Dear Colleagues,
I would love to hear your thoughts of my recent Edutopia article, The Ethics, Hurdles, and Payoff of Advising an Online Student Newspaper.
I've pasted first two paragraphs below:
Teaching journalism students print layout is akin to teaching math students how to use an abacus. It's high time that more schools accept the death of the printed student newspaper -- not mourn its passing. Instead, we should focus all our energies on teaching students how to code, maintain a website, and use an ever-growing array of multimedia storytelling tools.
Take it from me. I'm an experienced journalist and journalism advisor who recently returned to his alma mater to advise The Gator, the student news site of Brimmer and May School in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts. I'm aware of the new and evolving ethical issues, hurdles, and tradeoffs that come with advising -- especially in a school environment. If you're considering launching a student news site, or someone at your school is talking about it, heed my advice.