Guide to Blogging: What are others doing?

Blogging Case Study: The University of British Columbia School of Journalism

Rationale

Using blogs to teach students in a journalism school seemed like a good fit. Alfred Hermida in the School of Journalism at the University of British Columbia turned to blogs when he wanted to teach his students modern beat reporting using Web tools. A typical beat reporter collects and editorializes stories related to a particular topic. Whether the beat is city hall, health care, or education, the focus is on synthesizing and linking rather than deep investigation. Hermida felt that blogs were a good tool for this due to the ability to regularly update content and the ease of hyperlinking. Due to the public nature of blogs and the communities of interested amateurs in the blogosphere, Hermida knew that his students could get valuable insight by engaging a community around their beat.

As an added bonus, students found that they developed skills that were of interest to employers. When students looking for summer internships could demonstrate familiarity with blogging and podcasting, employers took notice. Students unsure about the fit of new tools in journalism found a new appreciation for the experience. In a few cases, students’ blogs attracted attention, helping land them summer jobs.

Description

The School of Journalism at the University of British Columbia offers a two-year master’s program, after which graduates expect to join the profession. The program offers instruction in traditional as well as newer aspects of journalism including practices like podcasting, online journals, and blogging. Hermida used blogs to put a modern spin on beat journalism. Students picked an area of interest, or a beat, and produced stories to cover different aspects of their topic twice a week for a 10-week period.

This exercise was designed to develop a set of proficiencies different from the traditional journalism skills of investigation and writing. In this class, value was placed on surveying, filtering, and making sense of materials likely to have been covered in greater depth elsewhere. An emphasis on selecting relevant material, interpreting the material, and linking back to primary sources made blogs an ideal tool.

The structure of this exercise was quite deliberate. Rather than simply assigning blogging and evaluating the resulting blog at the end of term, Hermida chose to evaluate the blog over the course of a 10-week period. Students were required to keep up with the deadlines of regular publishing in addition to their other coursework. Blogs worked well to support the pace of the publishing deadlines as well as to provide an environment for the practice of professional journalism skills.

Implementation

Despite the availability of blogging tools on campus, including a learning management system (WebCT), Hermida used Blogger as the home for his class’s blogs because it had the lowest barrier to entry and required no setup on his part. Moreover, Blogger challenged students to explore an unfamiliar system. He felt it was important students learn out how to use an environment on their own.

Students were directed to the Blogger Web site to set up their blogs and asked to share the URL with the rest of the class. Students were expected to investigate how to set up their blogs on their own. While students may not have felt comfortable doing a completely new task, all were able to master the blog setup.

Entries were posted semiweekly. Because beats were interest-based rather than tied to geography, students often were able to find and tap into communities of interested amateurs in the blogosphere. Gaining recognition from and being accepted by these communities provided some students with additional feedback and resources in covering their beat. In one case, a student covering writings from The New Yorker was welcomed into the community of bloggers interested in the same topic. This beat reporter was able to establish himself as a promising rookie, giving him access to some of the most knowledgeable sources available.

Hermida evaluated the entries himself every two or three weeks. Stories were assessed based on choice of topics, mechanics, and linking; commenting and feedback on peers’ blogs were not part of the evaluation. While students were aware of their peers’ blogs, they were under no obligation to read them. Some took it upon themselves to add the rest of the class to their blogrolls—collections of links to other blogs—while others spent only the time necessary to complete their posts.

Impact on Teaching and Learning

Students used blogs to publish beat stories twice a week. By emphasizing the disciplined approach to producing two stories a week rather than simply writing when the muse visited, Hermida challenged students to develop the discipline to meet production deadlines while simultaneously applying critical thinking skills in gathering and assessing potential stories. Students were challenged to find ways of relating stories to their beat in a concise manner and were asked to provide enough context for their stories through carefully chosen links.

Hermida graded the entries for content (40 percent), mechanics (30 percent), and links (30 percent). When grading for content, Hermida looked for timely, interesting content that would captivate the audience. The mechanics portion of the grade emphasized professional quality spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Students received marks for links based on quality rather than number.

Hermida took some satisfaction from the fact that one or two students were able to showcase their extraordinary talent through their blogs. On the strength of her blog, one student was able to get a summer job with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (Canadian Public Radio) to create one of the first blogs for a radio show.

Reflection

Hermida’s use of blogs to train journalism students illustrates the value of existing tools like Blogger for discipline-specific applications. Hermida noted that blogging was a multipurpose tool that could help with many disciplines. His course simply put it to work to teach journalism.

Student use of blogs was variable. One or two had fantastic success with their blogs. Others used blogs only when necessary for the course. Hermida hoped that students would see the utility of the blogging tools and perhaps find uses for blogging in their other assignments including their graduate theses.

Fitting a rigorous blogging regimen into an already busy class and assignment schedule proved to be difficult. Hermida noted that he might reduce the number of required postings in a future iteration.

