Quill & Scroll Fall 2013

1 quill & scroll • fall 2013

Quill & ScrollF a l l 2 0 1 3

7 blog tips

technology tools for staffs

get certif ied

copyediting path

fundraising totravel


High

School Journalists

Editor and Business Manager Vanessa Shelton

Executive Director, Quill and Scroll Society

Assistant Editor L.C. Graf

Junior, University of Iowa

Contributing Editors Julie E. Dodd

Professor, College of Journalism and Mass Communication

The University of Florida, Gainesville Bruce E. Konkle

Professor, College of Journalism University of South Carolina, Columbia

Book Editor Barbara Bealor Hines

Professor, Mass Communication and Media Studies, Howard University,

Washington, D.C.

“Effective composition ... from the expression to the hair in her hand” is what the judge said about this photo by Kristin Taylor of Granite Bay High School, Granite Bay, Calif. The photo, from a series covering the “Shaving for Cancer Cause” event, was selected as the News Feature Photo Sweepstakes Award winner in the 2013 Quill and Scroll International Writing and Photo Contest. Postmark deadline for the 2014 International Writing and Photo Contest, sponsored by ASNE’s Youth Journalism Initiative and Viacom, is Feb. 5. New divisions - Photo Slideshow and Multimedia Features - have been added. Kristin Taylor’s photo and other winners of the 2013 Writing and Photo Contest are included in a PowerPoint presentation

with judges’ comments, available on CD from Quill and Scroll. Visit our website www.quillandscroll.org to learn more.

Quill & ScrollVolume 88 • Issue 1

Magazine of Quill and Scroll International Honor Society for High School Journalists

the cover

3quill & scroll • fall 2013

in this issue5. Tips on blogs and potential publication by Judy L. Robinson and Julie E. Dodd

6. Grad projects yield instructional aides by Candace Perkins Bowen

7. A copy editor’s path by Emily Burker

8. Information technology tools for media staffs by Mike Simons

10. Steps to JEA certification by Kim Green

11. SPLC book updated by Frank D. LoMonte

13. QS alumnus looks back by Heather Chastain

14. Fundraiser nets travel fees by Jenna Duvall

16. Book Reviews by Barbara Bealor Hines

20. Passion for writing blossomed on red-dirt farm by Lisa L. Rollins

21. NSPA welcomes new director Diana Mitsu Klos

22. Quill and Scroll News Media Evaluation ratings 2013

23. 2013 Quill and Scroll scholarship winners


2014 QUILL AND SCROLLINTERNATIONAL WRITING AND PHOTO CONTEST, AND BLOGGING COMPETITION

POSTMARK DEADLINE, FEB. 5, 2014High school students, including Quill and Scroll members and non-members, are invited to enter the 2014 International Writing and Photo Contest and Blogging Competition, sponsored by the American Society of News Editors Youth Journalism Initiative. Work appearing online or in print is acceptable if published between Feb. 1, 2013, and Feb. 1, 2014. Entrants must have been an enrolled high school student at the time of publication. New awards this year, sponsored by Viacom, will recognize excellence in multimedia production – features, and photo slideshows. Other awards categories include writing (features, opinion, editorials, in-depth, reviews and sports), editorial cartoons, photo illustrations, infographics and photography published in newspapers, newsmagazines and on-line. Writing and photo Sweepstakes Award winners receive a plaque. Blogging competition winners receive digital badges and cer-tificates. All individual winners receive a Quill and Scroll National Award Gold Key and, as seniors, they are eligible to apply for one of the scholarships offered by Quill and Scroll. For more information on the contests and entry materials, visit quillandscroll.org/contests/writing-photo-contest. For instructional information on scholastic journalism blogging, visit Quill and Scroll Resources http://quillandscroll.org/research-and-resources features.

MIDDLE/JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL WRITING AND PHOTO CONTESTMiddle and junior high school students are invited to enter the Quill and Scroll 2014 International Writing and Photo Contest for Middle/Junior High School. Sweepstakes and National awards are presented in each of the three divisions – feature and opinion writing, and photography. Entries must have been published in a school or professional newspaper, newsmagazine or online between Feb. 1, 2013 and Feb. 1, 2014, and must have been the work of a middle or junior high school student in grades 5 through 9 at the time of publication. For more information and entry materials, visit http://quillandscroll.org/middle-junior-high-school-writing-and-photo-contest. Entries must be postmarked no later than Feb. 5, 2014.


Tips on blogs and potential publication

By JUDY L. ROBINSON, JULIE E. DODD,

Digital Journalism Educator University of Florida Journalism Professor

Now is the time to begin a blog – or improve your current blog — so you can participate in the 2014 Quill and Scroll Blogging Com-petition. The deadline is Feb. 5, 2014, and you must submit the URL for a blog with at least three blog posts.

Writing a blog post can be similar to writing a newspaper column but the post is part of the whole blog. You provide your perspec-tive and write in first person. You write in a style that will appeal to a wide range of readers – not just your friends who would read your blog. Don’t use inside jokes or comments. But a blog post is not just a newspaper column that is posted online.

Let us offer some advice to help you make your blog posts more effective – for your readers and for the competition.

Include external linksOne way a blog is different from a column is that it can connect

your readers to background information and additional resources through hyperlinks. You should strive to include at least one relevant link in each of your blog posts. A good way to link is to use a specific word or phrase that describes and identifies the link. For example, you could be writing about making holiday donations to a local food bank. The hyperlink should be the name of the food bank and not “click here.”Include visuals

Even though many blogs are predominantly text, most blogs are not just text. Most blogs include at least one photo. Photos can really add to the visual appeal of your blog. Some blogging platforms, such as WordPress and Tumblr, are designed to make including photos very easy. Unlike newspapers and yearbooks where writers and pho-tographers/videographers are different members of the media staff, bloggers usually are their own photographers. As you plan a blog post, consider what photos you could take to enhance the visual ap-peal of the post.Tag and identify your photos

In a blogging platform like WordPress, you have the ability to pro-

vide information about each photo. You can include a title, a caption, alternative text, and a photo description. Each of those descriptors enables search engines to find your photo and it follows, your blog. Be sure to include helpful information in each of those boxes.Include multimedia

With most blogs, you have the potential to incorporate multime-dia, such as audio, a slideshow or video. Depending on your server and blogging platform, you may have restrictions on file size or type. For example, in some cases, you may be linking to a YouTube video you’ve created instead of uploading the video to your server. Beware of copyright issues

Just because you can download an image from a website doesn’t mean you can use that image on your blog. Most images (photos, graphics, etc.) are protected by copyright. Read the “Terms of Use” explanation that is a link at the bottom of most company websites. Even websites like Flickr that provide sharing options have many restrictions. Often it’s best to provide a link to the image you want to include in your blog – or just take your own photos.Write headlines with SEO potentialBecause blogs are online, you have the potential to attract a much wider audience than those who would be turning the pages of the school newspaper or yearbook. You do that by writing a headline with search engine optimization (SEO). That means you write the headline of each post to include terms that people would be using in a Google search if they were interested in your blog post topic. Use categories and tags

Categories and tags are other ways to help people find your blog posts. Categories are words/phrases you set up that you think you’ll often be writing about. Tags are words/phrases that you use with a particular blog post.

For more information about creating your blog, see some of our previous articles that are posted on the Quill and Scroll website:

http://quillandscroll.org/research-and-resources


Journalism teachers and media advisers are always willing to give. Whether it’s offer-ing access to a newly developed series of AP style quizzes or sharing a room at a conven-tion, they want to help others in need.

So it should be no surprise what kinds of projects students in the Kent State Univer-sity/Center for Scholastic Journalism online master’s degree program create. Many are online and accessible to others. In fact, they were created with other teachers in mind.

