Continuing Ed
Poynter's NewsU offers journalism training 24-7
The growing reach of the Internet has changed the nature of job training and career development. Training no longer is limited to in-person contact, either by trainers coming onsite or by managers and employees traveling to seminars and conferences.
The Internet is increasingly popular as a delivery system for training – through Webinars, online courses that use instructors, Webcasts and readings, as well as interaction among participants in discussion groups. One of the fastest-growing sites for journalism e-learning is News University (www.newsu.org), a project of The Poynter Institute funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation.
While this isn’t the first attempt at electronic journalism training, News University’s style of e-learning reflects the Internet revolution that is reshaping the industry and news consumers. NewsU offers a different kind of online training. It delivers training for journalists anytime, anywhere.
Findings from a 2004 study about journalism training, conducted by Urban & Associates Inc. for The Poynter Institute and News University, demonstrated that the media industry not only needs greater training resources, but also demands it.
News University used data from the 2004 survey as the blueprint for its e-learning format. More than half of all respondents said that the most important motivator in stimulating interest in e-learning is “the ability to take the course whenever your schedule allows.” Sixty percent of respondents said they would be most likely to access online training at home – either after work or on weekends. Fifty-four percent of respondents said they would have less than one hour a day to spend with an online training program, and an additional 42 percent said they would have between one to three hours a day.
Respondents gave equal weight to other benefits of e-learning, including flexibility of access, technical help, one-on-one feedback and low cost.
The Approach
To meet this broad range of expectations, NewsU courses are developed along several key principles:
• Tightly focused. Rather than a 16-week course about writing better stories, NewsU courses focus on a specific craft skill such as interviewing or writing better leads.
• Short time commitment. To encourage participants to complete NewsU courses, most modules take just an hour or two to complete.
• Engaging activities. Interactivity is fundamental to NewsU training. Most courses allow participants to assess their skills as they go and specifically target their training needs. Courses use quizzes, games and other interactivity to teach. Participants learn from both “right” and “wrong” answers.
• Visual appeal. NewsU uses bright, modern colors, strong visuals, Flash-based animations, simulations and movies that appeal to all age groups.
• Continual resource. Courses include links for additional readings, contacts and other resources participants can review anytime, whether to refresh their knowledge of a particular skill or to help them with an assignment on deadline.
• Accessible with any Internet connection and platform. No special software is needed to participate in training. NewsU’s courses are Web-based and can be used on both PC and Macintosh platforms. Depending on the course, a high-speed or broadband connection might be important for the learning experience. Many of the courses require the Flash player plug-in.
• Availability. Most courses are self-directed. Participants can work through them at their own pace.
• Cost-effective. Most courses are free. Those with more faculty interaction charge a modest fee. The goal is to keep costs reasonable for both individuals and news organizations with limited resources.
Four Types of E-Learning
NewsU offers the following:
• Self-directed learning modules. These are the ultimate in e-learning flexibility. Users can start and stop whenever they like, progressing entirely at their own pace and going back as many times as they want to review the material. The courses make use of interactive technology, so they’re more engaging than a mere collection of Web pages and links.
• Group seminars. Participants gather in a virtual space, logging in from anywhere, day or night, over the course of several days or weeks. A faculty member guides the group through material, moderates discussions and provides individual feedback.
• E-seminars. These are live seminars or events broadcast over the Internet. Users can tune in from their computers at work or at home and ask questions in real time. Recordings of these seminars are also available as self-directed learning modules.
• Seminar snapshots. These are edited highlights of seminar presentations at The Poynter Institute.
Learn on the Go
In just two years, NewsU has grown to more than 35,000 registered users. Findings from user evaluations show that 72 percent rated courses as useful to extremely useful. Eighty-five percent said they would be likely to participate in another course. Seventy-seven percent said half to all of the course content was helpful in their jobs, while 28 percent said all of the content was helpful. Seventy-two percent said they would recommend NewsU to a colleague.
“We have some very happy e-learning participants,” says Howard Finberg, director of interactive learning at The Poynter Institute and the head of News University. “People like what we do, and there’s no certificate of completion; the greater value in taking a course is to learn something.”
Matt Tullis is a reporter at The Columbus (Ohio) Dispatch. He has taken “Anatomy of a Newspaper: Understanding the Business,” “Beat Basics and Beyond” and “On the Beat: Covering Cops and Crime.”
“I found all three really beneficial,” he says. The training budget at his previous small-market papers was small, he adds. “You have to get up and running quickly. It’s learn what you can while you’re doing the job. I check periodically for new courses or others that might not necessarily fit me but might help others out. I’m not an editor, but I like to help other reporters. I also teach college English – I guess I’m always trying to teach here, too.”
Melissa G. Baggett, who is on a fellowship in Macedonia teaching English to journalists on advanced, intermediate and basic levels, says she’s particularly drawn by the graphics.
“I’m big on diagrams and the like when teaching, and how many of these lessons distill vast amounts of information into teachable bits,” she said. “I could have my students do grammar exercises and study the AP Stylebook, but ultimately there are a few more important points that I want them to remember. I think NewsU is doing a good job of filtering what’s more important from what’s less important.”
What’s Next?
The NAA Foundation is currently working with NewsU on the creation of a module to help youth editors and scholastic advisers train the students who write for them. It will be launched later this year.
Among the courses that NewsU is developing are: privacy issues for broadcasters; introduction to headline writing; telling stories with sound; and obituary writing.
In addition, NewsU is exploring international alliances so that its content could be translated into other languages.
Beyond the potential for educating journalists around the world, Beth Parke of the Society of Environmental Journalists says she believes e-learning programs such as NewsU could help bloggers, podcasters and the general public better understand journalistic standards.
“As we move into the era of who’s a journalist – it’s getting fuzzier as the media changes,” says Parke, the society’s executive director. “Eric Newton [of the Knight Foundation] recently wrote that just because you give a person a first-aid kit doesn’t make them a doctor. Reporting means legwork, research, assistance and talking to sources. Anything that helps train the society in general about what journalism is is a good thing. I think e-learning absolutely meets a need. It’s like homework – the good students want extra homework so they get better.”
That is Finberg’s point exactly. “The very best journalists never stop learning,” he says.
Top 10 NewsU Courses
- Cleaning Your Copy
- The “Be a Reporter” Game
- The Interview
- The Lead Lab
- The Writer’s Workbench: 50 Tools You Can Use
- Get Me Rewrite: The Craft of Revision
- News Sense: The Building Blocks of News
- Math for Journalists
- Language of the Image
- Beat Basics and Beyond
