Newscasts produced by the students will be posted on this page.

There are two classes – Tuesday and Thursday.  The newscasts will have a DATE headline, so you can tell which newscasts are produced by which class.

A reminder that the students work in teams of three people, with five teams producing the half hour newscasts. They alternate in three key positions — as an anchor, a reporter and as a segment producer. One student is senior producer and one student is assignment manager. It mimics what they would experience in a so-called real life newsroom.

What follows are the newscasts produced so far, starting with the latest one and going backwards.

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The newscast below is the one produced by the Thursday class on April 21st. It is their second to last newscast. One more to go. There was a bit of a scramble, in part because they tried something different, mixing up the anchors and reporters, but also because students were dropping scripts and video late. There was some scrambling. It could have been a disaster, but it wasn’t. Let us know what you think.

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What follows is the newscast produced by the Tuesday class on April 19th. It is the second to last newscast. And the students were feeling pretty good about it. There has been some marked improvements. Watch and see.

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And the home stretch continues. This is the newscast produced by the Thursday class. It aired April 14th. Since I’ve talked about each one of these each time, I will leave the comments to you…. those of you watching. Here it is —

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We’re going into the home stretch.  This is the newscast produced by the Tuesday class that aired April 12th.  The lead story was about the student athletes arrested.  Now, it had been reported before, but there were some new ‘twists’ to the story.  The “best” part of this exercise for me was that the two student reporters working on this – Maghen Moore and Elizabeth Reid — were very aggressive in pursuing the story and pursuing the sources.  The other two stories in what we call the “A Block” was the reaction to the 90 days law in which the athletic association was given the extended time to respond to open records requests.  After that was a side-bar piece on G-Day logistics.  A little “UGA centric” but the stories were still solid.

Other notable packages were a piece on  school discipline, a look at Biotesting and plasma donation, followed by national library week, a look at library services and a profile of a bakery.  All light and feature-ish and not the “hard news” we would want, but still well done.  See for yourself:

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This is the fourth newscast produced by the Thursday class. It aired on April 7th. Like the others, we see a continuing improvement in the quality of news produced. The only “issue” I would raise is that there continues to be a UGA-centric focus, when we need more of a community-wide focus. Still, a lot of good “shooting” — video quality is up significantly and improvement in overall storytelling.

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This is the fourth newscast produced by the Tuesday class. It aired on April 5th. The ‘show’ went pretty well, but there was a problem with timing, and stories that went too long. As a result, the senior producer had to ‘kill’ six stories. That is unfortunate because the hard work those people put into getting those stories feels… almost… wasted. It was a learning lesson… that it is critical to watch the time, keep it short and tight. Still, all in all, a solid newscast. Take a look and let us know what yu think:–

 

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This is the third newscast produced by the Thursday class.It aired on March 31st. A little change from the normal. The students had their packages and material ready for inclusion, but it was a day of severe weather. So, we added a new lead– severe weather… just as we would have done if it had been the actual Grady Newsource newscast. The segment producer became the defacto reporter / weather person. We pulled material off the weather.gov website and did the update. Then we went on to the rest of the regular newscast. Anyway, here it is —

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This is the third newscast produced by the Tuesday class. It aired on March 29th.  At this point, most of the students have rotated through the three positions… most particularly, for the  at least… the two on-air positions of anchor and reporter.  So, take a look.

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This is the second newscast produced by the Thursday class. It aired on March 24th. The two classes are different in terms of numbers so there are adjustments to be made in producing a full half hour newscast. Look at the newscast and, yes, think about how they handled being anchors — that’s the most visible role in a newscast. But look at the reporters and not just their on-air appearance. More importantly, Look at, and listen to, the content. We had some issues in this area with this newscast. Overall though a solid production. Then again, you tell us what you think.

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This is the second newscast produced by the Tuesday class.  It aired on March 22nd.  We should re-emphasize that the students rotate through all positions, so that they have experience as not just an anchor, but also as reporter and producer.  The point is to help them see the full, or as close to full, 360-degree picture of what it takes to produce a newscast.