These projects are what most in the program choose instead of a thesis and, as the handbook states: “Professional projects are meant to provide a means for students to demonstrate the application of knowl-edge and skills learned through study in the School of Journalism and Mass Communica-tion graduate program. Professional projects are flexible and should be designed to help the student now or in the future.”

The program, which started with one student in one class in Fall 2007, has grown to more than 50 degree students and an ever-changing handful of guests who take up to 6 credit hours of courses that interest them.

The first to get her master’s degree in Fall 2011 was Marina Hendricks, a former teen-page editor and reporter from West Virginia. She then worked for the Newspaper Asso-ciation of America and NAA Foundation in various capacities, but particularly said she enjoyed activities dealing with youth content, in school media and elsewhere.

Her project, the “Social Media Toolbox” website, includes lesson plans and related re-sources to help student journalists and their advisers get started with social media, or re-fine what they already are doing with these 21st-century technologies.

“Toolbox lessons also encourage student journalists to examine legal and ethical con-siderations related to social media,” Hen-dricks said, “and to plan outreach activities for their school communities around issues

such as cyberbullying and responsible use of social media.”

Her project won the 2012 Innovative Outreach to Scholastic Journalism Award from the college educators’ group, Associa-tion for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication. Hendricks, who continued to update her blog on the site long after she successfully defended her project and earned her master’s degree, admits she hasn’t done much to it lately: She is now a doctoral stu-dent in journalism at the University of Mis-souri and still interested in youth media.

Another project with lots of online les-son plans belongs to Maggie Cogar, who’s currently a doctoral student in the Kent State College of Communication and Information.

“My site on Teaching Media Ethics would be valuable to advisers because of the variety of lesson plans and activities that are available for them to use, copyright-free,” Cogar, a for-mer high school journalism teacher, said.

Cogar’s research outlines why it is impor-tant to teach ethics to high school journalists, and her project delivers to advisers the tools they need to do just that.

“My hope in creating the site was to dis-tribute the site to as many high school advis-ers as possible so they could take what I have done, tweak it as needed for their classroom setting and their students, and use it to teach media ethics to those students who need it most — the student staff members who pub-lish news,” she said.

Challenges in their student media was the impetus for two of the program’s graduates. Lisa Bowen, a northeast Ohio adviser, was forced for financial reasons to put her stu-dents’ publication online. Her website rep-resents what she learned about that process.

“It was originally meant to give students and advisers a one-stop site for instructions on how to begin an online paper. But tech-nology is ever-changing, and, what may have been innovative a year ago, may be passé to-

day,” Bowen said. “To me, the most beneficial aspect of the project has to do with the ethical considerations that should be made regard-ing online journalism — things we would have never considered in print versions are now necessary for online news.”

Finances were also the concern of An-drew Christopulos, a Flushing, N.Y., teacher. “While the focus of scholastic journalism includes the importance of accuracy, objec-tivity, and exercising our First Amendment rights, the bottom line is programs cannot survive without money,” Christopulos said.

To assist advisers and students in find-ing a wide variety of ways to deal with bud-get cuts, he created the “Surviving the cuts” website to serve as a guide to help programs survive during difficult economic times.

Another challenge for journalism teach-ers can be having coursework that meets state requirements. Terri Hall, Utah adviser, used her professional project as a chance to explore what an Introduction to Journalism course should have and then chaired a com-mittee of four teachers from her state to de-velop that, complete with cross references to state standards, a syllabus, lesson plans, even mock-ups of handouts, all available on the Utah State Office of Education site.

“The site is particularly beneficial to Utah journalism teachers, but it works for others as well because it has an outline for curriculum and suggested lessons and activities. This site is a great resource for veteran journalism ad-visers as well as brand new advisers just get-ting started,” Hall said.

Other projects have included a manual for beginning sports broadcasters, an updat-ed Teaching Broadcast Journalism for the on-line master’s program, even a possible course for those advising a hybrid – online and print – publication. In each situation, they repre-sent a way to not only earn a master’s degree but also to give back to others who are in a similar teaching/advising situation.

Grad projects yieldinstructional aides

By CANDACE PERKINS BOWENExecutive DirectorCenter for Scholastic Journalism


A copy editor’s pathBy EMILY BURKERTest Development Editorial Associate at ACT, Inc.

There are people who instinctively know what they want to do professionally from a very early age. I have yet to meet any of them. There’s a reason counselors and men-tors repeat the sage advice to “find a career path.” If you’ve ever been on a bike path, you know that it can be winding. And long. Sometimes you get turned around and have to meander back to the street to figure out if you’ve gone too far or not far enough. Maybe you overshot the Dairy Queen by a mile, and have to turn back. Career paths are made up of choices, opportunities, and moments of awareness when you think, “I really enjoy doing this.”

I loved my high school creative writing teacher, so joining her literary magazine staff did not take much convincing. Of all the steps involved in creating that magazine, proofreading and copyediting the submis-sions were my favorite. I frequently stayed late and took home folders bulging with short stories and poems to search for errors in grammar and usage; becoming editor of the magazine felt like a natural fit. That po-sition inspired me to try out for the school newspaper, a role in which I pitched ideas and submitted articles, stayed late to fix lay-outs, and volunteered for abandoned tasks. Senior year I became the newspaper editor, enabling me to launch a new section, man-age staff writers, and – best of all – copyedit.

My high school interests drew me to Iowa City, which is recognized as a UNESCO City of Literature. However, two years into my English major at the University of Iowa, I was at a loss as to what I would do after graduation. I had buried myself so deeply in my courses that the professional world felt like a separate universe. Junior year is the Year of the Internship, and I needed to land one. Pronto. Looking around my infinitesi-mal bedroom for inspiration, all I saw were books. Surely, it was a sign.

I must have contacted every book pub-lisher in the Chicago area, where I grew up.

And then contacted them again. And again. It’s entirely possible that my phone number was blocked by a handful of them. It didn’t matter. I was going to have an internship in publishing. Besides, the worst they could say was “no.”

Finally, a response! I spent hours pre-paring to meet with the head of marketing at Academy Chicago Publishers. Although marketing wasn’t my end goal, I knew I could gain invaluable experience in a publishing environment. That summer I spent hours commuting to and from my internship and worked a part-time job to cover train fare. As a marketing intern I contacted authors and bookstores, scheduled author appearances, pitched titles, and replied to manuscript sub-missions. I loved it all, but was itching for editorial work. When a batch of book gal-leys arrived one afternoon, I knew it was my opportunity to show what I could do. That week I spent lunch hours flagging errors in spelling, grammar, layout, and typography. From that point on I was responsible for proofreading the galleys.

After Academy Chicago Publishers, I checked “internship” off of my “To Do” list. When a professor mentioned a year-long honors internship at the University of Iowa Press, I was hesitant to apply. The in-ternship was competitive, would have to be completed in conjunction with my classes, and included an application process that required a panel interview and a copyedit-ing test. When I called my parents for ad-vice, they said what they always do: “Go for it! The worst they can say is ‘no.’” I went for the internship; being selected was one of the most exciting moments of my life.

At the University of Iowa Press I was exposed to all aspects of book publishing, including proofreading cover and catalog copy, preparing and editing indexes, evalu-ating book proposals and manuscripts, and launching a new title. Staff there were in-credible, supportive professionals who in-

spired me and presented every assignment as a learning opportunity.

Now, as a copy editor at ACT, my average day is an amalgamation of tasks learned in high school, college, and my internships. I fol-lowed my interests and instincts; each experi-ence provided the tools and resources I need-ed to progress. I now know if I ever feel aimless or uncertain, I can always find the street again to reorient myself and continue on my path.

