Media Reform conference

• Posted by Bob Stewart in From the Front Office on 05/9/2008

The student members of Athens Free Press have organized the 2nd annual media reform conference, "We STILL Want Better Media." The conference begins will the viewing of a Scripps grad student documentary, "A Soldier’s Peace."

The conference runs May 9-10, 2008. For more information, visit the AFP Web site.

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On getting ready to be a freshman Bobcat

• Posted by Bob Stewart in Freshmen Experience on 05/3/2008
• tags: prepping for college

This past year I had a facebook group for the freshman class. I didn’t use it to "friend" students -- which seems to me to cross some important boundaries (call me old fashioned). Rather, I used it to post announcements and news, send messages to all group members, etc.

Problem is, not every freshman wants to use facebook, so I ended up having to email all freshmen each time I sent out a message to the facebook group. Double the effort for no particular pay off.

I am going to use a blog to communicate messages to this year’s freshmen. So, let’s get started. I received the following email (name removed):

My name is _______, and I was accepted into your Journalism program in January. I’m very pleased to have the opportunity to write the Associate Director of my school an email. My second semester has been overflowing with excitement about finally making it to college, and I can’t say enough about how proud I am to be a future Bobcat freshman.

I have been putting in overtime with my school newspaper, for which I’m sports editor, laying out pages and reporting events around my school.

My number one question for you would be - What are some of the best things for me to try and accomplish during the early stages of my education at Scripps? - I appreciate your assistance and look forward to hearing from you again.

My answer:

Great to hear from you... And great to hear that you are really devoted to your education and professional development.

I have three specific suggestions:

1. get involved in Gridiron Glory on WOUB... It is a prep-school football program in the fall, and great way to get involved in sports journalism -- regardless of whether you are interested in print/broadcast/online/etc.

2. tackle your coursework with vigor, so that you have a great 1st quarter in academic terms. Sometimes it is hard to recover from a dismal first quarter experience.

3. get involved in one of the student organizations in the jschool... SPJ, RTNDA, etc... It’s a great way to meet upperclassmen and find mentors among the student body.

Make sense?

I look forward to meeting you when you get here.

Check this blog periodically for more about the freshman experience in the jschool.

Prof. Stewart

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Meet the JSchool’s Pre-College Student Adviser

• Posted by Bob Stewart in From the Front Office on 04/25/2008

Amy Wright will be this year’s Pre-College student adviser for incoming freshmen. In this interview Amy talks about her own Pre-College experience as well as how she’s preparing to advise next year’s freshmen.

Important Dates:

housing contracts are due May 1

registration for Pre-College begins May 27

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OU Ad Club wins District 5 competition

• Posted by Bob Stewart in From the Front Office on 04/21/2008
• tags: Ad Club, advertising

April 19 -- Ohio University’s Advertising Association team won first place at the American Advertising Federation District 5 National Student Advertising Competition held in Lexington, KY.

[Front (L to R): Michelle Haidet, Megan Kosicki, Ellen Cox, Liz Follet and Katelyn Mooney; Back (L to R): Laura Marczika, Prof. Hong Cheng, Ryan Dease, Laurel Wiencek, Lauren Miller, Prof. Craig Davis and Victor Rasgaitis]

Twelve teams from universities and colleges in Ohio, Kentucky, and West Virginia participated in this year’s competition. As the first-place winner, the OUAA team will represent AAF District 5 to compete at the national finals in Atlanta in June.

[(L to R): Ryan Dease, Lauren Miller, Liz Follet, Katelyn Mooney and Victor Rasgaitis]

"The students have worked so hard since last fall on this competition and the five presenters did so well yesterday. Everyone of us was thrilled," according to Prof. Hong Cheng, one of the co-advisers (with Prof. Craig Davis) for Ad Club.

[OUAA’s Ellen Cox received this year’s only scholarship ($1,000) from AAF District 5, presented by AAF’s John McCafferty.]

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Amazing internship experiences

• Posted by Bob Stewart in From the Front Office on 04/17/2008
• tags: internships

In this post I want to tell you about three students’ internship experiences. Each of these student’s has a remarkable story to tell -- the story of how an internship shaped his or her journalism education.

