Inhoud -SJI 1996- Index

tech-note

Classrooms without walls

by Andrew Collins and Oliver Power

Technology is part of the classroom, whether teachers and students like it or not. SJI looks at how tertiary institutions here and overseas are coping with the digital age.

In the March edition of American Journalism Review, Jim Mosely, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch’s CAR (Computer-Assisted Reporting) specialist, warns "computer-assisted reporting is not for the getting ahead, it’s for the getting by." In this same article, 'Baby You Should Drive This CAR', the author, Rose Ciotta, says "while everyone agrees training is critical, there’s no unanimity on exactly what a training program should look like."

South African journalism schools have certainly recognised the need for CAR and Internet training. The question is whether these are the correct approaches to equip future journalists with the necessary skills to handle the increasingly electronic workplace. Cognisance must be taken of our mixed first world/developing world status and the parameters which that sets.

Across the globe, journalism educators are debating the correct approach for including the multitude of changes and advancements the computer age has brought. Most formal journalism courses seem to regard the new technology as yet another add-on, like media ethics, rather than a fundamental change in the way things are done. "What everyone is having a difficult time accepting is we’re in a revolution in terms of newsgathering," emphasises Brant Houston, managing director of the National Institute for Computer-Assisted Reporting (NICAR). Moegsien Williams, editor of the Cape Times, recognises the importance of computers in the newsroom, but does not consider them a priority in the classroom. He sees them to be more useful in layout and design than for providing solid background to stories through number and data-crunching.

Roland Stanbridge, a visiting CAR authority at Rhodes University’s journalism department, says in an e-mail interview that "around the world, the skills for tomorrow’s journalists are not being effectively taught. I am not referring to word processing or DTP skills, but electronic research, online journalism and the like. This is mostly because journalism lecturers do not have the competence to teach these skills. Most grew up in the age before computers." According to Stanbridge, Australian schools "are slowly introducing database and Internet research, and electronic publishing into the curricula" but not much is happening in European journalism schools. In Maastricht, the European Journalist Training Centre offers a few very expensive one-off courses while the school in Utrecht is busy developing CAR courses.

America, as always, views things in terms of scale. Similar to their gas-guzzling motor cars, journalism programmes must be bigger and (so they think) better than anybody else’s. Rider University in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, recently developed a $5 million information technology infrastructure. Columbia University in New York City has also been pumping millions of dollars into becoming the place to learn new media, a wide term embracing CAR, the Internet, and other electronic developments spanning all media. Philip Meyer of the University of North Carolina, says pressure is being put on journalism schools to add online craft courses because of the higher pay people with these skills can command. He says editors of online content in America are in great demand. Their starting pay is around $30 000 a year, compared to $15-20 000 for print journalists.

Masey Hamilton, of the News Bureau at Temple University, Pennsylvania, says they are "experiencing the phenomenon of students being hired specifically for their expertise in Internet/electronic information gathering." Meyer tells the story of an elated former student who e-mailed him because he had just won a five-day trial period on an eastern metropolitan daily on the basis of his CAR skills.

Francois Nel, head of Media Studies at the Cape Technikon, says "often educational institutions have not been visionary, they have not created programmes for what industry may need and have not had that kind of foresight in their training programmes." In other words, educators seem unable to fulfil their traditional role as both leaders and innovators.

"Journalism schools had better add appropriate coursework to their curricula - not just token introductions to the Infobahn or the Internet, but into the reality of what publishing is going to look like by 2000," pleads Jerry Borrell, in an article in The Quill magazine. There are "strong winds of change" blowing through journalism departments, that might even eliminate journalism as a distinct area of study.

Instead it is argued that journalism should be merged into communication courses, as remarkably few multi-media experts have journalism backgrounds. "Those of us publishing with today’s technologies spend increasing time with video, sound, design and computing, and less with the development of the words. Journalists take note- most publishing companies are driven by advertising, circulation and production, not editorial," says Borrell. Williams sees it differently. He was asked, in a discussion at Peninsula Technikon, what computer system he recommended they buy for their journalism students to be trained on. His recommendation was to take the money available and spend it on acquiring the best English teacher they could find.

According to the Poynter Institute in St. Petersburg, Florida, there is little difference among all communication fields, for example journalism, advertising and public relations. Continuing to educate for specific fields, especially journalism, will be disastrous. "If we don’t take responsibility for converging into communication, if we don’t merge the courses as well as the programmes, we are going to die."

