Speaker 1: Hi, I'm Professor Mark Hrabowski, and this brief video lecture will offer advice on how to write stories when facing tight deadlines. The advice in this lecture will be useful for both your story assignments and particularly for your writing tests, which are timed. As you know, meeting deadlines is really important in this class, more important than any other class you've probably taken. I never grant extensions, and I never accept late assignments. Never. If you miss a deadline, you automatically get an F. The reason for this policy is that this is a journalism class, and I'm trying to prepare you for what it means to be a journalist. Meeting deadlines in the news media is crucial. If a publication is going to be distributed on time, or a newscast is going to be aired at a certain time, deadlines must be met by each person in the newsroom, beginning with reporters. If a reporter fails to make a deadline, for example, then the person doing layout for the page on which that story is to appear will be late getting the page done, which will make the section editor, copy editor, assistant editor, and editor-in-chief late in getting their jobs done. Publishers generally run on a tight schedule, and if the publication is not received on time, they will move it to the back of the line and print the publications of those who got theirs to press on time. In addition, a newspaper may end up paying extra fees to drivers who will have to work overtime because their shifts will be extended as a result of the delay in getting the newspaper printed. And in this class, deadlines are also important because we're on a tight schedule. We're trying to squeeze a class that normally runs 15 weeks into only 10 weeks, so you need to make deadlines in order for this condensed course to work. Plus, it's also a matter of fairness. It's not fair if you're handing in stuff late, but the rest of the class is handing in assignments on time. Remember, as the syllabus states, meeting deadlines is your responsibility as a student. If you miss a deadline, I'm not going to come chasing after you. You'll simply get an F for that assignment. But the good news is that this video will offer you some tips on how you can ensure that you make your deadlines. So let's get into that. First, we're going to discuss some tips to help you meet your deadlines for story assignments. After that, we'll discuss how to organize your thoughts and write quickly when you have a very tight deadline. Okay, so first, here are some tips for your story assignments. Remember, late stories are not accepted, but there are many things you can do to ensure that you will finish your story ahead of time. Once you get an assignment from me, begin working on it immediately. Remember, first you need to propose a story idea and get my approval. Do that as soon as possible because once I approve your story idea, you can begin working on the story. Schedule your interviews immediately and research background information for the story. Remember, when you do journalism, you must interview lots of people. Often these people have different schedules than you. They have full-time jobs and families, and that can be very time-consuming. Unexpected things can happen, so it can be hard for them sometimes to find free time to sit down and do an interview. So while you may want to speak with your sources right away, they may not be able to speak with you until next week or the following week, or they may agree to an interview on a certain date and have to later on cancel it. So you want to schedule your interviews and conduct them as soon as possible. If someone isn't going to be able to meet with you well in advance of your deadline, or if you get the feeling that the person may flake out on you, you need to make adjustments right away. You need to start coming up with a contingency plan. You need to find other people to interview or change your story topic. Because if your story is late, it's your fault. It's that simple. Saying I couldn't get an interview with my source in time is not an acceptable excuse. If you work at a newspaper, your editor won't accept that excuse, and in this class, your professor won't accept that excuse. I always give students at least a few weeks to work on their stories, so there's plenty of time to change story ideas if necessary. It only becomes a problem when students wait until the last minute to begin working on their stories. Like I said, if your story is late, I don't care what your reason is, you will get an F. So after you've secured your interviews and conducted them, you want to go back, sit down, and organize your notes. Make sure you have all of the information you need to write your story. You want to make sure all the bases are covered. The who, the what, the when, the where, the why, and the how. If you're missing any of that information, go get it. Interview more sources, or do follow-up interviews with the people you've already interviewed to fill in the missing gaps. Next, I suggest creating an outline. Many students don't do this to their own detriment. Creating an outline will make the story more organized and easier to write. It will also make it easier for me to read. Remember, you are graded in part on your story organization, so it behooves you to do an outline. Otherwise, your story will likely come out randomly ordered or even coherent. So after you create your outline, write a rough draft. Sort through the information and determine how you can best tell the story. Select your opening and closing quotes. Write your lead and fill in the body of the story by alternating quotes and transitions. And voila, you'll have a rough draft. And then after that, revise, revise, revise. Remember to run a spell check. Many students forget to do this, and they lose points. Having misspelled words is really sloppy and unacceptable now that you're in college. And remember to check to make sure that your story follows the correct Associated Press style. So things like names, titles, numbers, dates, locations, and more all need to be checked to ensure they conform with your Associated Press style guide. So now let's move on to part two of this presentation, which is covering breaking news. Reporters often get sent out to cover things such as accidents or events, votes, sporting events, which require them to write up a story really quickly. Often the story may conclude or be going on when your story is due. In TV news, reporters may even report live at the scene. So when you're in situations like this, in these breaking news situations, you don't have days or even hours to cogitate on what to report. You must decide quickly. And the same goes for newspaper reporters. All newspapers now have websites that they update regularly. So if you get sent to cover a story for a newspaper, your editor may ask you to file a story for the website while the event is going on using your laptop and then coming back to the office and writing your story for tomorrow's paper. So to simulate this breaking news coverage experience, you will be given two writing exams during this course. I will give you a set of facts and you will have to write a story based on that information in only one hour. So what follows are some tips for covering breaking news and many of these tips will be useful for your exams. Tip number one, write in advance. Some stories such as elections, executions, or final passage of important legislation happen on deadline, but you know they're going to happen. You can write lots of background information that you know will go into the story and you can do that well in advance. You can write a general outline of the bill and the controversy that spawned it, for example. You can summarize the issues of the