10 COPYEDITING TIPS Consider your audience

Don’t make unneces-sary changes

Make multiple passes (if time permits)

Utilize a style manual and create style sheets

Check spelling AND usage

Be consistent

Know when (and when not) to query

Fact-check names, dates, quotes, etc.

Don’t introduce errors

Learn from your mis-takes

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Information Technology Tools for Media Staffs

Media staffs and advisers often face challenges in communication and organization. Several apps can ease those frustrations, however, and serve as powerful productivity tools in (and out of) today’s journalism classrooms. Here’s a look at three used by West High School’s Skjöld yearbook staff in Painted Post, N.Y.

There are a wide range of opinions on whether or not media advisers should use SMS text mes-saging with their editors and staff, with some school and district administrators going so far as to establish guidelines governing acceptable use or restricting all use outright. Regardless, student edi-tors and staff – sans adviser – can still make use of GroupMe, a web- and phone-based group mes-saging application.

Imagine a staff member contacting 10 classmates via text. They have a mix of Droid and iPhone devices, and the sender asks her 10 classmates, “Who can photograph tonight’s basketball game,” or “Who can bring the drinks for the work night tomorrow?” She gets five separate “I can!” responses for the basketball game, and another four “I can!” answers for the work night, and the students re-sponding can’t see each other’s responses. Suddenly, our basketball game is overstaffed, and we have plenty to drink but nothing to eat at work night.

GroupMe solves all of this. After a quick registration (email, phone number, and password), a user can create a group by enrolling other users from their contacts list or by directly adding their name and number. The group is assigned a phone number and broadcasts an initial enrollment message to all new group members. Users store the group’s number as a new contact or download the GroupMe app on their smartphone from Google Play or the iTunes store, and the group is ready to begin. Any member can send a message to the GroupMe number, and all other members see the post and its author’s name. Subsequent responses are broadcast to the entire group, as well, annotated with their authors’ names.

As an adviser, one tremendous asset is that all of the GroupMe discussions are archived online. Should any concerns arise, I have access to our message history to share with administrators and/or parents. Other built-in tools include the ability to attach photographs, share location, and make conference calls including all members. The Web interface is intuitive and easy to use, and users can text or use the app on their smartphone. Text messaging rates/plans do apply, and the app makes use of Wi-Fi or 3G+ data.

More on the messaging service at http://www.GroupMe.com

1GroupMe:

By MIKE SIMONSSecond VP for ConventionsCSPAA


Where collaboration is key, Google Drive (formerly Google Docs) excels. A variety of docu-ment types pay dividends in our staff ’s work on Skjöld:

Forms: These documents allow queries and responses using seven different question types and store the responses in spreadsheets. Yearbook students at West use them for surveys as they develop coverage, and our editors and I use them for intrastaff data collection and applications during recruitment season each year. Numeric and close-ended questions’ responses are tabu-lated and graphed in real time.

Spreadsheets: Supporting all of the key functions of Microsoft’s Excel and other spreadsheet software, Drive’s spreadsheets drive the work of our business and marketing team. We use the app as we develop our budget each year and track all of our $26,000+ in business and senior baby ad sales using the spreadsheets. Our ad designers also track their assignments and report progress

to their editors in the spreadsheet. We do more than manage our accounts in spreadsheets, too. Each deadline, our editors-in-chief track their staff ’s progress

via a deadline-specific ladder that is shared with everyone on staff and updated by our editors. They’ll use different colors to note progress on a spread’s coverage, and when the spread is “in the green,” it goes to proof and submission.

Documents: We get the most use out of the documents app, which supports basic word processing. As with all of the other Drive applications, multiple users can edit a document at once, and that has allowed our editors to edit and collaborate with their staff in real time. Students and advisers can leave embedded comments in articles, and work isn’t limited to the lab or what can be stored (and lost) on USB stick drives; everything is cloud-based and accessible anywhere one has Internet access, including via a Drive smartphone app.

For more, visit http://drive.google.com and click “Learn More.”

2Google Drive:

“Organize anything, together.” That’s the tagline developers use to describe the project manage-ment and collaboration application called Trello. Our team discovered the app just after our second deadline last December, and it revolutionized the staff ’s approach to collaboration and developing coverage for the yearbook.

The overall concept is simple: In Trello, you create an organization. An organization has boards, boards have lists, and lists have cards. Cards start on lists to the left of the workspace and migrate right as tasks are completed. For our publication (the organization), a board was a particu-lar spread on a given deadline, lists (arranged in columns left to right) were steps in our workflow, and cards represented discrete bits of coverage — stories, mods, and packages. Our left-hand list represented brainstorming and pitched angles for coverage; it might contain as many as 15 to 20

cards, with some angles stronger than others. After some initial research and critique, a select few made it to our “copy & photo” column, meaning editors had approved the coverage and gave the green light to the team working on the spread to develop those angles. The last two columns in the progression (layout and proofing) were for our designers and editors in the latter phases of production on the spread.

Cards can be dragged and dropped from one list to the next and back again, and students can be assigned to particular cards for collaboration and monitoring. Use of the “@username” tag puts notifications in a user’s inbox that there’s an item needing their attention. Additionally, users can embed to-do lists, attach photos, and post discussion comments to the cards. Editors can limit the number of boards to which a staff member is assigned while assigning themselves and the adviser to all boards, allowing for easy monitoring of the staff ’s work and collaboration. This is a powerful tool, as no staff member can slack off on participation on their team; their activities are logged by Trello and an editor or adviser can observe activity — or lack of it — in near-real time.

Once again, Trello is available as a Droid and iPhone app, giving staffs the opportunity for increased communication and collaboration beyond the lab and out into the field while doing the work of journalism at hand.

For more, visit https://trello.com/tourSee a 20-minute intro I prepared for publication advisers here: https://vimeo.com/55553981

3Trello:

There are likely dozens of other apps and technology-based resources media staffs can use to increase their efficiency in the production process. GroupMe, Google Drive, and Trello have done wonders for our productivity and accountability at West High School. I encourage you to explore them and learn how they can benefit you and your staff, as well.


By KIM GREEN, MJEChair, Journalism Education AssociationCertification Commission

Steps to JEA certification

With the push toward higher ac-countability for educators, those of us who teach journalism and advise stu-dent media have a unique opportunity to demonstrate the “highly qualified” standard through the Journalism Edu-cation Association’s certification pro-gram.

The only national organization specifically for scholastic journalism educators, JEA offers its members mul-tiple resources - from national teaching standards to curriculum development to mentoring to digital media to scho-lastic press rights to an online listserv on which members can share, ask ques-tions and collaborate - and that’s just a few of its services! JEA puts advisers in touch with folks who know what it’s like to walk in our shoes. Most im-portant, JEA seeks to cultivate a lively, proactive student press by supporting journalism educators in every aspect of their efforts.

Certification is a program that rec-ognizes journalism educators who have achieved a standard of excellence based on JEA’s national teaching standards with two levels of recognition: Certi-fied Journalism Educator and Master Journalism Educator.

The Certified Journalism Educa-tor (CJE) knows the basics of teach-ing journalism and media advising, including law and ethics, design and graphics, writing and reporting and photography as it applies to newspaper, website, yearbook and broadcast pro-grams. Three options exist to achieve CJE status.

Option A is for the adviser who has college coursework in journalism total-ing 18 semester (27 quarter) hours and consisting of three specific course re-quirements: communications law/eth-ics, newswriting/reporting and teach-ing journalism/advising student media.

Option B is for the adviser who does not have the required coursework but

has taught journalism/advised more than three years and demonstrates that experience on a test offered at both fall and spring national conventions.

