Hey, it’s 2008! Go to college and learn to become a print reporter!
Watch is amazing video promoting Conestoga College‘s journalism program.
Well, they do offer broadcast … here’s a list of their media courses. It must still be 1988 in Canada.
Not one mention of the web. Amazing.
Folks, this is what we’re teaching our kids.
” It must still be 1988 in Canada. ”
I protest, eh. Some of us up here actually mention the web every once in a while in the classroom. I teach in a print-based program, and for the past two weeks my blogging, Wired-Journalist-joining first-years have been diving head-on into their first audio slideshows and video reports.
This is what we teach “our kids,” too.
I don’t think many people realize how slowly schools are changing. I had one adviser tell me her chair said that putting the student newspaper’s videos on YouTube wasn’t journalism.
Having worked with several grads of the radio and television production programs, I can say that Conestoga does an excellent job of training students for the technical side. I can’t say how well they prepare people for the journalism side.
That said, I teach part-time at Humber College, a short trip down the highway, in Toronto and I believe they’re doing an excellent job of training journalists about the importance of having a solid multi-media experience. That said, you would be surprised at how resistant many students are to the idea that the web is equal to or more important than the print version of their work. The program coordinator can’t believe that old-school journalists like himself see the future (or present), but that the young students raised with YouTube and blogs don’t!
Personally, I believe a good journalist should be able to work in all media, and a good foundation of journalism skills is more important than specific technical skills. Then again, this is coming from someone who has a broadcast journalism diploma and a photojournalism diploma (and I had to teach myself internet media both times).