Julia Marino (BSJ ’07) recently completed an internship in Africa with the Common Language Project. Her internship was funded with a John R. Wilhelm internship program scholarship through the journalism school.

Here’s one of the projects Marino produced while in Africa. [visit the Pulitzer Center for more information]

Carla Saavedra-Santiago is a senior in the News Writing and Editing sequence. In this video Carla describes two paid internships she had during her years at OU, as well as other internships offered to Scripps students.

Garrett Downing is a second year student in the jschool. This past winter quarter he interned with washingtonpost.com in DC. In this video Garrett describes what he learned about the future of journalism and how to prepare for it.

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OU’s Tatge Awarded Reynolds Center Fellowships

• Posted by Bob Stewart in From the Front Office on 04/17/2008

TEMPE -- The Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism has awarded 12 fellowships apiece to its weeklong "Business Journalism Professors Seminar" and "Strictly Financials Seminar" for working journalists, both to be held in Jan. 7-10 in Tempe, Ariz.

Educators and journalists from around the nation were selected from a large pool of applicants for these two training events. They will be held concurrently at the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University, where the Reynolds Center is headquartered.

The seminar for professors covers essentials of teaching a hands-on course on financial, economic and writing aspects of the field. The financials seminar for journalists features training in financials, from stock markets and bonds to financial statements and company research. Fellowships cover all seminar expenses.

"The success of last year’s inaugural Business Journalism Professors Seminar encouraged us to repeat it," said Andrew Leckey, Director of the Reynolds Center. "We initiated the Strictly Financials seminar as a direct answer to many requests received from business journalists who wanted to learn how to dig deeper into the intricacies of how companies operate."

Fellows chosen for the "Business Journalism Professors Seminar" are:

Annie-Laurie Blair, Miami University of Ohio

Laura Castaneda, University of Southern California

Roger Desmond, University of Hartford

Dr. Martin Edu, Grambling State University

Lynn Holley, University of Illinois

Dr. Ed Lenert, University of Nevada, Reno

Shaheen Pasha, American University in Cairo

Mark Vamos, Southern Methodist University

Georgiana Vines, University of Tennessee

Leslie Whitaker, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee

Timothy Gibbons, University of North Florida

Mark Tatge, Ohio University

The "Strictly Financials" fellows are:

Hanah Cho, The Sun in Baltimore

Roberta "Robbie" DiMesio, The Oregonian

Nell Luter Floyd, The Clarion-Ledger, Jackson, Miss.

Delawese Fulton, The State, Columbia, S.C.

John Gittelsohn, The Orange County Register

Angela Gonzales, The Business Journal of Phoenix

Traci Gregory, The Mohawk Valley Business Journal

Beth Kassab, Orlando Sentinel

David Morrill, Bay Area News Group, Walnut Creek, Calif.

Stefanie Murray, Ann Arbor News

Denis Paiste, New Hampshire Union Leader

Kristen Tatti, Northern Colorado Business Report

More than 6,000 working journalists around the country over the past four years have taken part in workshops, online seminars and online tutorials of the Donald W. Reynolds National Center for Business Journalism. More information about the Center can be found on its Web site, www.BusinessJournalism.org.

The Center is funded by the Donald W. Reynolds Foundation, a national philanthropic organization founded in 1954 by the late media entrepreneur for whom it is named. Headquartered in Las Vegas, Nevada, it is one of the largest private foundations in the United States.

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Important calendar reminders

• Posted by Bob Stewart in From the Front Office on 04/17/2008
• tags: calendar

TUESDAY, APRIL 22

Last day to apply for graduation for spring quarter

WEDNESDAY, APRIL 30

Journalism Day (schedule to be posted)

MONDAY, MAY 12

Academic advising begins for fall quarter registration for continuing students (contact advisor/college/department/school/regional campus student services office as appropriate)

MONDAY, MAY 19

Fall quarter priority registration begins

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You heard it here!

• Posted by Bob Stewart in From the Front Office on 04/7/2008
• tags: freshmen experience

In Prof. Hodson’s current blog you can read about three freshmen journalism students who have made the most of their "year 1" at Ohio University. I’m including in this blog post interviews with Caleb Troop, Allie LaForce and Brian Boesch.