The newest level of CJE is Option C, specifically for JEA members involved in business or commercial enterprises supporting scholastic journalism, such as yearbook representatives. We are particularly excited about how this option has taken off, putting highly qualified people in direct contact with yearbook advisers. Candidates for CJE under Option C must be employed a to-tal three years as a journalism teacher or in a scholastic journalism enterprise and submit a letter of recommendation from a CJE or MJE, a resume and a list of courses, sessions and workshops the candidate has taught. Option C candi-dates also take the CJE exam.

The Master Journalism Educator (MJE) has the ability and experience to help other journalism educators, to develop curriculum and programs rel-evant to today’s media and to serve as a spokesperson for scholastic journalism on local, state and national platforms.

To become an MJE, the candidate is a CJE in good standing, has taught/ad-vised for over five years, demonstrates involvement in scholastic journalism with five specific examples, passes the MJE essay exam and submits a proj-ect suitable for a master educator. Re-cently submitted projects range from a curriculum revision, to a staff manual update, to a convention planner’s op-erations manual, to an article for pub-lication in a journalism magazine to a research paper.

Both the CJE and MJE tests have been created by members of the certi-fication commission, made up of eight members - four involved in journalism on the post-secondary level and four involved in high school/middle school journalism at both public and private schools, coordinated by a chair elected

by JEA members. The CJE test consists of 50 multiple

choice, 20 short answer and seven or eight demonstration questions. Those taking the MJE test must answer four of five essay questions, including one on law and ethics, applying their knowl-edge to real-life scenarios. Passing score for both tests is 75 percent, and test-takers must pass the law and eth-ics portions to pass the test. Tests are administered Fridays from 3:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. at both national conventions as well as the JEA Advisers Institute in Las Vegas in July.

Resources are available to help lo-cate coursework options, supplement test review materials and provide guidance for candidates. Commission members also present a series of “Get Certified!” sessions at national conven-tions.

On a personal note, I became a CJE later in my teaching/advising career. I had a journalism teaching minor and lacked only the law/ethics course to at-tain my CJE under Option A once I re-turned to teaching journalism after my sons had gone off to college. I signed up for the online course “First Amend-ment for Administrators” through Ball State University’s J-Ideas. Sure, I was busy. Sure, I was advising four media staffs and teaching two sections of J-1. But it was a great learning experience. Seeing the First Amendment through the eyes of administrators gave me a perspective I had never before encoun-tered. Sharing my side with them, I be-lieve, helped them see the importance of student-driven media as an excellent example of project-based learning as well as first-hand civics experience in a democracy.

Because I had taught journalism for more than 13 years, I applied for my MJE right away upon receiving my

Continued on Page 12

Journalism instruction mastery recognized


It’s been five years since the lawyers at the Student Press Law Center last updated our textbook about media law. That means today’s graduating seniors were middle-schoolers when we last surveyed the laws that protect student journalists’ rights.

How much has changed since 2008? The third edition of Law of the Student Press covered 402 pages – and did not once mention the word “Twitter.” (Of course, at the time, the “micro-blog-ging” Web portal had just a fraction of today’s 230 million monthly users.)

It would be unthinkable today to distribute a book about student jour-nalism without mentioning Twitter, Instagram and other technologies that turn anyone with an Internet connec-tion into a “publisher.” We’ve revised the newly published fourth edition of Law of the Student Press to address some of the uncertainties that new digital platforms are creating: Whether copyright laws still apply on social me-dia (yes), whether it’s possible to libel someone in a tweet (absolutely) and whether schools’ censorship authority can reach off-campus websites (some-times).

The pace of technological change has compressed time. Five years doesn’t just mean five years, it means three generations of iPhones. Here’s a look at some of the major changes in the land-scape of student media since 2008 that SPLC researchers had to consider:

Social media has – and hasn’t – changed the game. More than 56 percent of all Americans are walking around with a smartphone that affords them instanta-

neous Internet access. That’s exciting – and a little scary.

The First Amendment issue that is tying courts in knots from coast to coast is: How much can schools regu-late what students say on social media

when they’re away from school? The Supreme Court has yet to say.

Based on the first wave of court rul-ings in the age of social media, it’s pret-ty clear that schools will be allowed to discipline threats of violence or “cyber-bullying” no matter where they occur. But students have had better luck chal-lenging punishment for speech that criticizes school administrators. So the First Amendment should fully protect legitimate news and commentary that students post online at home.

A much larger audience is relying on students to de-liver the news. Since 2008, the American Society of News Editors estimates that professional news organi-

zations have cut 13,600 full-time jobs. That is terrible for anyone hoping for a long-term career in journalism. But it’s a call to action for student journal-ists to step up. In many communities, they are.

At Henry M. Gunn High School in Palo Alto, Calif., the student news-paper’s well-researched editorial en-dorsement was credited with influenc-ing the outcome of a tight school board race. At Colorado’s Mountain Vista High School, student journalists host-ed a school board candidate forum and then “fact-checked” the candidates’ campaign promises and rated them for honesty. This is the type of coverage that understaffed community newspa-pers no longer can always be counted on to provide.

It’s safer to be a pho-tographer than it used to be. Two recent federal court rulings make it clear that the First Amendment protects the right to non-

disruptively shoot video of police do-ing their jobs. Federal appeals courts in Chicago (ACLU v. Alvarez, decided in 2012) and Boston (Glik v. Cunniffe,

decided in 2011) declared that police can’t bring charges against journalists just for recording police in public plac-es. And the right isn’t limited just to credentialed news media – it protects all citizens.

In October 2010, the Department of Homeland Security settled a law-suit over the wrongful arrest of a New York photographer by declaring that it’s perfectly okay to take pictures of the outside of federal buildings – even courthouses and military bases. Photo-journalists still at times get hassled, but those incidents should become rarer as more officers get trained.

It’s harder to protect stu-dent media from adminis-trative censorship than it used to be. The Supreme Court stripped away much of the First Amendment

protection for student journalism in its 1988 ruling, Hazelwood School District v. Kuhlmeier. That ruling left an “es-cape clause” that hundreds of student publications have taken advantage of. The school has very limited power to control what students choose to pub-lish, the justices said, if a publication operates as a “public forum” – mean-ing that its primary role is to provide a platform for students to express them-selves freely.

But in 2011, a federal appeals court in New York (R.O. v. Ithaca High School) decided that even “public forum” status did not protect a student newspaper from administrators who ordered the removal of a political cartoon mocking the school’s sex-education program. The judges viewed the Ithaca High School newspaper, The Tattler, as only a “limited public forum,” which they interpreted as “limited” to whatever subjects the administration deemed appropriate.

SPLC book updatedBy FRANK D. LOMONTEExecutive DirectorStudent Press Law Center

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Law of the Student Press fourth edition available


CJE. At the time, I had recently reorganized our state con-vention’s on-site competition into a three-year model and used that as my MJE project. That’s the cool thing about the MJE. If you’re a master educator, you’re already doing some-thing that’s project-worthy, that other advisers would love to use as a resource. Or, maybe there is something you’ve been wanting to do - develop a website or combine your staffs to incorporate convergence in your newsroom - and that could become your MJE project. Sure, it takes some time. Sure, there’s stress involved. But it will be a great learning experi-ence.

I know for a fact that when my newsmagazine staff was facing controversy and potential prior review a few years ago, my being a recognized Master Journalism Educator by a national organization lent credibility to the standard of journalistic integrity driving my kids to provide relevant coverage to their readers. I felt more confident in myself as an adviser with JEA certification.

