Rush+Academy+Broadcast+News

**Project Title/Team Members**
A “Meta-curriculum” for High School News Literacy Education By David Moore, Denise Clay, Sam Srauy, Stacey Sullivan, and Yangzi Li

** Key Ideas from the Literature **
// Preliminary Literature Review // S. Sullivan

News literacy can be described as an offshoot or subdivision of the larger media literacy movement. The goal of news literacy is to foster critical analysis of media messages, both in print and broadcast news, to detect and understand propaganda, censorship and bias (Garber 2009). News literacy aims to hone student’s “critical thinking skills, re-teach the history of America’s fourth estate [the press], and start students on the lifetime search for reliable information,” as well as teach students how to be a participatory citizen of a democratic society (Miller 2010).

The difference between news literacy and media literacy is that media literacy calls attention to how the media’s structural forces—such as funding models, consolidation, commercial concerns, etc.—affect the information that is reported upon and how it is framed (Garber 2009). Renee Hobbs illuminates this point, “You cannot separate news literacy from advertising. It’s irresponsible to focus on the relations between reporters and sources and news value without positioning all of that in a larger context that has to do with increasing competition, the question of revenue streams, and the like” (Cited in Garber). However, some proponents of news literacy argue that such a strong focus on the commercial elements of the media foster more cynicism in students and a general sense of distrust in journalism rather than a healthy sense of skepticism of news messages (Garber 2009). Instead, news literacy is primarily concerned with teaching students to be able to distinguish and appreciate good, quality journalism. The reasoning behind this paradigm is that if students can recognize good journalism “even when there is no longer a reflexive trust in the vendors of journalism,” then they will continue to want to seek it out, and later also produce quality journalism of their own (Garber 2009).

The common thread connecting news literacy and media literacy is the emphasis on the cultivation of savvy information consumers and participatory democratic citizens (Garber 2009). However, Ralph Beliveau argues that current journalism pedagogy often places significant priority on learning //what// a journalist does over considering //why// the profession operates in a particular way (2009). A successful journalism course should promote the development of critical and reflective attitudes toward media while simultaneously teaching the historical and contextual background of media and journalistic practices (Beliveau 2009). Classroom pedagogies that stress the importance of rules, styles and technical skills without spending sufficient time developing critical literacy skills do a disservice to students who are consequently taught to approach journalism from a superficial and uncritical standpoint which they mistakenly understand as objective (Beliveau 2009). In contrast, instructors can implement a media literacy approach to teaching journalism where students are encouraged to analyze the economic, social and commercial structures of the media and how these forces frame the way a story is reported. Beliveau and others, namely Lewis and Jhally (1998) argue that journalism education is about more than just teaching students how to be sophisticated producers of news, and by incorporating media literacy it can teach students to become sophisticated citizens, and, in turn, increase the quality of the journalism that students produce (2009).

Works Cited: -Garber, Megan. “Leap of Faith.” //Columbia// //Journalism Review//. Jul/Aug 2009. 48 (2), p41-45. Database: Ebscohost -Beliveau, Ralph. “Literacy problems within skill solutions: index, contexts and critical journalism education.” //Journalism Practice.// 2009. 3(3), p335-346. Database: Ebscohost -Lewis, Justin. Jhally, Sut. “The Struggle over Media Literacy.” //Journal of Communication//. 1998. 48(1), p.109-120. -Miller, Dean. “Want better journalism? Boost News Literacy.”//Christian Science Monitor.// Jan. 2010. Database: Ebscohost.

