A new kind of Homecoming

Each Mizzou Homecoming has been special. Freshman year of college, it was the fascination of the campus decorations, campus-wide spirit and watching all of your hard work and "pomping hours" pay off. Sophomore year, ESPN Gameday came, Mizzou beat Oklahoma and we rushed the field. Junior year, it was the Homecoming Centennial, bringing thousands of alumni back, and I had the opportunity to serve on the committee and celebrate with my family. So how could all of that be topped this year? As a senior, technically 1st year grad student, I can't say I was very involved in the preparations. I didn't pomp or put boards up all night for house decorations. It was my first year watching the parade instead of being in it. And I haven't been working since last March with preparations for Homecoming weekend like I did last year.

But Homecoming gained a special meaning this year; it was the first time alumni that I'm close friends with all came back. All of my best friends at school's families come into town and tailgate together, and my mom was able to come in too. I got to meet up with my Mojo team who I spent so much time with last semester, sorority sisters and other friends from activities who I now realize I won't get to see too often in the near future.

Me, Chris, Lexi and Natasha having a Mojo reunion at Big 12

All of this makes it one of the best weekends of the year. It's nice to break apart the phrase and think about it literally: all of the alumni and families come home - to see their friends, kids, alma mater. Everything else is just the icing on top of the cake- with the tailgating, house decorations, parade and nights at the bars- facilitating all the fun. I look forward to coming back next year and seeing not only campus, but my best friends and their families!

Mom and I tailgating before the game

Twainers and families in town at the tailgate

Convergence Final Project

Now that we are done with the upfront work in my convergence class, we end the semester with a final project applying all of the multimedia lessons learned. For this project, I am in a group of 3 students that will produce a multimedia project on a story topic of our choice. As we approach the end of the semester, here are my goals for the finished product:

• Keep all reporting with a journalistic purpose. In class, we have been talking a lot about having a journalistic mission. While multimedia reporting, it's easy to get distracted from the story's purpose and acquire the best footage. Therefore, I aim to keep each multimedia component of our story on track. 

• Improve my video recording skills. Video reporting was particularly difficult for me- especially filming sequences. I hope to practice this and walk away with some solid video. 

• Shoot photos and capture good moments. After learning a lot about photojournalism during the beginning of the semester, I hope to apply these skills and really contribute some good visuals to our project. Both of my partners' strengths are in video filming, so I really see this being somewhere to take charge. 

• Be a patient reporter and team member. I'm working with two international students, and English is their second language. Because of this, I am not only producing a project, but acting as a liaison between our sources and my teammates. Sometimes, they think of a word or description in their native language, but can't think of the phrase in English. Usually, once we discover the message intent, it's something great that will really help our project. Knowing how our group meshes together will be a driving force for patience and an excellent completed project. 

I'll measure how I attain these goals at break points the rest of the semester to assure they are being accomplished. After we field report once, twice and start creating the website are good check-in points to measure the status on these. Wish me luck!

Video reporting

In my convergence journalism class, we put together our first broadcast stories in video package form. Multimedia reporting was a lot more difficult for me than I ever could have expected, because you can't redo events if what you filmed isn't exactly what you want for the video package. My first package portrayed the impact of children's theater in Columbia, with interviews from a theater dance teacher and two students who have acted in many local musicals.

The biggest thing I've learned and will do differently in the future when compiling TV stories is referencing. Referencing is when the verbal narration of a piece is aligned with what visually appears on the screen. This is especially important in broadcast journalism because it is common for TV viewers to look at the screen but not fully listen to what's being explained. When they do choose to tune in, the narration must match the visuals so viewers understand the news and digest it accordingly.

One way to counteract the issue of referencing is to acquire as much "b-roll" film as possible, with a variety of shots. Then, you can set the scene with a good variety of shots and reference each one. Therefore, in my future video projects, I will set the goal of getting as many shots as possible so I can reference what's going on when I put together the package.

What do you call members of society?

In my qualitative research class, we are currently discussing when to use certain labels for the audience. The audience refers to people in a society, but the way they are depicted has a huge impact on how we envision who they are.

Is it an audience or consumers? Consumers or media users? Audience or "the public"? The public or the masses? Citizens or people? Readers and viewers and listeners, or users?

All of these conscious labeling decisions are important for semiotics and word selection in writing. Each term carries implications and definitions of who the term incorporates. While some choices might be easier than others, it's rare that one is wrong--but vital that the word you choose is most accurate and representative of who you want to portray.

The simplest choices are describing an audience as readers, viewers or listeners because those refer to the manner in which something is consumed. But deciding whether an audience is a consumer or a user becomes tricky. I encourage you to think about how you reference people in your writing, especially in media, and how it influences the holistic meaning of the piece!

Journalistic video: A crowded Mexico City prison

On Time.com's video stories, I came across a news video story titled Inside Mexico's Overcrowded Prisons. After learning about good qualities of journalistic video stories in my convergence coursework this week, I paid attention to the video's attributes to analyze if the correct types of shots were retrieved, how the interviews are framed and if using multimedia for the story contributes something new to the stories that photo, text or radio cannot add alone.

I think this video is a good example of TV journalism because it takes the viewer on a journey through the jail. The reporter takes viewers through the largest penitentiary in Latin America in Mexico City, discussing how its 12,000 inmates are crowding the property. Video reporting allows various parts of the story to be told and portrayed- such as the overall atmosphere, exercise therapy, and the different programs and recovery classes that the Mexico City prison has. A variety of wide, medium and tight shots are used wisely and work together to portray the story of an inmate's daily life inside this packed prison. While a photo slideshow would also be powerful, the background sound as we observe the prison and interviews contribute to the significance of this prison and its newsworthiness.

