STUDENT JOURNALISTS

CRITICAL OR MENACE?

“Journalism is printing what others don’t want printed. Everything else is public relations.”

George Orwell

Just in the headline I have already set up the straw man that appears to be so prevalent in thinking about student journalism. Yet in reality, nothing is either this or that. That is what students learn in the process of covering issues. When we teach students to think critically we create citizens that can be involved in a meaningful way in this wonderful experiment we call democracy. They can’t look at things simply, not if they want to concisely reflect facts. Conciseness requires a deep understanding as to what is relevant and what is extraneous.

Students all engage in journalism, they do it through projects, microblogs, blogs, and other social media. They do it by phone, by text, by email, and more widely on the internet. They do it with no training and no editorial guidance. They don’t know the impact of their words, nor do they know the importance of choice of words.

Having spent a couple decades supervising professional writers I know how important the approval and edit cycle is. This is what is missing now. Someone to ensure facts are checked and that the focus is correct is critical. Not everything is worth journalistic focus. COVID protocols are probably not worth an exposee unless not being enforced equally. School lunches probably deserve a look but the focus should be on why COVID has affected quality instead of culinary reviews.

Student journalism is many things, it is not, nor can it ever be lazy though. Work ethic, team work, deadline driven work, preparing multimedia presentation, critical thinking and so many other things are all learned in the process of working on journalism. There is nothing learned that will not improve the skills as a citizen. Student journalism meets the goals of everyone in developing our students. It belongs in ELA, Social Studies and CTE curriculum. Most importantly, it belongs in our student’s lives.