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This is the first newscast produced by the Thursday student group. It’s from March 17th. We had some issues with basic mechanics of producing a newscast — format, scripting, uploading, playback, etc. Despite that the newscast produced was reasonably credible — although we will ask you, the friends, family and viewers, to tell us what you think. What follows is the newscast –News FiveSeventy for March 17th, followed by the post show critique.

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This is the first newscast produced by the Tuesday class of the News Five Seventy group.  It aired March 15th and it was a strong premiere newscast.  It helped obviously that the senior producer was experienced in Newsource, acting as senior production manager, and so he understood the logistics and mechanics of the situation.  It also helped that on this first newscast they were able to use the pieces produced for professor Chris Shumway’s videography class.  Regardless, we would appreciate any and all feedback.

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FROM LAST SEMESTER ——-

On Thursday, December 3rd, the class produced this — the FINAL newscast of the semester for the Thursday group.  The lead was the Veterans’ Day observances in the Athens and Northeast Georgia area.  It was followed by a story on Extra Special People, people with needs and physical or mental disabilities, the Georgia CARE program, Holiday Mail services and ended with the “kicker” block piece on the Athens Art scene and some particular events going on.

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On Tuesday, December 1st, the class produced this — the FINAL newscast of the semester for the Tuesday group.  The lead was the national AIDS Day observance, and events and issues going on in the local area.  As with the Veterans’ Day story above, it was a national story, but whereas the Veterans’ Day story above had local events tied to it, on this one the reporters had to development their local angle. As always, the focus on all these newscasts is on the LOCAL stories, not national or international stories.  In some cases, a national or international story may be included, as in this, but usually only if —

A) It is of such importance that we need to acknowledge

B) And most likely, if the story is ‘localized’ — that is, a local twist is provided on the story, as happened in this case.

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On Thursday, November 19th, the class produced the following newscast.  The lead story was a protest in Tate about the reggae situation.  It was followed by stories about bike thefts and area robberies in the “2nd” block, a look at apartment utilizes and their costs in the third, LEGBT Awareness in the fourth and ending on an after school celebration at Thomas Lay.

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It should be noted that this is the Tuesday, November 17th, newscast.  The downloading of the newscasts is handled by the volunteer production staff, which is very good about doing this.  This was the newscast that led with the story about the shooting in Paris and the fact that a member of the band performing Paris is a member of a band that originated here in Athens, Georgia.

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On Thursday, November 12th, the class produced the following newscast. In this newscast, the lead was on the so-called “opportunity zones” which are special tax exempt areas designed to encourage development. It was followed by a story on “Pocket Points”, then a look at the Hunger Bowl drive, a report, or package, on Veterans Day, and finally a look at the Athens recycling program called CHaRM.

A variety of pieces, and a variety of performances. As always, we encourage people to look and share and comment, as appropriate.

One disclaimer: – the production staff that handles the technical delivery of the newscast also is responsible for recording the newscast. As so often happens, the staff begins recording a little bit early to make sure they get the full newscast. In this case, the anchors were… how can we put this… having fun. No harm. But it does serve as a little bit of a warning that you have to be careful any time you’re in front of the camera.

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On Tuesday, November 10th, the class produced the following newscast. Frankly, the content was mainly features, rather than what we would call “hard news.” Part of that is understandable because they work on the stories ahead of time and do not normally produce them in full on the day of the news event. Part of it though is also that the students are basically more oriented toward the “lighter news.”

Here were the stories covered: Seasonal Depression especially brought on by the recent poor weather…. a Teen Advisory board which helps local teens cope… the impact of football on the local economy… and a special and different kind of fashion show in Athens.

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What follows is the FiveSeventy newscast produced by the Thursday class on November 5th.  Again, the stories are pretty “featurish” and again for the same reasons. That doesn’t mean they’re not good.  They are interesting, but one of the issues we deal with is making the news stronger and more of a hard focus.

The stories in this newscast were the “No Shave November” move where people stopped shaving for the month to show their support for people with cancer, a look at Hurricane Patrician and the donation efforts locally, the number of Athens pets in shelters, Arts in Athens and the challenges facing print media in this ‘new media world.’

As you can see they are “feature-ish” stories. But the other important part we emphasize is that the stories must ALL be LOCAL. That means they need to be stories about local issues, local events, local people.