campaign. You can even plan for surprises and say you were covering this past presidential election, you could write an Obama wins version and a McCain wins version and then just go and plug in the numbers along with election night quotes and developments. On the election night or the final night of the legislature, you also have to prepare for the possibility that a bill will pass right on the deadline or you will call a race with just minutes to update your story. So if you wait until the last minute to write your entire story, you simply won't have time to do it. That's why as much as possible you want to write in advance, but of course this isn't always possible. You might get sent out to cover a sudden accident and you'll have no idea, you won't have any sort of background information to go on, you'll have to get all your information on the scene. But as much as possible, of course, you want to write in advance when it's possible. Tip number two, write, don't ponder. One of the biggest time wasters on deadline is the lead. Don't ponder the lead while you look at a blank screen. Write a simple declarative sentence such as the school board voted Tuesday to cut funds for its program to teach English as a second language and that will help get you launched. Keep writing, maybe halfway through the story you'll think of a better lead, then you can go back and fix the lead and maybe that will require fixing a few other paragraphs too. You will have more of the story written than if you tried two or three leads and stared at the blank screen for a while. You don't have time for that on deadline, so write the story and hopefully the writing will bring out the best lead. Even if it doesn't, you probably will have a better story with a simple declarative lead followed by a full, well-written story than with a polished lead reflecting heavy labor followed by a story that was rushed and incomplete. Here's the third tip, write as you report. If you're working on a story by phone, you're going to have some dead time, maybe a few seconds at a time when you're on hold or waiting for someone to answer, maybe a few minutes while you're waiting for people to return calls. Start putting the information from your last interview into story form. Even if you don't know where it will go in the story yet, start writing paragraphs that will fit in somewhere. Write a lead based on what you know so far. In addition to starting your writing, this helps sharpen the focus of the reporting that remains. Writing as you report allows you to continue your reporting closer to deadline. Now writing in chunks with frequent interruptions as you return to the reporting can lead to choppy writing. You need to fix this by using some of the time you save to read back through the story to polish it and make it flow smoothly. If you are at the scene and need to run back to the newsroom or hotel to write, you can't physically write as you report, although wireless communication is making that less of a problem. So what you should do is start writing an outline in your head or in your notebook or on your laptop or BlackBerry during those moments when you find yourself waiting. The story will come faster when you sit down to a keyboard, and of course writing for online forces you to write as you report. Using this will help you advance and focus the final story. Tip number four, identify the minimum story. Decide early what your minimum story is. The story that answers the basic who, what, when, where questions. This is the story that meets the basic levels of journalistic competence and allows you to keep drawing a paycheck next week. This is your first goal. You can often get the minimum story from an official source or a few official sources. Often you can get the minimum story by telephone. When you have the minimum story, be sure to file it for the web, though you may have to file a few graphs earlier as the story is unfolding. Tip number five, identify the maximum story. Decide early what your maximum story might be, the story that readers will be talking about at work and in coffee shops the next day. This is the story that your editors and readers will remember that marks you as a star performer. This is the story that will drive heavy traffic to your newspaper's website because no one else has it. This story may answer difficult how, why, so what, or how much questions, or it may address the who, what, when, where questions in greater depth. The maximum story may have such enticing story elements as setting, plot, characters, and dialogue. The maximum story may be a narrative, unfolding the drama rather than summarizing. You are looking for elements that might make this story especially memorable. This is your ultimate goal. Maximum stories often require unofficial sources, such as witnesses, victims, neighbors. The maximum story almost always requires being at the scene. So our next tip, tip number six, is a combination of the previous two tips. You want to secure the minimum, then pursue the maximum. If you're not on deadline and not writing for the web, you might gather the information for the minimal story fairly early, then build incrementally to the maximum story. Or you might start with some of the information for the maximum story and spend a lot of time developing that, knowing you'll be able to fill in the basics later. On deadline, you want to identify immediately the potential sources who could provide the information for the minimum story and get the information from them as quickly as possible. After filing for the web, you zero right in on the sources who might provide the maximum story. Maybe you can't get the maximum story on deadline. It might be a second day story or a Sunday follow-up, but go for it. If you don't land the maximum story, you're likely to gather material that will improve on the minimum story. Tip number seven, outline. I've said it before and I'll say it again, outlines really should precede any story, but especially breaking news stories. So here's what you want to do. Make a quick list of the highlights so you don't miss any. You can even rank them in order of importance and then do a quick outline to make sure it flows logically without repeating your points. Make sure you've covered the five W's. Tip number eight is for really ambitious people and people who want to be extra sure they make their deadline. And the tip is to set your own deadline. And that deadline needs to be ahead of when your story is actually due. So if your editor wants your story at 5 p.m., hit the print button at 445 and spend the extra time double-checking names, titles, quotes, facts, and figures. This way, when you hit the send button, you can feel confident in the story's accuracy, saving yourself the middle of the night realizations, oh geez, his middle initial was C. You may also want to have an additional five-minute buffer to allow for computer problems and delays. I highly recommend doing this for your exams because you'll need to save your stories as a file and then upload them to the online test tool, which can take time. Here's the final piece of advice. If you're stuck on how to write or how to word something in an interesting manner, take this piece of advice. Tell your best friend. Assume your topic is as interesting as lint from a clothes dryer. In other words, work to make it inviting, either by finding an unexpected perspective, telling fact, or a quick anecdote to lure in the reader. Try if possible to write what the other guy isn't. As I like to tell my students, write like you're composing an email to your best friend. Well that concludes today's lesson. If you have any questions, email me at mark.grabowski at maris.edu. That's mark.grabowski at maris.edu. Thank you. Bye.