2017-18 Author Handbook

Thank you for writing for ASDA!

In this handbook, you’ll find ASDA’s Editorial Policy, tips for writing a compelling article or

blog post and more.

Please contact your editor directly with any questions.

Edito

rial P

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ASDA Editorial PolicyThe publications staff has established an editorial policy to guide writers and staff editors and clarify ASDA’s editing process. Following are edito-rial policies pertaining to content for Contour:

ASDA editors review article submissions for accuracy, completeness and objectiveness. News articles must be factually accurate and balanced and should not include opinions unless attributed to sources. ASDA pub-lications staff may add and/or cut material from articles as needed.

ASDA publications staff will edit submissions for length, overall content, clarity and style without the express permission of the writers. The publi-cations staff maintains the writer’s opinion within the submission as best as possible. No publications will be delayed for writers to submit late pieces or review edited work.

For some articles, writers may interview sources for information or opin-ion to be included in articles, or writers may interview sources for Q&A articles. Quoted material may not be edited for content or word choice unless noted by brackets. Quoted material may be edited for grammar and punctuation.

Please note: ASDA uses a staff of writing professionals as well as a free-lance journalism professor to ensure the quality and accuracy of publica-tion content. While we try to preserve the student “voice” when possible, ASDA publications are meant to be objective and informational. If an author injects his or her opinion into a piece, uses platitudes to illustrate a point or adds unnecessary length to the story, these will be edited out. It is the editor’s role to communicate this policy and any edits to an author.

Photo Policy: ASDA prefers to publish student photos but will also pur-chase stock photography when necessary. Any photos submitted or pur-chased for publication in Contour or on Mouthing Off must display proper use of personal protective equipment (PPE). This means that individuals pictured in a clinical setting must be wearing gloves, a mask (not pulled down) and eyewear. Use of any photo that does not depict proper PPE will be determined by the editor-in-chief on a case-by-case basis.

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Writing Guidelines Be accurateCheck facts and statistics before including them in your article. The credibility of ASDA publications depends on it.

Be timelyInclude timely material in your article. Remember, it will be printed several months after you turn it in. Any source that is more than five year old loses credibility with your reader.

Summarize important points in your lead paragraphIf you don’t capture the reader’s interest in the opening sentences, he or she is not likely to read the rest of your article. Check out the “leads” in the front-page stories of your local newspaper for examples. Here are two ways to reel them in:

• Hard lead — immediately tells the reader the point of the story: who, what, where, when, why, how

• Soft lead — uses a quote, anecdote or other literary device to attract the reader first, then provides essential details

Avoid editorializingSeparating the news from editorial opinion is important. Factual accounts are presented in news articles; opinions appear in editorials/columns and are so labeled.

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Journalism 101Writing an Article Using the Inverted PyramidWith the inverted pyramid, information in an article is arranged from most important to least important. It saves readers time (and editors space).

The Most Important StuffLead with the who, what, when, where

and how of the article.

The SupportUse the body to present facts and further information, most of which is necessary,

revealed in order of importance.

The FluffDetails of little

importance.

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Citing & Attributing SourcesAttributing the sources of your information is an essential part of journalism. It greatly increases the quality and reliability of your article up front and shows the reader that you conducted the proper research. Please cite your sources within the article rather than as a separate reference section (see examples below) and keep in mind the following:

• Consider the age of studies or resources. Say a recent study finds that 75 percent of recent dental grads are more than $200,000 in debt. Before you report this, be sure to answer a few questions: how many people were surveyed? What does “recent” mean? What kind of debt? Seventy-five percent doesn’t mean much if only 150 people were surveyed.

• Although you do not need to provide all the technical information you may have given in a works cited (volume and issue number, for example), you should provide enough to validate the source. How do you know? If you type the information into Google, you should be able to track down the source with what’s given in an in-text citation.

• If you’re citing a source in a blog post, you can include slightly less information and link the in-text citation. Example: According to a 2017 article from ADA News, “people love the dentist.”

Examples of citing print, surveys, studies: • According to the July 10, 2010 issue of The New York Times, Dr.

Levine won the lawsuit filed against him by GO SMiLE.• According to a January 2011 survey by the American Association

of Endodontists, 70 percent of Americans want to avoid losing their natural teeth.

Examples of citing people, online sources, video:• “I love working with the Editorial Board,” said Kim Kelly, ASDA’s

senior manager of publications.• Joel Smith, vice president of marketing at SmileTrain, posted the

following to the organization’s blog on Feb. 11, 2014, “We’ve begun expanding the rollout of messages to everyone in the organization. This will happen gradually over the next few weeks.”

• As Dorothy Gale said in “The Wizard of Oz,” “There’s no place like home.”

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Interviewing 101• Determine your goal. Your interview should achieve one of three things:

to obtain the subject’s knowledge, to obtain the subject’s opinion, to feature the subject in a profile article.

• Draft a list of questions. Research the subject so that you can create well-planned questions. Ask open-ended questions and never feed the subject an answer while asking your question.

• Be prepared. Bring a pen and paper to take notes even if you’re recording the interview. If technology fails, you’ll still have thorough interview notes.

• Stay neutral. Try not to introduce your own bias into an interview. Don’t appear to be persuaded by the subject’s opinions or directly criticize what they are saying.

• Don’t interrupt and don’t talk about yourself and your opinion. On occassion the subject will ask, and that’s ok.

• Strike a balance between questions and conversation. Small talk before or after an interview is polite and may expose information that wasn’t covered in your questions. Just keep your opinion out of the actual interview.

• Ask if there are any questions the subject would like to be asked.

