Change Minds in the Classroom

I came to Ohio University’s journalism school because it is one of the most highly regarded in the country, and their Online Journalism sequence is known for its uniqueness and foresight to step in to an area that is taboo for many other schools. This summer I worked for Manning Selvage & Lee, a top 10 PR firm in NYC, and without my experience I would never have the confidence or ideas to come back to my educators and insist that they consider revising curriculum to better suit their students when they enter the real world. And while I cherish the education I have been given, my experience this summer and other experiences have put me in a unique position to be able to offer advice and guidance to start pushing universities in a 21^st century direction.

I have two main purposes for writing. First, to challenge the current way of thinking about the digital space, especially when it comes to journalism, as that is where I have my background. Secondly, I believe if universities embrace some of the ideas I offer they will see a boost in credibility, but more importantly, an increase in the caliber of students they attract.

When you mention the word ‘blog’ in a journalism classroom there are a few typical responses. First, ‘blogging is the downfall of journalism, it’s not professional and the writing skills are inadequate.’ Second, ‘blogs can not be trusted, it is unethical for a journalist to think about blogging, and it is unethical for others to trust blogs, anyone who blogs will lose credibility.’ Third, ‘blogs are OK, I read them sometimes, but unless it’s Steve Jobs I don’t take it seriously.’

Does that seem odd to anyone else? It’s obvious that J-schools are hesitant to peak outside the box for fear of losing credibility. But when companies come to PR, advertising and marketing firms looking for the most innovative ideas, it’s obvious that the digital world needs to be taught in a different way in classrooms across the country. It says something about the future of business when just about every commercial I see ends with promoting a microsite or some sort of Web 2.0 application to engage consumers.

There comes a point in school when you are tired of getting posed questions and no one ever having the answers. I’ll give an example, in journalism a major question is of course, “Print readership is down everywhere, what can we do about it?” Well if you said in a classroom what I’m about to say then you’ll be kicked out of school as quickly as you can say “New York Times.” What if you did nothing about it? What if instead you focused all your efforts in to attracting new, young, Gen X, Gen Y readers to come to your website? What if you had all of your staff, including senior executives, writing a blog on a daily basis? Of course there are gray areas here because you flirt with professional bias, but don’t statistics show that this generation yearns for transparency in all online endeavors?