And today as my fellow journalism teacher - a new MJE! - and I compete with other courses and departments for students, it carries weight with parents that our courses are

taught by and our staffs are advised by Master Journalism Educators as recognized by the Journalism Education As-sociation. This also adds points to our evaluation rubric be-cause we have gone above and beyond to seek and validate our teaching credentials.

More important, though, is how I feel about myself. Why wouldn’t I want to make sure I’ve done everything to dem-onstrate my “highly qualified” status. After all, the level of professionalism demonstrated to achieve both the CJE and MJE takes the quotation marks off the term highly qualified.

Check it out for yourself. Go to http://www.jea.org/certification/ and look it over. Watch these two quick videos by Don Goble http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N0t3CxAp8C4

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lhV47DAWXHA.

Contact me ([email protected]) with questions or concerns or for encouragement. I’m here to help you!

Why seek certification? Why not!

Updating media educators......

FROM PAGE 11

SPLC BOOK CHARTS MEDIA LAW DEVELOPMENTSAnother federal appeals court setback in Virginia (Sons

of Confederate Veterans v. Town of Lexington) in July 2013, decided that a government agency can change a forum from “public” to “non-public” basically overnight and for any rea-son at all. When you combine that court ruling with the ear-lier Ithaca one, being a “limited public forum” offers about as much protection as an umbrella made of cotton candy.

As a result of these legal setbacks, the Student Press Law Center advises the student media to go beyond just the name “public forum.” Students should push for a policy – at the state level, if possible, or at the district level or even the school level if a state law isn’t practical – that spells out in detail what level of administrative involvement is allowed. Since 1977, California law has allowed school officials to censor only material that is illegal or substantially disrup-tive. It’s an excellent model for states and districts every-where.

Maybe the most remarkable thing about the last five years

is what has not changed. Since Oregon became the seventh state with a law protecting the freedom of high school jour-nalists in 2007, not a single state has joined the list, even though advocates tried valiantly in Kentucky, Connecticut and Washington.

Student journalism can’t afford five more years of inac-tion. Young people nationwide are demonstrating against school closures, teacher layoffs and high-stakes testing. Pro-tecting the right to speak freely – the right that makes those other protests possible – should be at the top of the agenda.

There’s a terrific “digital backpack” online at stuvoice.org with pointers about becoming a successful student activist. Young people have led movements for social change far more difficult and dangerous than protecting student press free-dom.

Perhaps by the fifth edition of Law of the Student Press in 2018 or so, students will experience censorship only by read-ing about it.

FROM PAGE 10

WHY JEA CERTIFICATION COUNTS

From Quill and Scroll member to college and career


Updating media educators

When I was cutting my teeth as a young journalist, “immersion” was all the rage. The forced blending of print, broad-cast and Web journalism. I say forced because everyone feared the unknown. What would happen if these competitors became one? No one knew how it would work or what would happen to the indus-try once they merged.

As the field of journalism continues to evolve, here’s my single most important piece of advice that will help you become a reputable and successful journalist: Learn as much as you can about as much as you can.

As a journalist, you’ll cover stories on a variety of topics – some of them you will know little about – but it will be your job to report on them. Your job is to tell the story and provide your audience all the information they need.

Complicating this goal is the myriad ways people consume and process news. The industry is still struggling to figure out the best way to allow for audience preferences, and because of that, most newspapers, television and radio stations are being forced to make cuts. As a conse-quence, those who are the most indispen-sible – staff who know the most about all aspects of their industry – are surviving. So much has changed since I graduated from Avon High School, Avon, Ind., in 2000.

In high school, I joined the school’s newspaper staff my sophomore year. I was immediately hooked. I was always asking for additional story assignments. Junior year, I became the writing editor and finally, senior year I became editor-in-chief. I also was inducted into Quill and Scroll International Honorary Society for High School Journalists.

Journalism was in my blood, but I wanted a new challenge in college. I

joined the telecommunications depart-ment (TCOM) at Ball State University in Muncie, Ind., and immediately be-came involved in their student-run news team. Since most students were already involved and had seniority, I started off small. I ran the cameras during the news-cast. As I took more courses and learned more about producing newscasts, I took on more responsibilities. My sophomore year I was associate producer and junior year I produced one show a week, work-ing behind the scenes putting the show to-gether, deciding which stories go in what order and writing most of the content, in-cluding scripts for the news anchors.

Senior year, Ball State did something a little different; it was truly unique and groundbreaking. They started a program called NewsLink. The program allowed students to participate in a real world newsroom and produce a nightly news-cast live for the county in which Ball State was located, Delaware County. During the program I had a chance to be a pho-tographer, a reporter and a producer. That’s when I learned how much I loved producing. It was because of the contacts I made during that program I was able to land a producing job right out of college. The head of the NewsLink Department once worked with the executive producer of the TV station where I was hired.

It was at a small market TV station. My job function was simply to produce a daily newscast, but I wanted to know more. I worked with the Web department (see even five years ago the newsroom kept the people updating the website in a separate department from the newsroom) to learn more about updating the site with our reports. I learned how to upload pictures and video. I also learned how to send out the breaking news email alerts. Most newsrooms are no longer doing

email alerts as they have apps send push alerts. I quickly rose to a much larger market (markets are based on the Nielsen audience ratings and population).

Based on the experience I gained along the way, I was able to move on to become a social media strategist and website man-ager after leaving the news business. My decision to leave the business was purely because of the work schedule. I was work-ing overnight hours – midnight to 8 a.m. – the complete opposite schedule of my hus-band. I was exhausted all the time. Some people are able to handle the shift easily and have done it for decades and love it. Unfortunately, I was not one of those peo-ple. It’s a shame because I do miss it. Since leaving the news business, I have taken my writing and storytelling skills and turned them into a career as a successful content marketing professional.

During my tenure as a news producer, I had the opportunity to cover some really great news stories. Some of those stories were even covered nationally. For ex-ample, Jeff Ake the American contractor taken hostage in Iraq in 2005 and hasn’t been heard from since; NBC executive Dick Ebersol’s plane crashed on the way to South Bend, Ind., killing his 14-year-old son; stories about Indianapolis Colts former football head coach Tony Dungy and former Indiana Gov. Mitch Dan-iels’ campaign and election into office. I even earned several awards, including an Emmy, for my work.

Covering political stories was always a challenge for me. I took as few politi-cal science classes in college as I possibly could! Trying to learn that information on the job is difficult and, for me, made me feel ill-equipped. Obviously, no one is ex-pected to know everything, but make sure you round out your courses and learn as much as you can on a variety of topics.

Alumnus looks backBy HEATHER CHASTAIN Emmy-award winning journalist, and marketing and communications professional

From Quill and Scroll member to college and career


Throughout the Houston community, Dynamo soccer team star Brian Ching and Astros baseball legend Jose Cruz have left their mark. On Oct. 4, both Ching and Cruz left their mark in autographs and attendance at The 25 Drive, a Sum-mer Creek High School journalism fundraiser. The evening included a dinner, a meet and greet, a question and answer session and an online auction.

“Both do a lot in the community and wanted to help as soon as I mentioned it,” said Houston Chronicle sportswriter Jesus Ortiz, who was the event’s emcee and moderated the Q&A. “They were willing to support a cause in a dinner that also honored them.”

The 25 Drive fundraiser was organized to defray the costs of journalism students traveling to state and national conven-tions in San Antonio and Boston this fall. The event raised around $1,500 in ticket sales and about $4,500 in auction items that varied from a signed J.J. Watt football to a date-night package.

“The 25 Drive was very successful for our first time do-ing such an event,” said adviser Megan Ortiz, who has taught journalism at Summer Creek since the school opened in 2009. “We had a great time, raised some good money and I think a lot of people had fun.”