(A foot note – For technical reasons, the support crew did not record the Tuesday FiveSeventy newscast from November 3rd.

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Here is the FiveSeventy newscast produced by the Thursday class on October 29th. To the students’ credit, they did a nice preview on the upcoming local elections, with one reporter (Michelle Baruchman) managing to interview all three candidates for the mayor’s position in Winterville. We also had stories on local coffee shops, a police trunk or treat event and the amnesty law. Unfortunately, one package had to be ‘killed.’ The reporter did not get the script approved by the executive producer in time. Script approval is a critical part of the process. Any script not approved by the executive producer (most particularly, so-called ‘packages’ which are reporter pieces) is in doubt. Some shorter stories, such as readers and voice overs, may be approved by the senior producer on duty. In any case, here it is —

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Here is the newscast produced by the Tuesday class on October 27th. The stories ranged from animals at Sandy Creek to the AthHalf Marathon, the so-called Fring Fest and OChem. Don’t know what that is? Watch and find out. You can see it here.

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Here is the newscast produced by the Thursday class on October 22nd. It had some good content and some good visuals. So there is progress.

Unfortunately one reporter package was not approved for airing. That meant the newscast was short, so the executive producer had the anchors ask each reporter a question after their package aired, to add substance and depth. Then we had them do a newscast recap at the end of the newscast, to review the stories they had produced.

This was a bit of a curve ball for them. We did it, not just to “fill” time but to provide the student reporters and anchors a real-life experience. It forced them to think on their feet and respond just as would happen in a live newscast. It’s all part of the learning process. In any case, here’s the newscast and the post-show critique as posted on YouTube.

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Here is the latest newscast produced by the Tuesday class on October 20th. This is the 3rd newscast produced by this group. We had some issues because what was supposed to be the lead package was uploaded very late to the playback unit for playing on air. So, that meant we had to start with what is called the “B block” newscast segment, then go back to what was the original “A block” newscast segment. In any case, here’s the newscast with the post show review as well, as uploaded to YouTube.

We encourage you to watch all the newscasts and we welcome your comments. We will post the other newscasts as they become available on our video server. We are late posting these because we have had technical problems with the video server and have had to make some adjustments.

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The newscast that follows is from the Thursday class, produced on October 15th.

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The newscast that follows is from the Tuesday class, produced on October 13th.

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Below are the newscasts produced by the students in the Spring 2015 class. Below you will find the newscast produced by the Tuesday class and the newscast produced by the Thursday class. We should note there was one “rehearsal” newscast produced before these two. But for all intents and purposes these are the first “real ones.

A reminder that the students work in teams of three people, with five teams producing the half hour newscasts. They alternate in three key positions — as an anchor, a reporter and as a segment producer. One student is senior producer and one student is assignment manager. It mimics what they would experience in a so-called real life newsroom.

We post the newscasts on this website from the latest, going backwards to the first ones.  You can see them all on this website.  The latest newscast for the Tuesday group follows.  It is from April 14th.  We believe that if you look at this newscast and compare it to some of the first ones, you should see a dramatic difference.  But, wait, there’s still one more Tuesday newscast to come — the last of the semester.  In any case… here’s Tuesday’s newscast for friends, family… and fans.

This  newscast was uploaded to our server from Thursday, April 2nd. There are five sections to the newscast with each team, as noted before, responsible for a segment / section. A reminder that after the newscast there is a ‘post show critique’ in which the executive producer reviews the newscast along with the senior producer and director. Feel free to watch and comment.

Following is the newscast from Tuesday, March 31st.  If you look at the newscasts from each night, you will see the student journalists in the various roles… as anchors and as reporters.  As noted before, they rotate those positions.  The positions you don’t see are the ‘producer’ positions for each group.  These people are responsible for seeing that the news segment is structured right and the group is focused.  In any case, here is the newscast from Tuesday. If you look at the successive newscasts, you should see a slow but steady improvement.

The newscast from Thursday, March 26th, focused on five key issues.  Again…. five groups of three people.  Each group produces several stories, or angles, on a single topic.  This time the issues were a Phone Scam… Cross Walks on Milledge Avenue… the new Foothills Charter School… Solar Energy and a look at Restaurant Week in Athens.  Here’s the newscast (and the post show critique.)