By: Denise Clay

In order to understand what news literacy is it is important that students first understand what constitutes “news”. In their book //“The Elements of Journalism: What Newspeople Should Know and What the Public Should Expect”,// Bill Kovach, chairman of the Committee of Concerned Journalists and Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Project for Excellence in Journalism, define news as the need to be aware of things that are going on beyond your direct experience. According to Kovach and Rosenstiel, this need to know impacts how we as citizens relate to each other. (//Kovach and Rosenstiel, 1, 2007).//

Because of this, the role of the journalist is to gather that “beyond your doors” truth in a way that takes the responsibility journalists have to citizens into consideration, provides information that is truthful and can be verified as such while remaining interesting and relevant for those receiving said information. (//Kovach and Rosenstiel, 2007)//

However, one of the elements that Kovach and Rosenstiel discuss in their book, the responsibility that citizens have in relation to the news, is a far more crucial one than it ever has been due to the advent of the 24-hour news cycle and the technology that has made it possible. In their essay “The Future of News, The Future of Journalism”, John Carey and Nancy Hicks Maynard compare the accessibility that citizens have to news in the 21st Century to the advent of refrigeration and say that search engines like Yahoo! and Google are the equivalent of being able to defrost your news and consume it whenever you like, something that the students this curriculum is directed toward understand very well. (//Carey and Hicks Maynard, 2005)//

Another change in the way that “news” and “journalism” is being defined comes from the fact that anyone can gather or produce the news. Because of this, a long-held tenet of journalism, objectivity, is under siege. Since the news frontier has gotten wider and everyone has access to it, journalism as it once was is effectively over, according to media scholar Jay Rosen. Also, traditional journalists have a different idea of what constitutes the “truth” and how to go about getting it. (Singer, 2006)

Because of this, the news media itself has joined the chorus calling for those who consume it to be more conscious of what they are taking in. In their essay “What Kind of Press Does the Public Need?” Carolyn Marvin and Phillip Meyer say that not only should citizens hold those who produce the media they consume accountable for what they produce, they should feel free to tell the media where they have gone wrong and what they can do to correct themselves, something that the students accessing this curriculum could take part in. (Marvin and Meyer, 2005)

// Bibliography: // Kovach, Bill and Rosenstiel, Tom, //“The Elements of Journalism: What Newspeople Should Know and the Public Should Expect”,// Three Rivers Press, 2007 Carey, John and Hicks Maynard, Nancy, “The Future of News, The Future of Journalism” from //Institutions of American Democracy: The Press,// edited by Geneva Overholser and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Oxford University Press, 2005 Singer, Jane B., “Journalists and News Bloggers: Compliments, Contradictions and Challenges” from In //Uses of Blogs.// Ed. Axel Bruns and Joanne Jacobs.New York: Peter Lang, 2006. 23-32. Marvin, Carolyn and Meyer, Phillip, “What Kind of Press Does the Public Need?” from //Institutions of American Democracy: The Press,// edited by Geneva Overholser and Kathleen Hall Jamieson, Oxford University Press, 2005

**Big Research Question**
What constitutes a "meta-curriculum" from which news and media literacy can be taught in broadcast journalism programs?

What are some common features of "successful" broadcast journalism programs? What are the criteria for successful broadcast journalism programs? Does the explosion of news outlets on television and the internet change the way journalism is taught? Should it? Why or why not? Why is a meta-curriculum especially useful for middle-to-low budget schools, like Benjamin Rush High School?

**Research Design/Methods**
**By Sam Srauy


 * NOTE: interview Craig Santoro, csantoro@whyy.org, he's the head of the Learning Lab. ML outreach through WHYY who has met with Ben Hesse at BRush HS.**

=== ** Practices that are designed to increase the "media literacy" level of students are articulated within a community of scholars and practitioners. As such, an examination of what constitutes a "good" media literacy program must come from the field where the theater of real-life blurs the clarity offered by theory. Of course, the criteria that constitute a "good" media literacy program themselves must be argued. Thus, we use the theoretical frame of [name works that Yangzi recommends]. Furthermore, we recognize that any "meta-curriculum" needs to gives space for the experience and knowledge gained in the field by practitioners and educators. Thus, we used [Yangzi's theorists] arguments to identify 5(?) schools that we argue are "good" media literacy programs. We take these case studies and examine the points of intersection with [Yangzi's theorists] and the points of divergence that arise out of practice in the field. We argue that that by examining these intersections and divergences we can gain a fuller understanding of what a good media literacy program might look like. ** ===