Caleb Troop is in his first year of study in Ohio University’s E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. In this interview he tells JSchool director Tom Hodson about experience he is gaining as a freshman.

Allie LaForce is a freshman at Ohio University, majoring in journalism in the Honors Tutorial College and the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. JSchool director Tom Hodson interviewed LaForce during the first week of spring quarter.

Brian entered Ohio University in the Fall of 2007. He’s in the Honors Tutorial College with a journalism major. Prof. Tom Hodson, director of the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism, interviewed Brian prior to a basketball game at Ohio University.

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JSchool freshman featured by Yahoo Sports

• Posted by Bob Stewart in From the Front Office on 04/2/2008
• tags: Allie LaForce

She dazzled them with her looks, impressed them with her posture and used her personality to win their respect. And, heck, if judges in the 2005 Miss Teen USA pageant had asked Allie LaForce to make a free throw, you can bet she would have done that, too.

By Jason King, Yahoo Sports. Used with permission.

Anyone who likes girls who are into sports will surely be a fan of Allie, who feels as comfortable in her Ohio University basketball uniform as she did her Miss Teen USA crown. Along with being one of the most striking women in college basketball, Allie is also one of the most well-rounded.

She was valedictorian of her senior class at Vermilion (Ohio) High School, where she starred in basketball, softball and volleyball. Now a freshman walk-on at Ohio U, Allie is studying journalism with the hopes of becoming a sideline reporter or play-by-play analyst once her basketball career ends. She’s also maintained her involvement with the various charity organizations she worked with during her reign as Miss Teen USA.

"Not exactly," said Allie, when asked if her life had calmed down during the last year. "It was crazy being Miss Teen USA, but things are still pretty crazy. I’ve got a lot of things to keep me busy, but I like it that way."

Luckily Allie penciled in a few minutes to chat with me before Sunday’s Super Bowl.

KOTR: How has college basketball gone for you thus far?

ALLIE: So far so good. We’re No. 1 in the MAC right now, so you can’t get better than that. We’ve won six games in a row.

KOTR: How much different is the college game from the high school game?

ALLIE: It was an easy transition for me, mainly because the coaches and the girls on the team were so welcoming and so helpful. The level of play is definitely a lot harder than high school, but it’s all been very rewarding. It’s awesome to play with people that understand the game. In high school you have people playing for a lot of different reasons. It’s not always because they love basketball. In college everyone loves it and everyone is dedicated. That’s the best part about it.

KOTR: Why did you pick Ohio University?

ALLIE: I came to Ohio University for the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism. My AAU coaches and I were in contact with the basketball coaches here. There was an open tryout. I knew that if I didn’t give it a shot that I’d regret it. Luckily it worked out well.

KOTR: How active have you been in the journalism school?

ALLIE: I’m trying to get as much hands-on journalism experience as I can. There are so many opportunities here. I’m doing morning sports radio right now. I go to high school basketball games and film them and report on them. I’m playing basketball on top of that and I just transferred into the Honors Tutorial College, so there’s going to be an extra workload.

KOTR: Have you decided what field of journalism you want to enter, or are you still in the experimentation stage?

ALLIE: I’m still in the experimentation stage. I think sports broadcasting is what I want to focus on. After college, I won’t be playing basketball anymore, but I want to keep it in my life. So broadcasting is something I’d enjoy. I think it’s great that women are getting more and more opportunities to be seen and heard in the sports industry. I can see myself being a sideline reporter or doing play-by-play. Play-by-play may be further down the road, but I can see myself doing sideline stuff right now.

KOTR: What are some parallels between competing in a beauty pageant and a basketball game?

ALLIE: There’s a lot of pressure because you’re out there in front of a big group of people. The preparation is (tough) too. When I won Miss Ohio I did it with almost no preparation whatsoever. I wasn’t expecting to win. I just did it to mix things up from sports a little bit. But for Miss Teen USA … that was on national television, so I wanted to be prepared. There was a lot of preparation that went into it as far as walking technique, sit-ups, jogging, eating healthy, interview questions … it goes on and on.

KOTR: What was the toughest part?