There are more than three interviews, and the interview shot framing does a good job of focusing on the sources. The interviews showcased are not just thrown into the story, they add detail and personal stories to the package by discussing the inmates' situations, explaining how one man has not seen his son in years.

One way I observed that the video could have improved upon was using a tripod to film shots. Some of the film was bouncy - meaning someone carried the camera around instead of keeping it still on a stand - and it diminished the story's credibility.

Check it out yourself:

Lessons from graduate school: be careful how you write

This year, I am completing my Master’s degree in convergence journalism at Mizzou this semester through May. In the next few weeks, I’ll be publishing a series of posts of some of my most interesting observations from graduate school.

One of the biggest realizations made is how many different writing styles I have learned and read throughout my education. The nature of being in journalism grad school, studying strategic communication and learning research methods to write a thesis exposes me to different writing methods each day. Let’s review three distinct types of writing:

• Writing for business: This is how creative briefs and points of view are written in the advertising industry. Business language and fancy words are acceptable, and each sentence must be clear, crisp and concise. A lot of bullet points and rationales are used here, but each individual word chosen matters.

• Writing hard news stories: News is written in the inverted pyramid style, providing the most important facts at the top and moving down from there. Hard news is very factual, with information given and quotations from reputable sources used to support or exemplify it. The story is written with language you would use conversationally; for example, I would write "he said" and not "he exclaimed" as in literature. One of my professors describes news writing with the goal of describing what has happened, what the implications are and if it could happen again. 

• Writing about research: This one baffles me the most because the writing style is full of jargon, obvious transition phrases and often in first person. For my qualitative research and mass media seminar courses, I read articles that fit this description every day. They begin with an abstract, which usually states something like “In this paper, I will review the eight ways you can accomplish these three goals in journalism. The theory I propose implies that there is a relationship between x and y, and we will look at 5 interviews showing how.” Writing is pretty much an outline with subheads, descriptions and a lot of foreshadowing. Overall, writing for research is explaining a method for research, providing your findings and analyzing the implications from your perspective.

My favorite part about reading writing for research is the amount of words that authors and researchers make up. Interactionism, operationalize, cathection…none of those are in the dictionary. The amount of times I have to switch between both reading and writing styles on a daily basis is absurd. I will write a paper on interviews as qualitative research one hour, write a news story for Missouri Business Alert the next and then review Mojo Ad's creative briefs for this semester's campaigns. 

My biggest tips for managing different reading and writing styles on a regular basis as a graduate student are getting in the zone and considering your audience. Remember what the assignment is and which type of writing is best. The mindset needed to read research is a lot different than reading a news story. Be prepared to write to your audience: whether it's undergraduate students, other master's students, adjunct professors or professors with doctoral degrees. Each will ask different questions about what they read; some want the rationale clear and specified, others want it grounded in your writing. 

I've also noticed that my email writing sometimes incorporates all three of these unintentionally.  Technically, email should be categorized as writing for business, but sometimes I'll write my emails in outline for if I have just read some research stories. But then you have to remember- emails are supposed to be brief and get the point across, not become an outlined paper! Therefore, if you're going to be a grad student, be aware that each of these writing styles requires a different mindset to comprehend and express yourself.   

A different kind of listening: being open to suggestions

One weakness many humans have is the ability to sit back and listen. We want to be heard and in control so much that we sometimes become so picky that we don’t take the time to ask others what they think—even when they’re experts. A comical area where this close-mindedness comes to life everyday that we should rethink is food preferences. You’re probably laughing, thinking, Katie- I want to eat what I want to eat. Where does listening fit in with food?

When I was younger, I ordered the same couple of meal items over and over again. Plain hamburgers, chicken pastas, the list goes on. But after studying abroad last year, I learned the value of trying new foods and asking restaurant employees to recommend something from their menus. They spend the most time around the place they serve food—and if they’re not eating it, they’re observing what everyone who comes in is ordering. Asking friends and wait staff for meal suggestions has opened me up to a whole new world of food: hummus, different ice cream flavors and even some seafood. Listening to the server recommendations provides the replenishing lesson that hired employees really are experts on their workplace—and even if we think we are smarter than them in some capacity, we’re probably not.

Asking waiters and waitresses what they recommend has gotten me to try a variety of new items throughout the years. Just yesterday, I entered Starbucks with a free drink coupon and told the barista that I wanted something fun that most people don’t order. She told me—“Order the salty caramel mocha.” On the surface, it sounds disgusting. I just started liking coffee less than a few months ago and suddenly, I want to drink it with salt and caramel? Ick. But I took a chance, tried the concoction and it was just as amazing as the barista said—like a chocolate-covered-pretzel flavored coffee. And it was amazing.

This has happened countless times in the past few years when I’m trying any new restaurant. Server suggestions have led me to the incredible inventions of the black bean hamburger, great steak sauces and a personal favorite—cotton candy ice cream and oreo cookies blended together. The variety of dishes and suggestions given showcase a server’s personality, and reflect what is both good and relatable.

So why did I waste your time talking about food? Because it’s one small reminder of how asking the right questions and listening from there on out is incredibly important in life. Just because we think we have an idea of what we want doesn’t mean we have to block out all of the  other forces that could somehow change that. Sometimes, there are experts right in front of your face and we blatantly ignore them out of superiority. Take advantage of others’ recommendations, don’t be afraid to ask for them and listen, and listen to what the people surrounding you say in everyday life so you don’t get lost in your own thoughts and miss what’s right in front of you.