=== ** In addition to the case studies, in depth interviews with the media literacy teachers in these cases provide insight into the contingencies that arise from parents, administration, students, and the teachers themselves. These contingencies provide insight into where the divergence between theory and practice lie. Yet, we understand that, as case studies, these cases exists within their own sphere of logic and must be understood as particulars. In discussing spheres of logic, we adopt Lyotard's (date) and Wittgenstein's notion of "language games" as self contained discursive spaces with their own narratives, which do not depend on any meta-narrative. We diverge from Lyotard and Wittgenstein in that we argue the "meta-narrative" of media literacy lie in the literature and the spheres of logic are merely the particular spaces of the case studies themselves. That is, as the literature outlines the universalizable aspects that should guide media literacy practices, these cases are particular instances of media literacy education. Where divergences from theory exist, we argue, illuminate these particularities. Therefore, we can only understand those particularities in regards to the sphere of logic presented by the individual programs. We, therefore, also conducted discursive analyses of texts that the schools produce about their respective programs to understand these spheres of logic. ** ===

=== ** Yet, any discussion of "successful" or "good" media literacy cases must be judged by the outcomes of those cases. That is, to discuss the structure of those cases is not useful unless an argument for the "goodness" of the products of those cases is explored. We do just that by examining the media literacy artifacts that the students produce in those programs in the light of [Yangzi's theorists'] conception of good media literacy. We, thus, argue that the artifacts of the media literacy programs in our case studies evince adequate material for analysis. ** ===

=== ** In sum, our methodological approach is qualitative. We performed a discursive analysis of texts which describe the cases' media literacy program to determine their spheres of logic. Within those spheres, we conducted in depth interviews to find the points of divergence the programs have with the broader media literacy literature. That is, we analyzed the particulars of those cases. Those particulars give us a frame in which we analyze student produced artifacts to examine the points of departure from the media literacy literature. The points in which we find intersection with the media literacy literature, we analyzed the notion of a "good" media literacy program. ** ===

= ** Approach to Analyzing the Data ** = We will be focusing on qualitative approach, namely documentary examining, case study, and student media production analyzing.

In the literature review part, we will be reading through all the texts we need, looking for key ideas, sorting the ideas, considering the conflicting themes (if any), critically pulling out the important concepts we need, and so forth. In the case study part, we will be categorizing the key features of the broadcasting journalism programs that we are going to examine. In terms of student media production analyzing, we will be doing "cut and sort", so that we would be able to identify how well the productions intersect with the key concepts of news literacy. At the same time, we will be defining the problems of the student productions.

**What New Knowledge is Expected to Result?**
-What are the similarities and differences between news literacy and media literacy? -What is the criteria on which to judge a broadcast journalism program successful? -What are the most effective tools in teaching news and media literacy in broadcast journalism courses? -How do young people in high school consume news, on average? What are their attitudes toward news? -How do students already use critical thinking skills when consuming news? How can media literacy improve this? -How can media literacy improve the quality of the students' production of their own news broadcasts? -How can broadcast journalism programs increase students' news and media literacy? How is this measured? -How can a media literacy centered broadcast journalism program improve the way that students consume news and produce news? -How do new media platforms, such as the internet, change the way broadcast journalism should be taught in the 21st Century?

**Why this New Knowledge is Important**
. This new knowledge will help us to create a 'meta-curriculum' that will be easy for teachers--who have more enthusiasm than resourses--to implement in broadcast journalism courses. The goal of this curriculum is to increase students' news and media literacy while teaching them the fundamentals of journalism and production.

The curriculum will provide a taxonomy of activities that can be shaped into specific lesson plans guided in part by student interest -- a set of "lesson types" that can be catered to different current events, local interests (school-wide or community-wide), and new and emerging broadcast media platforms.

**What New Questions are Likely to Emerge?**
-Will this 'meta-curriculum' be successfully implemented in other middle-to-low budget schools? -Will our criteria for evaluation be sufficient in measuing students' news and media literacy? -Can teachers with little MLE knowledge and experience successfully teach their students broadcast journalism from a media literacy standpoint? -How important is a large budget and access to numerous resources (cameras, sound equip, etc.) in creating a successful broadcast journalism program? What resources are absolutely necessary for a school to aquire before they can have a successful broadcast journalism program?