ALLIE: The interview, just because the walking and the dancing is all something we rehearsed for 18 days. We practiced from early on the morning until late at night. In the end it was like riding a bike for us. It was nothing. The interview was something we never practiced. You are who you are. There’s no teaching involved. So it was nerve-wracking, because you had no idea what they were going to ask you. Plus, the contestants write the questions, and no one was going to (reveal) what they wrote.

KOTR: What did you talk about during the interview?

ALLIE: They asked me about the all-guys baseball team I was on when I was younger. I told this story about how I drove in the game-winning run in a championship game. The crowd went crazy. They loved it. I was the only girl on the team and those boys weren’t expecting me to get a hit. All of a sudden those guys were my friends.

KOTR: Why did you enter the pageant?

ALLIE: My mom was Miss Ohio in 1977. One day she said, ’I think you should enter the Miss Ohio pageant. I think it would be fun for you. Just treat it like it’s a (sports) camp. Go meet some girls, have fun doing something that’s out of your comfort zone.’ There were no expectations of winning and I didn’t tell many people I was doing it. There were a handful of my family members that came and I didn’t have any of my friends come.

KOTR: Then you went on to win Miss Teen USA before your junior year of high school. What were some of the perks?

ALLIE: The day after I won I was on a plane to New York City to see my Manhattan apartment (laughing). Just imagine a junior in high school, from a small town, going to live in a Manhattan apartment. The day I got there it was a big publicity day. There were a bunch of different TV shows and radio tours. It was exciting. I got to go overseas twice. I went to Germany and visited a military base and interacted with some of the sons and daughters of the men and women who are deployed. Then I went to China for a bridal fashion show. I missed 60 days of school. Thankfully my high school was very cooperative. I got all my homework assignments before I left and then I’d do them on the plane or in the car. I still graduated as valedictorian, so it was worth it.

KOTR: Tell me about some of the charities you worked with?

ALLIE: I did a lot of work with the Sparrow Club and Best Buddies. I did a 90-mile bike ride with Best Buddies. It was on a tandem bike and I had a ’best buddy,’ which is a person with a mental disability that you help. You become one of their best friends. You’re there for them. You’re their buddy. My buddy was named Katie and she’s a victim of Down’s Syndrome. We rode 90 miles together on a tandem bike. It was awesome. It was featured on NBC. One time our pedal broke off and we were sitting on the side of the road until a repair team came and fixed our bike. We really had a chance to bond. We still talk to each other. She’s an awesome girl.

KOTR: Sounds as if you had some rewarding experiences that will stick with you. What do your new teammates and classmates say about your time as Miss Teen USA?

ALLIE: When I first got here the basketball girls didn’t know me, so they just called me Miss America. I wasn’t Allie or anything. I was just Miss America. Most people don’t know that there’s a difference between Miss America and Miss USA. I just laughed about it. It was a funny joke between us. They still call me that from time to time.

RELATED LINKS:

player bio: Allie LaForce (OU Women’s Basketball)
Yahoo story

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First-year Opportunities Abound

• Posted by Tom Hodson in Director Hodson’s Blog on 04/2/2008
• tags: freshman, sports journalism

Potential first-year students and their parents often ask me about opportunities available for new students to get involved in journalistic enterprises early in their academic careers. The answer is simple. There are plenty.

Opportunities abound for first-year students at the E. W. Scripps School to get involved in co-curricular and extra-curricular journalistic activities in all media about all subjects.

This year, it is certainly true of students who are interested in sports journalism. I can personally tell you about three first-year students who have excelled during their first two academic quarters.

Caleb Troop traveled to us from St. Louis. While in high school, he had his own sports Web site and reported on sports for various high schools around his home area.

Before coming to campus this past fall, Caleb laid groundwork to launch his professional career in the Athens area. He secured a once-a-week sports column position for the twice-a-week newspaper, The Athens News. He started his column during his first week on campus.

I came to college with a strong amount of experience, in high school, so I felt that the sky was the limit if I worked hard. That said, not once did I think I would be involved to the extent that I am currently. While I have been fortunate with the connections I have made, without a doubt the school and the city that surrounds it allows for boundless opportunities. -- Caleb Troop [read full interview]

He also started a sports blog (troopsports.com), quickly building the reputation of breaking big sports stories before other local media. He became an authority on football recruits and is often quoted in various media outlets for his accurate and breaking stories.

