The Student Newspaper Survival Guide

Rachele Kanigel is an Associate Professor of Journalism at San Francisco State University, where she advises Golden Gate [X]press, the award-winning student newspaper, and teaches reporting, writing and new media courses. She has directed summer multimedia study-abroad programs in Italy and France with the Institute for Education in International Media (ieiMedia). Professor Kanigel was a newspaper reporter for 15 years for daily newspapers, including The Oakland Tribune and The News & Observer of Raleigh, NC, and was a freelance correspondent for TIME magazine. In 2006 she was named Journalism Educator of the Year, Four-Year Division, by the California Journalism Education Coalition.

Preface xii Acknowledgments xiv

1 THE ROLE OF THE STUDENT PRESS 3

TIPS FROM A PRO Susan Goldberg 5

REFLECTIONS OF A COLLEGE NEWSPAPER EDITOR Ed Ronco 9

2 RECRUITING AND TRAINING YOUR STAFF 13

TIPSHEET Training your staff 15

CHECKLIST Planning a training workshop 16

Q&A Miguel M. Morales 18

Appendix 2.A Training exercises 20

3 COVERING A CAMPUS 23

CHECKLIST Covering a beat 27

TIPSHEET How to fi nd story ideas 28

TIPSHEET Covering meetings 35

TIPS FROM A PRO Mike Donoghue 36

4 REPORTING 43

TIPSHEET Student journalists share advice on covering a campus shooting 46

TIPSHEET Evaluating information on the Web 49

TIPSHEET Interviewing 51

CHECKLIST Reporting for accuracy 54

5 NEWSWRITING 57

TIPSHEET Writing ledes 60

TIPSHEET Newswriting 62

CHECKLIST Self-editing 64

6 THE LIFESTYLE PAGES 67

CHECKLIST Profi le writing 69

TIPS FROM THE PROS Debby Herbenick and Jennifer Bass 72

Q&A Josie Roberts 72

7 SPORTSWRITING 77

CHECKLIST The game story 79

Q&A Adam Rubin 86

TIPS FROM A PRO Joe Gisondi 88

8 ARTS AND ENTERTAINMENT WRITING 91

Q&A Roger Ebert 93

CHECKLIST Entertainment review 94

TIPS FROM A PRO Sean McCourt 94

Q&A Rob Owen 96

9 OPINION PAGES 99

CHECKLIST The editorial 105

TIPS FROM A PRO Jill "J.R." Labbe 105

Q&A Nate Beeler 108

10 EDITING 111

TIPS FROM A PRO Steve Buttry 114

CHECKLIST Editing a story 118

TIPS FROM A PRO Becky Sher 124

11 INVESTIGATIVE REPORTING 137

TIPS FROM A PRO John Frank 144

TIPSHEET A dozen ways to avoid being burned by a hot story 145

Q&A Matt Waite 147

12 PHOTOJOURNALISM 151

CHECKLIST Photo editing 161

TIPS FROM A PRO Kenneth Kobré 161

CHECKLIST Writing cutlines 164

13 LEGAL ISSUES 167

TIPS FROM A PRO James M. Wagstaffe 169

CHECKLIST Newspaper theft 172

CHECKLIST Legal issues 176

Q&A Student Press Law Center on copyright and fair use 177

14 ETHICAL ISSUES 181

TIPS FROM A PRO Harry Kloman 184

TIPSHEET Dealing with potentially controversial content 191

REFLECTIONS ON AN ETHICAL DILEMMA Joel Elliott 192

15 STARTING A NEW NEWSPAPER 197

Q&A George Srour 203

16 DESIGN AND GRAPHICS 207

CHECKLIST Designing for content 208

TIPSHEET Good page design 211

TIPSHEET Creating a design style guide 214

CHECKLIST Page layout 216

CASE STUDY Anatomy of a newspaper redesign 217

Q&A Emmet Smith 218

17 WEBSITES 223

Newspaper or news organization? 224

CHECKLIST Breaking news shift 225

TIPSHEET Breaking news online 226

TIPSHEET Writing breaking news 230

CHECKLIST The newspaper website 231

TIPS FROM A PRO Jake Ortman 236

18 MULTIMEDIA STORYTELLING 241

TIPSHEET Multimedia reporting 243

CHECKLIST Multimedia equipment 244

TIPSHEET Audio reporting 245

TIPSHEET Shooting video 249

19 SOCIAL MEDIA 257

TIPS FROM A PRO Josh Shannon 263

TIPSHEET Twitter for journalists 265

20 ADVERTISING AND MARKETING 271

TIPS FROM A PRO Kami Hammerschmith 274

Q&A Leigh Sabey 282

APPENDIX 1 Associated Press style cheat sheet 285

APPENDIX 2 Contests for student journalists 289

Index 293