Elective Spotlight: Journalism

By Daniel Mitchell

Reporter

Journalism is all about expressing your opinions and giving facts about a certain topic. Journalism gives people hope, inspires, and changes people’s perceptions.

The field is not just the news, but it is an art form and a type of writing technique. Each journalistic form and style uses different techniques. There are five principal types of journalism: investigative, news, reviews, columns and feature writing.

“Journalism is a collaboration of photography and writing that makes appealing articles for one’s intended audience,” said Kameron Casper, one of the two editors-in-chief of The Warrior Times. “Journalism is kinda cool and everyone works really hard.”

The purpose of journalism is to provide people with the information they need to make the best possible decisions about their lives, their communities, their societies, and their governments.

It teaches you things that you will need in the real world even if you do not pursue journalism as a profession.

“Journalism has taught me a lot about people skills and being able to understand what people are thinking and turning it into an article,” said Alexis Cook, an E-Journalism Club member.

It serves as an outlet for expressive writing. You can express opinions in a simple article.

“I love writing articles because it lets me write. It gives me a creative vibe and allows me to write about something I care about and get to tell people about something I like,” said Chloe Ortega, a journalism student and E-Journalism Club member.

E-Journalism Club is an extension of the journalism class. Yet it contains one small difference. They run The Warrior Times website.

“E-Journalism is fun because you do different things. We are designing a website for The Warrior Times and it can be accessed by students,” said E-Journalism Club member Alejandro Sandoval.

In journalism, you write articles. Some can be as long as 1,000 words and some can be as short as 250 words. The articles are stories the students write themselves and are proofread by editors.

“Making an article takes a lot of work,” Ortega said. “You have to first find and research a story, then interview people about it, then make sure it fits the criteria, then make edits. The process is long.”

If you love writing, you should try journalism. You can learn how to write better and try something new. It is very different than writing an essay, and there are more guidelines to follow.

There are a couple of different types of articles you can write from opinion articles, features articles, entertainment articles, and news articles.

Feature articles are stories that are on the lighter side of news. The main subtypes are the news feature and the human-interest story. A feature story is distinguished from other types of non-fiction by the quality of the writing.

Opinion articles are articles where the reporters write about their opinions about certain topics. Some topics can be about sports or news or entertainment.

News articles are about the news and what is going on in the real world. These articles talk about stuff like politics or the water in University Park.

Entertainment articles are about things like TV shows and movies.

These things make a magazine or a newspaper what it is. Journalism teaches you confidence, photography, design, and writing skills.

“I hope that my students will have confidence and I feel that the class will be more like a family. It’s special to me to know that I have made an impact on students, and that it helps people know who they are and helps them use real-world skills,” said Mr. Kenealy, the journalism teacher and E-Journalism Club sponsor.

If you are passionate about your story, it can change your perception on life.

“I remember I wrote an article about homelessness for The Daily Eastern News at EIU. I volunteered at a PADS homeleess shelter for the story, and I found out that a number of homeless actually have jobs and are trying to get back on their feet. I ended up staying on there even when the story was over. So through journalism, it really opened up my eyes to the world around me, and I hope by writing that story, it opened others eyes as well.”

For people thinking about pursuing journalism as a career, it is an interesting field. There are tons of jobs you can do as a journalist.

You can be a field reporter where you go around the world to get things for your story and you are where all the action is.

You could be a content marketer where you create videos, articles, and images within an editorial calendar to create brand awareness.

You can be an editor. Editors oversee the publishing process making sure that stories, magazines, newspapers, and social media outlets are good to go.

There are so many jobs to choose from in this profession. Also, you do not have to be a news anchor on TV to be a journalist.

Photojournalism is a particular form of journalism through the collecting, editing, and presenting of news material for publication or broadcast that employs images in order to tell a news story.

“Photojournalism is important to show the visual part of the article and people see pictures first on an article so it’s crucial to grab your attention”, said Sanaia Jenkins, a photo editor for The Warrior Times

Design is a big part of journalism. The class is using a design website called LucidPress. Lucidpress is what the students used to layout the magazine.

“Design is big, as it attracts people to the paper because people want to see something that looks nice and something that looks neat,” said Logan Brooks, a layout editor for the magazine.

Journalism is a great experience if you want to try something new. You will get experience and have a lot of fun. It is a great profession and a great hobby. E-Journalism Club meets every Thursday from 2:45-3:50 in B111 for those interested in learning more about it.