Journalism students at Summer Creek had traveled to a number of in-state competitions and conventions in previ-ous years. With so many upperclassmen wanting to attend the Journalism Education Association/National Scholastic Press Association convention in Boston in November, Ortiz reached out to friends and supporters of the program to help organize a fundraiser to make it possible.

Summer Creek is a diverse school of 2,300 students, with more than 50 percent of the students on free or reduced lunch. The dinner made it possible for all students interested in attending JEA/NSPA in Boston to help with the fundraiser, which in turn reduced their cost of the trip.

Journalism supporters and community members turned out for the event, helping boost a five-year-old program that has already won 18 individual national awards and 77 state awards. This fall, The Odyssey monthly newsmagazine was a George H. Gallup Award winner in the Quill and Scroll News Media Evaluation service for the first time as well as received the All-American rating by NSPA.

“This event and the journalism department have surpassed any expectations the Humble ISD district had,” said Humble Independent School District Assistant Superintendent Trey Kraemer, who hired Ortiz as the journalism adviser when he was SCHS principal from 2009-2012. “(The dinner) was a testimony of our school and Houston’s involvement in our lo-cal area, and Humble ISD couldn’t be more proud.”

Cruz left his mark, “Jose Cruz #25,” in black Sharpie on baseball bats and jerseys throughout the night. Cruz spent the majority of his 19-year professional career playing for the As-tros and represented the team in two All-Star Games.

Ching, who posed with fans and signed a number of auto-graphs, reached two MLS Cup championships and four MLS Cup finals with Houston. He was also on the 2006 World Cup team.

Both athletes donned the number 25 on their jerseys and have left a more permanent mark on the Houston area by their dedication to the people.

Ching is known for his contributions to Habitat for Hu-manity. At the end of the season, Ching will start a front office job for the Houston Dynamo.

“I love my team, but I want to see how successful I can be off the field,” Ching said. “I want the Dynamo organization to be successful with the people of Houston.”

Their dedication to the community was evident at Sum-mer Creek as their support was much appreciated by a jour-nalism program working hard to establish itself and find new and bigger opportunities for its students.

“I always want to be active in my community,” Cruz said. “I wasn’t busy when Jesus (Ortiz) asked me about the dinner, and I said yes right away.”

The students enjoyed meeting the Houston legends and thanking the community members who took time out of their weekend to join them for the special night. The dinner re-mained on the forefront of their minds as they enjoyed the opportunities and experiences at the conventions, especially the first out-of-state one they had ever attended.

“Meeting Brian Ching and Jose Cruz was a great experi-ence,” said newspaper staff member Regine Murray, a junior. “I am so thankful that their participation in the dinner made my trips to San Antonio and Boston affordable.”

By JENNA DUVALLCo-editor-in-chief Odyssey newspaper, senior at Summer Creek HS, Houston

Fundraiser nets travel fees


How one staff raised $6,000 in

one nightParents were a big help in the fundraiser

that collected $6,000 to support the Summer Creek High School journalism program. Al-though the fundraising culminated in one grand event, it required days of preparation and the assistance of parents and other sup-porters.

One parent helped organize donations, creating fliers and informational sheets that she emailed to people with suggestions.

Parents also took tickets at the dinner, helped with the event set up and clean up. They helped sell tickets to family and friends. They also publicized it on social media.

A parent volunteer ran the online auc-tion, listing items, making bid increments and setting lowest bids. She also finalized all payments the night the auction ended.

The Humble ISD Education Foundation, which specializes in helping school pro-grams get grants, set up the auction website and paid the initial fee for it. They trained a parent to use the online program and pro-vided support throughout the process as the auction was happening.

Auction items were listed for about three weeks on the website. They then went “live” for one week. Bidding ended in the middle of the fundraising dinner so the winners could be announced.

While all the auctioned items were at the dinner, bids were placed using laptops set up on site or on personal smart phones. The winners did not have to be present to win. It was solely done online to reduce the han-dling of cash and allow those who were not in attendance to support the program.

Summer Creek’s media do not have a par-ent booster group simply because of the long process in setting it up, but parents defi-nitely stepped up to the plate to help make this a success for the program and for their children.

Houston Astros baseball legend Jose Cruz signs a jersey that was included in a raffle for those in attendance at The 25 Drive. Cruz and Dynamo soccer star Brian Ching were honored for their contributions to the community while they helped raise money for the journalism program at Summer Creek HS. Between the dinner and auction, the students raised about $6,000.

Houston Dynamo soccer star Brian Ching and Astros baseball legend Jose Cruz take a photo with some journalism students at a fundraising dinner Oct. 4. The event was held in the Sum-mer Creek HS cafeteria. Proceeds went toward helping the journalism students pay for their travels to the state TAJE con-ference and the JEA/NSPA convention in Boston. The students had never gone to an out-of-state convention.

Houston Dynamo soccer star Brian Ching goes through the line for barbecue brisket as Summer Creek HS jour-nalism students Paige Gonzalez, ’15, and Olivia Gonzalez, ’17, serve. Former principal Al Segura kept a watchful eye over the student helpers as they served the food he prepared for the dinner.

Photos provided by Shaianne Rubin


BOOK REVIEWS By Barbara Bealor Hines, Howard University, Professor, Department of Journalism

As the platforms we use to tell stories continue to evolve, it’s impor-tant to find the tone, style (and ways) to get our messages out. This issue of Quill & Scroll highlights books that show how writers find topics to explore, how they face the challenges of a changing profes-sion, and what journalists face in the future.

As life changes, journalism changes. And it’s not just technology that is driv-ing the change. Dan Kennedy, who had a stellar reporting and editing career at the Boston Phoenix, understands the best of the new delivery that journalism requires. In The Wired City, he writes about the evo-lution of the New Haven Independent, a nonprofit community website in Connecti-cut and how it is changing local journalism and responding to the area’s residents.

While Kennedy focuses on the Inde-pendent, he also writes about other non-profit, community-focused online efforts including the Voice of San Diego and the Connecticut Mirror and for-profit websites (Batavian, Baristanet and CTNews Junkie.

In Chapter 5, “Print Dollars and Digital Pennies,” Kennedy writes about how foun-dations and corporate underwriters have become players in the digital space. He

explains the variety of reasons for a non-profit model to fit journalism.

In Chapter 8, “The Care and Feeding of the Former Audience,” he delves into public journalism and online comment-ing, discussing ways online publications are dealing with requiring commenters to use their names. There’s much to think about in Kennedy’s world of online jour-nalism.

While Kennedy admits that the road ahead is “murky” for journalism, he also writes that “the next few decades are likely to be as exciting a time for journalism as the mid-19th century, when a revolution in printing technology brought newspa-pers to the masses, or the mid-20th centu-ry, when television brought national and world events into our homes.” For those of us who are journalism junkies, we cer-tainly hope that’s true.

Kennedy, Dan. The Wired City: Reimagining Journalism and Civ-ic Life in the Post-Newspaper Age. University of Massachusetts Press. 2013.

$2295


Reporters often lament the difficulty of finding a topic to write about for a column. Many times the best columns are written about everyday occurrences. Regina Brett, col-umnist for Cleveland’s The Plain Dealer, showcases her talent to do that with her book 50 Lessons for Making the Impossible Possible. It’s a collection of essays, stories and columns based on the people she met and wrote about in her newspaper column. The book’s title comes from an update of one of her columns in which she wrote her 45 life lessons – and five to grow on.

Through her down-to-earth and breezy style, Brett shares her wisdom in chapters like “Start Where You Are,” “Do Your Best, Forget the Rest,” “Get in the Game,” and “Shine Your Light.”

This book is a good addition to help young journalists understand that problem-solving begins wherever you are. It’s also a leadership guide for any age group.