During his first academic quarter, Troop also began doing play-by-play of high school football games on 970 WATH radio, a local commercial station (also available at 970wath.com). This continued throughout basketball season as Troop became the play-by-play voice of Athens High School sports.

Additionally, Troop and a fourth-year student Jimmy Smith began to do pre-game shows on WATH and WXTQ radio for all Ohio University home football games and all Ohio University Mid-American Conference home basketball games.

In January, Troop and Smith began a one-hour five-night-a-week telephone sports call-in show on WATH radio called The Sportsfan. (also available at thesportsfan.mypodcast.com). They’ve interviewed top local, regional and national sports figures and broadcasters, broken several top university sports stories and lead the way in high quality local sports reporting.

Troop was not yet finished. During Winter Quarter at Ohio University, he produced about 30 three-minute audio interview packages for the pre-game shows for Ohio University Women’s Basketball. He did color analysis for two women’s games and as a first-year student, he actually called the play-by-play of Division I women’s basketball," doing the Ohio v. Bowling Green game in February for the Ohio Bobcats Sports Network.

This Spring Quarter Troop will be sharing the broadcast booth with Smith to call Ohio University Division I baseball games. Remember, Troop has been at Ohio University all of two academic quarters.

Brian Boesch, a journalism major and an Honors Tutorial College student from Medina, Ohio, also is making a name for himself in sports journalism. As a first-year student, he emerged as the chief color analyst for Ohio University Women’s basketball during Winter Quarter. He also is blogging for Bobcatblogs.net, a new sports blog he helped found to cover Ohio University sports.

Before coming to Ohio University and to Scripps, I had very little journalism experience. I had been the sports editor of my school newspaper and had covered my high school’s football team, but these jobs did not offer much preparation. Despite my lack of experience, I jumped right in at WOUB. By the end of fall quarter, I was covering a few games around the Athens area. Once winter quarter began, I was cleared for morning radio, and I was continuing to report some games. -- Brian Boesch [read full interview]

Boesch also is traveling with the Ohio University baseball team this Spring Quarter and is broadcasting the team’s away league games in the Mid-American Conference. That’s right. A first-year student is doing play-by-play broadcasting of Division I college baseball.

This diligent work also has landed Boesch an internship this summer as media coordinator for the Southern Ohio Copperheads baseball team. This team is part of the wooden-bat Great Lake Summer League sponsored by Major League Baseball.

Boesch will be in charge of the team’s entire media operations and he also will be broadcasting all of the team’s away games via the Internet.

Boesch has accomplished all of this plus he has worked for WOUB Sports on radio and he maintains a stellar academic record.

Finally, Allie LaForce, from Vermillion, Ohio, has lived both sports and sports broadcasting during her first-year. LaForce is a journalism major recently admitted to the Honors Tutorial College based upon her outstanding academic performance while in the Scripps School.

LaForce, the 2005 Miss Teenage America, has spent time in front of the camera because of her former crown and also has earned her way as a sports reporter and correspondent for Sports Zone, a student broadcast vehicle on campus. LaForce also has trained as a reporter for WOUB and had the early morning sports shift at the radio station during winter break.

On a ten point scale, ten being the best, I would rate my opportunities as a ten. Professors, students, and alumni have done a wonderful job informing me of all of the opportunities that Scripps has to offer. On top of that, I have been embraced by each local media organization to become an active participant. -- Allie LaForce [read full interview]

LaForce not only reported about sports during her first-year but has participated as well. During Fall Quarter, she was informed that she made the Ohio University women’s basketball team as a walk-on. She practiced all season with the Bobcats and was with the team for all 33 games from November through the first part of March.

Now that the season is over, LaForce will head back to the broadcast booth in earnest to hone her broadcasting skills.

Although we have highlighted these three students as examples of what can be done by first-year students, they are not the only students who are producing top-flight journalistic products. There are many first-year students working at The Post, WOUB Radio and Television, speakeasymag.com, poisefashion.com, and Backdrop Magazine.

We invite all potential students to explore the journalistic experiences that can be garnered quickly here at the E. W. Scripps School of Journalism. The results will amaze you.

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