you're graded and how you can improve on your next assignment. A copy will accompany each assignment sheet.

Quiz stuff

You will complete four assessments in the NewsU Language Primer

  • this intro and refresher on language and grammar counts as a grade for you
  • it costs $12.95 (we killed a $50 textbook and replaced it with this ... so it's a deal!)
  • you can take just the assessments, but we strongly recommend doing the prep quizzes first
  • the assessment grades are averaged and count toward your 202 final grade in Segment A
  • deadline 5 p.m. Friday, Week 2

Visit the Quizzes section of our J202 Learn@UW site for an extra practice quiz, if you'd like

Sample J202 quizzes and quiz keys

Tip sheet stuff

We provide tip sheets to help you in your writing.

Advice from past students

I often find past students' experiences help you succeed in your own J202 work. Sometimes it helps to know how people tackled the class. Here is how a set of students answered the question, "What is the one thing next semester's class should know coming into J202?"

 

Questions?

Always feel free to stop in my office (5146 Vilas) or email me when you don't understand something or you have a suggestion. If you come to my office, I usually have a pretty great selection of music going, fueled by cool 202er suggestions in the past. My favorite? Ben Folds. In fact, my kid and I are front and center with him at the :49 mark of this video, shot in Madison, and a bunch of past J202ers are at the :15 mark. Ben is kind of a 202 thing ...