• Get it right. Ask the subject to spell their name, repeat something you missed and verify information. Make sure you get the facts straight while you have the subject on the phone.

• Take notes on everything the subject says, how they look, gestures

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and expressions they make and where the interview is taking place. If the interview is over the phone, you can still record their location and what the background sounds like.

• Read your notes immediately following the interview. If you’ve recorded the interview, this is when you should transcribe the recording. Add anything that wasn’t written down the first time and also add your thoughts on certain quotes or ideas sparked by reading them.

• Put your notes down for a couple days. Don’t wait too long to write the article, but just long enough for the information to sink in. Consider researching your topic during these days.

• After 2-3 days, pick up your notes and read through them. Highlight anything that stands out. Here’s what you should look for: - Good quotes to use in the article - Reoccurring themes - Large issues/topics relevant to your story

• Repeat steps 1-4 for each interview you conduct. Once you have all your notes collected, group quotes and ideas highlighted from each interview by like topics. This will help you organize your article.

• Begin writing. Start with the who, what, where, why and why now. Then introduce the main topics you developed in your interviews. Supply your own research with quotes from the interviews you conducted and weave the story together. Make sure to add the details you captured in your notes: atmosphere of the interview, the subject’s mood and demeanor, mannerisms or gestures made during the interview, etc.

Creating Interview Questions• Determine your goal. Your interview should achieve one of three things:

to obtain the subject’s knowledge; to obtain the subject’s opinion; to feature the subject in a profile piece.

• Research. Google your subject and take notes on their career and their education. Bring these to the interview. This shows your subject that you’ve prepared and it also saves you time in the interview.

• Ask open-ended questions to get the subject talking. An open-ended question usually begins with “why,” “how,” or “tell me about.” Sometimes they aren’t technically a question but elicit a response (e.g. “tell me about your involvement in organized dentistry.”)

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• Avoid leading questions. Leading questions are prompts for a respondent to answer in a particular way. Examples include “How did you like the event?” This question leads the subject to say they enjoyed it when they haven’t told you that information yet. A better approach would be “Tell me about the event.”

• Ask one question per question. Don’t ask a long question that actually asks three things at once. This will only leave the subject guessing as to where to start. When you draft your question, be sure that each one only covers one thought. Also draft follow-up questions so that the topics are covered completely.

• Anticipate. The number one goal of journalism is to keep your reader reading. Ask yourself what your reader would want to know about the topic and then ask those questions of your subject. This is also a good way to structure your article (always ask why? or what next?).

• Listen. Interviewers sometimes make the mistake of thinking of their next question as the subject is answering the previous question. Engage yourself in the conversation and ask unplanned questions in response to information the subject just shared with you.

• Include ASDA. Always ask about ASDA. Whether or not the subject is a dental student, it’s good to tie things back to the association. If they are a dentist, ask if they were an ASDA member. If they’re slightly outside of dentistry, ask if they’ve ever heard of ASDA. You don’t have to include whatever answer you get, but it’s good information to have.

• Practice. Ask the questions out loud to yourself or a friend before you conduct the interview. If any of the questions are leading, yes-or-no, or too complex, you should catch it while reading them aloud.

• Follow up. Get a phone number from the subject and let them know that you may call if you need to verify any information. People are usually receptive to follow-up because they want their quotes to be accurate. Collect all of your information and follow-up in one call. You don’t want to annoy the subject with too many follow-ups.

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• Get passionate. Have it boiling in your guts. Then sit down to write.

• Write a hard news lead. Example: “The Budget Control Act of 2011 eliminates deductibility of student loans, averaging about $X,000 per student.”

• State your position. In the first or second paragraph, state your thesis in 1-2 sentences.

• Make your case. Construct a logical argument for 2-3 paragraphs.

• State what critics say about the issue. To be fair and credible, you have to clearly state the opposition’s viewpoint.

• Explain why their position doesn’t make sense. Use logic, not emotion.

You have to be passionate about your topic before you begin.

Start with a hard news lead. Remember to answer “why this now?”

Give your side of the story. What’s your view on the issue?

Build your case. Provide supporting evidence and quotes.

State the opposing point of view.

Debunk the opposing point of view!

Finish with a call to action. What should your reader do now?

HOW TO WRITE A STUDENT

PERSPECTIVE

- Tips for ASDA’s Editorial Board from David Weissman -

• Present a course of action. What should we as readers do about it? Make this a clear and compelling solution.

• Write an informed opinion. Use examples and hard data to present your viewpoint. Also draw upon expertise. Emotional reactions without logical support will not hold up.

• Include at least one “point of enlightenment.” This is one fresh and original observation that hasn’t been presented before to this argument.

• No !’s please. Let your word choice depict your passion for the topic, not your punctuation.

Writing a Student Perspective

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Top 10 Writing Tips 1. Know your article’s point before starting to write.

2. Make the lead paragraph pull the reader in with the five W’s.

3. Limit sentence length to 10-15 words. If you can’t read a sentence aloud without taking a breath, it’s too long.

4. S-V-O: Subject-Verb-Object. Don’t delay meaning.

5. Use strong verbs and avoid empty words like “very.” There’s a word to describe “very happy.”

6. Don’t use jargon or fancy words. Make it easy for the reader to under-stand.

7. Get quotes from relevant stakeholders (students, faculty, industry, etc.). They add substance to any article.

8. Be balanced. If you cover one side of an issue, always mention the other side’s argument.

9. Know your audience, but don’t assume they know all the “insider” terms that you may know.

10. Readers respond well to lists (and photos) so use them!