Brett, Regina. Be the Miracle: 50 Lessons for Making the Impos-sible Possible. Grand Central Publishing. 2013.$1499

Nader, Ralph. Told You So: The Big Book of Weekly Columns. Seven Stories Press. 2013. $2999

Ralph Nader has spent more than 45 years in the public eye as a consumer activ-ist, political candidate and observer of both the good and bad in America. In Told You So, he has culled the best of his weekly col-umns over a 10-year period to continue to make an impact on people’s lives.

Among Nader’s most noteworthy ac-complishments include his 1965 Unsafe at Any Speed, which caused the automobile industry to enhance safety features. Less than 10 years later, in 1974, as a result of his work, an amendment to the Freedom of In-formation Act gave the public better access to government documents. His grassroots

activism improved food safety and brought attention to consumer rights.

Told You So includes Nader’s columns that shout out names and organizations for both positive and negative accomplish-ments. They’re colorfully written and tackle problems large and small. Nader cites his work about the National Security Agency, Wall Street, nuclear energy and the cost of the Iraqi war as columns with lasting effect.

Nader’s book provides a dynamic his-tory lesson of the trying times Americans have faced and their many successes and some failures. And it provides a wealth of ideas for stories.

For those who have followed Tom Bro-kaw’s life through television, The Time of Our Lives reminds us of his Midwestern wit, his sense of creativity and his sound news judgment. For student journalists, his book provides a good lesson about interviewing.

Brokaw’s book was based on his travel across the country, where he relished con-versations with people on college campuses, in factories, newsrooms, and boardrooms, in towns small and large. He kept hearing many of the same questions about the U.S. political system, American journalism, national ser-vice and financial security. Those questions framed his discussions with those he inter-viewed.

In Chapter 3, “K Through Twelve and

the Hazards Along the Way,” Brokaw shares stories about East Lake (Georgia) project, the Taft Information Technology High School (Ohio), Jack Britt (North Carolina) and PS 109 (New York), examples of where changes in the environment create success.

In Chapter 7, “Survivors,” he writes about workers who have lost their jobs, but are de-veloping skills or enrolling in formal educa-tion that will prepare them for the changing workplace.

Each chapter deals with the present, the past and the promise – providing a depth of understanding about the human spirit. It’s a true conversation about America with stra-tegic answers.

Brokaw, Tom. The Time of Our Lives: A Conversation about America. Paperback. Random House. 2012$17



Book reviews continued

The Principal’s Guide to Scholastic Journalism, since 1966, has assisted princi-pals and teachers in staying up-to-date with the media trends of the day. In the re-vamped third edition, the Principal’s Guide continues to do just that by includ-ing new information on issues in this digital age.

The Principal’s Guide to Scholastic Journalism is published by Quill and Scroll Foundation, with support from the Ameri-

can Society of News Editors. This book can be used by princi-pals, administrators, and teachers alike, anyone with the goal of creating a well-rounded learning environment for students.

The new edition has information about online and so-cial media uses and ethics that many teachers and ad-ministrators may find useful when instructing their stu-dents on journalism skills. The information addressing the use of electronic media can even be advantageous to stu-dents who want to learn more about scholastic journalism.

“Any media book out there has to talk about digital because that is what’s most pervasive right now,” said Vanessa Shelton, execu-tive director of Quill and Scroll International Honorary Society for High School Journalists. Shelton is in charge of making updates to the Principal’s Guide and also contributed to the newest edition.

The inclusion of content addressing the digital age brought

the topic of a website to the attention of the guide’s writers, who are experienced scholastic journalism educators. Through their collaboration with Kent State University School of Jour-nalism, the Principal’s Guide has been converted into a com-panion website, which can be found at principalsguide.org.

This online version provides much the same information as the book, plus some extras, such as an audio presentation by JEA 2012 Administrator of the Year Susan Enfield, superin-tendent of Highline Public Schools, Burien, Wash. Enfield dis-cusses the value of journalism education in secondary schools.

The website also offers simple icons for users to follow Quill and Scroll on social media sites, such as Twitter and Face-book, so users can stay up-to-date on the latest information.

“I hope it will show administrators, teachers, students and communities that scholastic journalism free of arbitrary cen-sorship is the best way to achieve established school missions and goals,” said John Bowen, editor of the book and chair of the JEA Scholastic Press Rights Commission. “Journalism is an extremely efficient way for students to master the vari-ous outcomes and parts of Common Core and P21 learning standards. Scholastic journalism reaches its peak in student learning when students are responsible for their content and journalistic efforts.” Bowen is also the assistant director of the Center for Scholastic Journalism at Kent State University.

The Journalism Education Association provided funding for commission members to travel to Kent State University to the Center for Scholastic Journalism to develop and write the book.

Principal’s Guide to Scholastic Journalism: What ad-ministrators need to know about student media is available through Quill and Scroll and the JEA bookstore at $5 each.

With today’s emphasis on media literacy and the environment, Antonio Lopez has writ-ten a book that can make one think critically about the role that ecology can play in develop-ing responsible media.

Lopez believes there’s a need for a more sustainable media ecosystem that requires ev-eryone to rethink daily media activities. He calls for “organic media practitioners” who will strengthen communication through their intelligence and supportive culture. Through his writing, Lopez is passionate about the topic, but this book is a difficult read. As he says, “This is a slightly different way to describe media literacy.”

Lopez, Antonio. The Media Ecosystem: What Ecology Can Teach Us about Responsible Media Practice. Evolver Editions. North Atlantic Press. 2012.

$1295

$5 QUILL and SCROLL PRINCIPAL’S GUIDENew edition keeps Administrators Up-To-Date

www.niu.edu/comm

CommunicationDepar tment of

The foundation for your future.

Applications for the 2013-2014 year are available online at:

www.niu.edu/apply

Undergraduate emphases• Journalism•RhetoricandPublicCommunication

•OrganizationalandCorporateCommunication

•MediaStudies

Graduate emphases• Journalism•RhetoricalStudies• Interpersonal,Organizational,andPersuasiveCommunication

•MediaStudies

SummerJournalism Camps

Nationallyrecognizedstudentnewspaper,The Northern Star

NTC News TonightatourNorthernTelevisionCenter

InternshipsintheChicagomediamarket

StudentFilm and VideoAssociation

- Shaina Tromp, Junior, univerSiTy of iowa


Book reviews continued

www.niu.edu/comm

CommunicationDepar tment of

The foundation for your future.

Applications for the 2013-2014 year are available online at:

www.niu.edu/apply

Undergraduate emphases• Journalism•RhetoricandPublicCommunication

•OrganizationalandCorporateCommunication

•MediaStudies

Graduate emphases• Journalism•RhetoricalStudies• Interpersonal,Organizational,andPersuasiveCommunication

•MediaStudies

SummerJournalism Camps

Nationallyrecognizedstudentnewspaper,The Northern Star

NTC News TonightatourNorthernTelevisionCenter

InternshipsintheChicagomediamarket

StudentFilm and VideoAssociation


Diana Mitsu Klos joined the National Scholastic Press Association as ex-ecutive director in October.

Klos previously was a media educa-tion and nonprofits consultant based in northern Virginia, and a senior staff member at the American Society of News Editors from 1996 to 2012.

Previously she has held positions as a staff writer, city editor and manag-ing editor at daily newspapers in New Jersey, Connecticut and New York. She also has served on the board of NSPA. She holds a bachelor’s degree in communications from City Col-lege of New York.

The first woman executive director of NSPA in its 92-year history, Klos will lead a national organization that sup-ports scholastic journalism at middle school, high school and college levels. The association pro-vides journalism education services to students, teachers, me-dia advisers and others throughout the United States.

