I thought that spending an extended length of time with one person and writing down every detail would become exhausting and a little boring after about the first 30 minutes. But after writing my day-in-the-life story, I was pleasantly surprised. This was probably my favorite story up to this point.
The best part was the actual reporting. I went on a police ride-along with a University of Northern Colorado police officer for several hours during a night shift. The night was full of action, and the time passed very quickly. Because I am also majoring in criminal justice, I loved getting an inside look at police work.
After I finished the reporting, I wrote a story that included creative writing rather than just hard facts. The words seemed to just flow; I had so much information. It was sometimes difficult to capture the exact feeling I wanted to portray in each individual scene, but writing descriptively was a great change of pace. The details really make these types of stories. Hours and hours of reporting is a lot of work, but it is very beneficial in the end.
I learned a lot during the process of writing this story, but one thing sticks out above the rest. Just because it’s work doesn’t mean it can’t be fun.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Thursday, February 4, 2010
The art of blogging
So it’s day one of my second blogging experience, and I am very excited to get started. This blog is a place for me to inform readers of the news of my beat as well as the other experiences in my advanced news and feature writing class at UNC. One of the goals of the blog is to evaluate my writing in order to become a better journalist.
As I near the end of my journalism education, I am eager to cover a beat. I have yet to investigate one topic over the course of many weeks like I will with this beat. I will be reporting on the UNC Police Department. I hope to cover the officers in the uniforms as well as the issues they enforce. From this experience, I hope to get a better look into the lives of police officers and the challenges they face each day on a college campus.
In addition to journalism, my other passion is criminal justice. I already have some background on policing, but I know there is so much more to learn. There are many differences between city police departments and the ones working on college campuses. I have already noticed the increased focus on crimes relating to alcohol, drugs and driving violations. Other departments must focus on a much wider range of crimes. It is all relative to the population the department is serving.
From covering this beat and writing other stories in the class, I hope to improve my ability to think of creative story ideas. One of my weaknesses in the journalism field is coming up with good ideas to write about that will make for interesting stories. Once I have the idea, I am able to do the writing. It’s the idea that always stumps me. This is probably because of my lack of journalism experience outside of the classroom. I have a lot to juggle both in and out of school, so free time to further my journalism practice is hard to come by.
I do have some experience with blogging. Last semester I wrote a blog for another journalism class on my experiences covering Greeley's City Council. I really enjoyed keeping a blog. It was a great way to keep track of my experiences and write in a creative way. I find it hard to update the blog with posts that are short and concise, but that also are interesting to read. Sometimes the line between professional and personal gets blurry. But after last semester, I am confident in the blogging process. I think it is a great way to communicate, and I know that with more practice, I will learn the art of keeping a successful blog.
As I near the end of my journalism education, I am eager to cover a beat. I have yet to investigate one topic over the course of many weeks like I will with this beat. I will be reporting on the UNC Police Department. I hope to cover the officers in the uniforms as well as the issues they enforce. From this experience, I hope to get a better look into the lives of police officers and the challenges they face each day on a college campus.
In addition to journalism, my other passion is criminal justice. I already have some background on policing, but I know there is so much more to learn. There are many differences between city police departments and the ones working on college campuses. I have already noticed the increased focus on crimes relating to alcohol, drugs and driving violations. Other departments must focus on a much wider range of crimes. It is all relative to the population the department is serving.
From covering this beat and writing other stories in the class, I hope to improve my ability to think of creative story ideas. One of my weaknesses in the journalism field is coming up with good ideas to write about that will make for interesting stories. Once I have the idea, I am able to do the writing. It’s the idea that always stumps me. This is probably because of my lack of journalism experience outside of the classroom. I have a lot to juggle both in and out of school, so free time to further my journalism practice is hard to come by.
I do have some experience with blogging. Last semester I wrote a blog for another journalism class on my experiences covering Greeley's City Council. I really enjoyed keeping a blog. It was a great way to keep track of my experiences and write in a creative way. I find it hard to update the blog with posts that are short and concise, but that also are interesting to read. Sometimes the line between professional and personal gets blurry. But after last semester, I am confident in the blogging process. I think it is a great way to communicate, and I know that with more practice, I will learn the art of keeping a successful blog.
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