Online Courses, Summer 2018

Introduction to Journalism is a survey class that covers the basic principles and practices of contemporary journalism. By studying fundamentals like truth telling, fact checking, the First Amendment, diversity, the watchdog role of the press and public engagement, students will explore the role of the journalist in a democratic society. Students will also assess changes in the production, distribution and consumption of journalism through new technologies. Students will examine case studies across the media, and learn how different audiences, media and perspectives affect the news.

What is fact? What is fiction? Can we even tell the difference any more? Today's 24-hour news environment is saturated with a wide array of sources ranging from real-time citizen journalism reports, government propaganda and corporate spin to real-time blogging, photos and vidoes from around the world, as well as reports from the mainstream media. In this class, students will become more discerning consumers of news. Students will use critical-thinking skills to develop the tools needed to determine what news sources are reliable in the digital world. Through readings and assignments, students will deconstruct stories, breaking down broadcast, print, web, and social concepts such as objectivity, opinion, bias and fairness and how all contribute to the mix of news reports in today's digital landscape. 

Journalism 300 introduces students to basic reporting and newswriting skills, including interviewing, researching public records, fact-checking and much more. This class includes numerous reporting and writing assignments.

Prerequisite for matriculated UMass Amherst students: EngWrit 112. If you are not a regular UMass Amherst student and you would like to enroll in Journ 300, please contact the UMass CPE Records & Registration Office (413-545-3653 or regoff@cpe.umass.edu) as soon as possible. 

This is a required course to earn the Certificate of Journalism.

This course explores the challenges and issues facing journalists covering global affairs. Students will learn about intercultural communication, overcoming biases in reporting, and the use of social media as a platform for news reporting. They will also examine the work of foreign correspondents from a critical perspective. Through a mixture of readings and news writing, the course will broaden students' understanding of current affairs on the global stage.

This course addresses the principles and practices of public relations and strategic communication in the public, private, for-profit and no-profit arenas. Course includes lectures, readings, multimedia viewings and student-engaged, collaborative and classroom and online learning methods. 

The roles and responsibilities of today's PR practitioners are expanding. PR Professionals must understand and embrace how to integrate social media communications with overall business communications, learn different ways to engage with customers and other stakeholders and navigate a changing media landscape with new technology that drives consumer news consumption. This course examines the role of today's communicators who are developing new strategic approaches to the practice of PR.  Students will learn how to research and evaluate various types of 2.0 collaborative technologies, monitor conversations for reputation and crisis management, develop social media objectives and strategies for integrated communications programs, create and manage the social media communications process, identify opportunities to engage via different networks, develop content for deeper interactions with stakeholders, and use different types of measurement to gauge communications success.  The class will focus on how to align strategic PR and social media programs with higher level business goals and objectives.

Public relations writing requires a narrative arc and good storytelling in which essential information gets delivered, along with a feeling of positive connection to an organization. Students in this course will learn how to translate an institutional mission statement into various narratives. They will learn how to gather information in a complex environment, and how to evaluate that information according to constituency needs. Writing projects will be required ranging from basic press releases and news briefs to interviews, speeches, profiles, a roundtable report, a position paper, first-person essays, and possibly a full-length magazine feature story. Course materials will include examples of excellent magazine writing, and books and articles on effective public relations programs. 

Pre-requisite: Journalism 300 Newswriting and Reporting

Basic training in writing editorials, columns and broadcast commentary with an emphasis on political and social policies. How to encourage the persuaded, nudge the neutral and discomfit the opposition. The ability to write quickly will be stressed. Several short (two-page) papers. Prerequisite: Journ 300 or permission of the instructor.

This combines the text work of John Brady's anecdotal Craft of Interviewing and The Interviewer's Handbook with decades of reporter tips and scientific studies to provide a framework to develop professional interviewing skills. Students will learn interview preparation skills, reading body language, pacing tactics, the psychiatric basis for information storage and retrieval, listening skills, physiological causes for certain responses, statistical parameters of certain reactions. Police and military interrogation skills are combined with reporters' tips and psychological studies to better prepare students to conduct efficient and accurate interviews. 

This course will develop an understanding of the ethical questions raised by media coverage in a democratic society at a time of focus on profit over news values and on entertainment over substance. Issues discussed will include: accuracy and fairness, diversity, conflicts of interest, privacy, deception, relationships with sources and photojournalism. We will also learn to identify news values--or lack of them--both as professionals and as consumers. Satisfies the Integrative Experience requirement for BA-Journ majors. 

This class will help you learn what makes magazine journalism different from newspaper journalism. Unlike newspaper writing, magazines often demand that a journalist bring both authority and a point of view to the work. We workshop each student's paper, so each student is expected to think as an editor as well as a writer. There is substantial reading required from magazine anthologies, plus your fellow students' work. We will learn how to do the type of research necessary to produce a magazine article, and work hard to improve writing and analytical skills. Weekly writing and reporting assignments, plus one 3000-4000 word magazine feature that will require extensive field work and interviewing.