“We are delighted to have found a journalism leader of Di-ana’s national stature to lead our organization. This is a time of dynamic change for journalism organizations of all kinds,” NSPA Board President Al Tims said of Klos’ appointment.

“Diana is the right person to help us reach and serve ever

more young journalists and their advisers, throughout the nation.”

NSPA also is a leading advocate for First Amendment and free press is-sues as they pertain to school jour-nalism. The NSPA website features a wealth of resources in support of the development of high school journal-ism.

In addition to its original mission, dating back to 1921, of serving high school journalism, NSPA’s Associ-ated Collegiate Press division serves college, university, and profes-sional and technical school media. Student media in its headquarters state are organized under the Min-nesota High School Press Associa-tion, which also is administered by NSPA. Headquartered in Minneap-

olis, Minn., NSPA has long and close ties to the University of Minnesota’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication.

NSPA and its divisions operate eight conventions and work-shops each year; two of the conventions are in conjunction with the Journalism Education Association. NSPA also con-ducts contest and critique programs that define the highest standards of scholastic and college journalism and recognize those who meet them. Among the association’s awards are the prestigious Pacemaker Award presented annually to top pub-lications at the high school and college levels.

NSPA welcomesDiana Mitsu Klos as director

This is a time of dynamic change for journalism

organizations- NSPA President

Al Tims


NSPA welcomesDiana Mitsu Klos as director

News Media EvaluationRatings 2013

GALLUP AWARDS

California Granite Bay: Granite Bay High School San Jose: Lynbrook Sr. High School Studio City: Harvard-Westlake High SchoolFlorida Miami: Dr. Michael M. Krop Sr. High SchoolGeorgia Athens: Clarke Central High School Decatur: Decatur High SchoolIllinois Rolling Meadows: Rolling Meadows High School Indiana Carmel: Carmel High School Crown Point: Crown Point High School Indianapolis: Lawrence Central High SchoolIowa Cedar Rapids: Kennedy High School Davenport: Davenport West High School Iowa City: West High School City High School Johnston: Johnston High SchoolLouisiana Metairie: Grace King High SchoolMichigan Grosse Point Farms: Grosse Point South High School Southfield: Southfield High SchoolMinnesota Stillwater: Stillwater High SchoolMissouri Chesterfield: Marquette High School St. Charles: Francis Howell North High School Wildwood: Lafayette High SchoolOhio Bexley: Bexley High School Dublin: Dublin Coffman High School Liberty Township: Lakota East High SchoolTexas Houston: Summer Creek High SchoolVirginia Harrisonburg: Harrisonburg High School

INTERNATIONAL FIRST PLACE

British Columbia Coquitlam: Gleneagle Secondary SchoolCalifornia Redlands: Redlands High School San Leandro: San Leandro High SchoolFlorida Sarasota: Riverview High School Miami: Felix Varela Sr. High School Plantation: American Heritage SchoolGeorgia Atlanta: Henry Grady High SchoolIdaho Lewiston: Lewiston High SchoolIllinois Downers Grove: Downers Grove North High School West Chicago: Community High School Lake Zurich: Lake Zurich High School Chicago: Resurrection College Prep High SchoolIndiana Fishers: Fishers High School Munster: Munster High School Indianapolis: Lawrence North High SchoolIowa Cedar Rapids: Washington High SchoolKansas Topeka: Topeka High SchoolMaryland Bel Air: The John Carroll School Potomac: Winston Churchill High SchoolMichigan Sterling Heights: Adlai Stevenson High SchoolMissouri Webster Groves: Webster Groves High School Fenton: Rockwood Summit High SchoolNew Jersey Wall Township: Communications High SchoolOhio Loveland: Loveland High School Sylvania: Sylvania Northview High SchoolOregon Salem: South Salem High SchoolPennsylvania Easton: Notre Dame High SchoolVirginia Virginia Beach: Ocean Lakes High School

For a complete list of winners please visit our website www.quillandscroll.org

Quill and Scroll


There aren’t many 8-year-old newspaper editors; in fact, I’ve never known another. But I was one, perhaps the only one, thanks to Mrs. Frances Coffman, a school teacher in the dusty farm country of Knox County, Texas.

Admittedly, I never sat in Mrs. Coffman’s formal classroom during the school year. No, I wasn’t that lucky. But I did spend my fair share of time at her dining room table — the one she inserted the extra leaf in when it came production time for my first newspaper. And it was there that I first burned the midnight oil as a writer, after traversing across two-lane highways dotted with oil pumps that, somehow, re-minded me of big sewing machines — and in springtime, fields of Indian paintbrushes and Bluebonnets for as far as I could see.

The 170-mile route to Granny’s house, a.k.a. Mrs. Coffman’s, was not one I traveled nearly enough to suit my childhood heart. But dur-ing holidays — namely, Thanksgiving, Christmas and Easter — and a few weeks in the rattlesnake-wary summers, her red-dirt homestead was my primary destination.

Situated on a forgotten route off U.S. Highway 82, Granny’s house was a place where German pancakes with homemade plum jelly warmly awaited my arrival; a home away from home where a toothless cow dog named Prunes adored me; and a haven from chores where the freezer never ran shy of all the Popsicles needed to fuel the creativ-ity of a tom-girl with windswept hair and mulberry-stained feet.

Moreover, in the summertime I reaped big rewards in town by vir-tue of being the grandchild of Mrs. Coffman. You see, the local public librarian knew her well, and because of this, there were perks. I was a veritable VIP, meaning I had no limit on the number of books I could check out each visit. No, I didn’t have to choose between books about horses or American Indians — two of my favorite interests. I could take them all.

Thus, it was from this love of reading that I first decided to pen my own media for public consumption, specifically, the aforementioned hometown “rag” that I named in honor of my grandparents. Granted, that first newsroom didn’t look like a “real” newspaper office, for it was a tiny farmhouse surrounded by cattle, horses, cotton and wheat fields. Yet, it was there the “Coffman Chronicle” found its inception, and it was there that a fledgling reporter began what would be a lifelong love of writing, a career in journalism, and later, journalism education.

Some days, my hard-farming “Grandpa” had mealtimes that were

disrupted because I was “on deadline” and the table was covered with my scribbled notes, Correcto-Type, carbon paper and Merriam-Web-ster’s Collegiate Dictionary, as I feverishly hunted ‘n’ pecked my way to the next edition. But my writing was never impeded; my newsgather-ing was never squashed.

Looking back, Granny was the sounding board for what I now know to be my paper’s budget. She let me use her manual typewriter — and trusted me not to ruin the ribbon. And when all my headlines were just right and my paper was ready to be “put to bed,” she loaded me in her Buick LeSabre to make the 18-mile drive to her school, where the smell of wet ink filled the musty, after-hours air of the prin-cipal’s office. There she cranked the mimeograph machine to bring my first publishing venture to life.

No, Mrs. Coffman was never formally my classroom teacher, and I assuredly was envious of those who did fill her classroom’s wooden seats. But today, I know she was something better: A grandmother-turned-managing editor, who inspired and encouraged my love for reading, words and writing beyond any classroom walls.

By LISA L. ROLLINSJournalism Educator Ashford University

Passion for writing blossomed on red-dirt farm

Lisa Rollins traces her journalism roots to the “Coffman Chronicle,” a newspaper she produced as a child with her grandmother-managing editor Frances Coffman in her Texas farmhouse. Photo courtesy of Lisa Rollins.


2013 Quill and ScrollScholarship Winners

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Attending: University of Arkansas at Fayetteville

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Attending: Iowa State University

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Attending: Northwestern University

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Washington University School of Media and Public Affairs

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Journalism teacher at Oak Ridge HS,

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