ELI Discovery Tool: Guide to Blogging What are others doing? Central Queensland University Middlebury College University of British Columbia Additional Examples of Blogs What do students think? Reflecting, Writing, and Responding: Reasons Students Blog The Campus Press Blogs How do I get started? Position and Perspective Decisions to Make About Blogging What Faculty Want to Know Making the Case for Blogging		University of British Columbia Guide to Blogging: What are others doing? Blogging Case Study: The University of British Columbia School of Journalism Rationale Using blogs to teach students in a journalism school seemed like a good fit. Alfred Hermida in the School of Journalism at the University of British Columbia turned to blogs when he wanted to teach his students modern beat reporting using Web tools. A typical beat reporter collects and editorializes stories related to a particular topic. Whether the beat is city hall, health care, or education, the focus is on synthesizing and linking rather than deep investigation. Hermida felt that blogs were a good tool for this due to the ability to regularly update content and the ease of hyperlinking. Due to the public nature of blogs and the communities of interested amateurs in the blogosphere, Hermida knew that his students could get valuable insight by engaging a community around their beat. As an added bonus, students found that they developed skills that were of interest to employers. When students looking for summer internships could demonstrate familiarity with blogging and podcasting, employers took notice. Students unsure about the fit of new tools in journalism found a new appreciation for the experience. In a few cases, students’ blogs attracted attention, helping land them summer jobs. Description The School of Journalism at the University of British Columbia offers a two-year master’s program, after which graduates expect to join the profession. The program offers instruction in traditional as well as newer aspects of journalism including practices like podcasting, online journals, and blogging. Hermida used blogs to put a modern spin on beat journalism. Students picked an area of interest, or a beat, and produced stories to cover different aspects of their topic twice a week for a 10-week period. This exercise was designed to develop a set of proficiencies different from the traditional journalism skills of investigation and writing. In this class, value was placed on surveying, filtering, and making sense of materials likely to have been covered in greater depth elsewhere. An emphasis on selecting relevant material, interpreting the material, and linking back to primary sources made blogs an ideal tool. The structure of this exercise was quite deliberate. Rather than simply assigning blogging and evaluating the resulting blog at the end of term, Hermida chose to evaluate the blog over the course of a 10-week period. Students were required to keep up with the deadlines of regular publishing in addition to their other coursework. Blogs worked well to support the pace of the publishing deadlines as well as to provide an environment for the practice of professional journalism skills. Implementation Despite the availability of blogging tools on campus, including a learning management system (WebCT), Hermida used Blogger as the home for his class’s blogs because it had the lowest barrier to entry and required no setup on his part. Moreover, Blogger challenged students to explore an unfamiliar system. He felt it was important students learn out how to use an environment on their own. Students were directed to the Blogger Web site to set up their blogs and asked to share the URL with the rest of the class. Students were expected to investigate how to set up their blogs on their own. While students may not have felt comfortable doing a completely new task, all were able to master the blog setup. Entries were posted semiweekly. Because beats were interest-based rather than tied to geography, students often were able to find and tap into communities of interested amateurs in the blogosphere. Gaining recognition from and being accepted by these communities provided some students with additional feedback and resources in covering their beat. In one case, a student covering writings from The New Yorker was welcomed into the community of bloggers interested in the same topic. This beat reporter was able to establish himself as a promising rookie, giving him access to some of the most knowledgeable sources available. Hermida evaluated the entries himself every two or three weeks. Stories were assessed based on choice of topics, mechanics, and linking; commenting and feedback on peers’ blogs were not part of the evaluation. While students were aware of their peers’ blogs, they were under no obligation to read them. Some took it upon themselves to add the rest of the class to their blogrolls—collections of links to other blogs—while others spent only the time necessary to complete their posts. Impact on Teaching and Learning Students used blogs to publish beat stories twice a week. By emphasizing the disciplined approach to producing two stories a week rather than simply writing when the muse visited, Hermida challenged students to develop the discipline to meet production deadlines while simultaneously applying critical thinking skills in gathering and assessing potential stories. Students were challenged to find ways of relating stories to their beat in a concise manner and were asked to provide enough context for their stories through carefully chosen links. Hermida graded the entries for content (40 percent), mechanics (30 percent), and links (30 percent). When grading for content, Hermida looked for timely, interesting content that would captivate the audience. The mechanics portion of the grade emphasized professional quality spelling, grammar, and punctuation. Students received marks for links based on quality rather than number. Hermida took some satisfaction from the fact that one or two students were able to showcase their extraordinary talent through their blogs. On the strength of her blog, one student was able to get a summer job with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (Canadian Public Radio) to create one of the first blogs for a radio show. Reflection Hermida’s use of blogs to train journalism students illustrates the value of existing tools like Blogger for discipline-specific applications. Hermida noted that blogging was a multipurpose tool that could help with many disciplines. His course simply put it to work to teach journalism. Student use of blogs was variable. One or two had fantastic success with their blogs. Others used blogs only when necessary for the course. Hermida hoped that students would see the utility of the blogging tools and perhaps find uses for blogging in their other assignments including their graduate theses. Fitting a rigorous blogging regimen into an already busy class and assignment schedule proved to be difficult. Hermida noted that he might reduce the number of required postings in a future iteration.
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