Nel argues there has been a merger between the archetypal four-eyed computer nerd and the content-driven journalist, signalling the end of one-dimensional journalists. Writers can no longer afford simply to be good writers; economics dictate a need for them to be multi-skilled. This is fair enough, but Nora Paul, of the Poynter Institute, points out the need for at least one highly skilled CAR reporter in every newsroom. Journalism schools, while obliged to instil basic CAR skills in every student, must also provide for this necessity. The integration of new media skills into each and every facet of formal journalism training, from day one, is surely the only logical course of action.

This will allow CAR experts to evolve from within the ranks of any given journalism class, without singling out individuals for specialist training. George Claassen, head of the journalism department at Stellenbosch, plans to integrate cyber-reporting proficiency into both his B.Hons and M.Phil. programmes. Although no formal CAR skills are taught, students are presently required to make extensive use of new media across the entire curriculum.

Perhaps the greatest benefit the World Wide Web has bestowed upon journalism schools in South Africa and the developing world, is its role as the great information equaliser. A student in the million dollar lab at Rider has access to no more information than the under-graduate at Grahamstown or Stellenbosch. Budgetary constraints limiting international telephone calls and faxes, and hence the free flow of information, are a thing of the past. The free exchange of information is now practically that.

New media may be the flavour of the month around the globe, but precious little attention is being paid to the ethical and practical day-to-day problems it brings. Christopher Feola in an article in the American Journalism Review, tells the story of Richard Lamm, a former governor of Colorado, who was misquoted by a reporter. This error was perpetuated once the story was stored on Nexis, an electronic database used by American journalists. Time and again the story would be called up in a search and ten years later reporters were still making the same mistake, despite corrections stored in Nexis. "The corrections move by bicycle while the stories move at the speed of light," fumes Lamm.

The Lamm saga clearly illustrates the potential pitfalls journalist relying on the World Wide Web can fall into. Journalism schools have a duty to train reporters to treat databases like Nexis, and even the Internet, with the same critical suspicion they would any other source. Single-source journalism tends to be fostered by the great ease with which reporters can access reams of information from electronic sources. "Reporters are supposed to be so hard-bitten and cynical. How can they simply swallow what appears on these systems without applying the same criteria they do to everything else?" questions Kathleen Hansen, a professor at the University of Minnesota.

Once again, these issues need to be examined by journalism educators and integrated into media ethics, sociology and related courses. The task of training journalists to adopt a responsible attitude towards the "information age" lies squarely with the schools that nurture the ethics, instincts and core values of tomorrow’s professional reporters.

It is not only tomorrow’s reporters who need to be trained in CAR and new media skills. Computers are here, right now, and cannot be ignored. In September last year, a workshop was held at Rhodes University for working journalists. Reporters from the Cape Times, The Argus, the Daily Despatch, The Star and East Cape News Agencies spent four days learning computer-aided research, including sophisticated database searching, and advanced issues in online publishing.

The ideal would be for all matriculants to leave school, not only with typing skills, but with a working knowledge of Windows and basic packages such as word-processing, spreadsheets and databases. Experience using the Internet for research would also be highly advantageous. These skills should not have to be taught at tertiary level. In America and Britain there are moves to rapidly expand access to the Internet, targeted especially at the lower income groups. Britain’s Labour party has a policy document on the Internet in which they say "we shall insist that the providers of the networks lay a two-way broad band feed into every public library, every school, every health centre, every hospital and every Citizen’s Advice Bureau." In May this year, at a conference in Gauteng, governments from the G7 nations agreed that it is a priority to address the issue of telephone, satellite and Internet availability in the developing world.

Until such time as this is achieved, the reality is that tertiary institutions cannot knowingly send graduates out into the job market without these skills. It is the manner in which these skills are taught that is crucial. Unless they are integrated into every aspect of a journalism education, they are of little use. Using a computer to analyse data, gather research material and contact people around the country, and around the world, should be as much a part of the journalist’s daily life as conducting interviews and using the telephone and the library.

Integration is the key, as computers are merely tools which ought to be used to help improve the quality of journalism. They are not a substitute for good writing, cultural literacy or solid research. They also cannot be neatly partitioned into one or two courses, tacked onto the end of a degree or diploma. Ethics and sociology affect computer usage as much as any other aspect of journalism.

Lack of finance is not a completely credible argument either. Granted, universities such as Rider and Columbia in America are spending enormous amounts of money on new media laboratories, but a few networked personal computers linked to the Internet are easily within the financial capabilities of most tertiary institutions.

This is an area within which the developing world can conceivably compete with the developed world. All that is needed is for those teaching journalism to realise what Eric Mankin of the University of Southern California has. That three new W’s have been added to the traditional five - World Wide Web.

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