 

The newscast from Tuesday, March 24th, had a variety of stories… one on Athlete concussions… the Shuttle service… Car Seats… Work Zones and the New Veterinary Center opening. As always, take a look… give it a critical once over… and let us know what you think.

Here is the newscast from Tuesday, March 17th.

And below this is the newscast from the Tuesday class, prior to Spring break, that aired March 3rd.

 

This is the Thursday newscast. The students work in teams of three — a producer, an anchor and a reporter. Each ‘team’ is responsible for producing three to four stories on a single topic. Each topic will be the subject of one whole segment of the newscast. There are five teams of three persons, plus a senior producer and an assignment editor.

This is the Tuesday newscast. We did something a little different this newscast and produced a six-block newscast.  The first block was a brief headline service of the top four stories of the day.  Each presented by a different student anchor and each one being a VO-SOT.  That translates as Voice Over into Sound On Top.

The students rotate through the teams through the semester.  That way, each group will work with a different set of students each week.  I do this in the belief that this will help them learn to work together and operate as a “team.”

Although a lot of the students’ focus is on their on-air presentation, our emphasis as a journalism program is on the content of their stories… AND that their stories actually be that — Stories.  Let us know what you think.

 

This is the Thursday newscast from November 13th by the Mock Show FiveSeventy students.  With this class, there are five groups of students, so each group is responsible for one block of the newscast.  Again, there are five “blocks” — normally referred to as the A, B, C, D and E block, or Lead block (A), B Block and Kicker Block (E).  As always, take a look and tell us what you think.

And the hits keep coming. This is the Tuesday newscast for the Mock Show FiveSeventy group. Tuesday poses an interesting challenge because there are few students in Tuesday (14 versus 16 in Thursday). Since we break the students up into groups of three, that gives them four groups, with one assignment editor and one senior producer. Each group is responsible for a “block” of news in the newscast.

With four groups, that means four blocks of news. A normal newscast has five blocks of news. That leaves the Tuesday newscast “short” a block of news. Remember, they are supposed to produce a standard 30-minute newscast, which includes five commercials of two minutes each. That leaves 20 minutes of news. It doesn’t sound like much time… until you’re the one having to produce the content.

So, we did something different and had the four “anchors” come back on the set for the fifth block and do a brief wrap-up of their top stories. They had to “ad-lib” much of this, which was a good test of their ability to ‘think on their feet.’ Again, it is something that would happen in the so-called ‘real world’ of broadcast journalism. They did a pretty decent job, but we of course would love to hear comments.

What was also different about this newscast is we had a former student act as Executive Producer. Jacqueline Gulledge, a producer for CNN, graduated nine years ago after going through the broadcast journalism program. She came back and oversaw the day’s newsgathering, writing and producing of the newscast. You can see her and her critique in the post show review which follows the newscast.

This is newscast #5 by the Thursday newscast. At this point, the students are producing a full half hour newscast — running from 7:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. with a 2:00 minute commercial outbreak.
It is followed by a 20:00 minute long post newscast review and critique. The director and senior producer, in charge of the newscast for that day, provided their feedback and thoughts. The producer of each newscast segment then adds their thoughts to the process. The executive producer / faculty member also provides some feedback and comments for the students. The purpose of all the process is to prepare the students for “real world” production of a broadcast newscast.

It should be noted also that the students are expected to update the website with their stories during the day and then post their “package” as the reporter voiced video piece is called, to the website.

Comments welcome.

The hits keep coming. I believe this is newscast #5 by the Tuesday class. The newscast above has been uploaded to YouTube, like all the newscasts, and is embedded in this website for people to view. We post these newscast — along with the post-show critique session — on this website for students, friends and family to review and comment… but especially — for the students — to review.

This is newscast #4 by the Thursday class. And, again, it is a full-length newscast. In the case of the Thursday crew, this is more realistic to produce a full-length newscast because they have five teams of journalists while the Tuesday class has four teams.

We had several of the teams come in with material of their own already shot… including both B-roll and Interviews. That makes a huge difference in being able to generate a quality product. It also allows them more hands-on experience. It should be noted that the students are taking the videography / editing course at the same time that they’re taking the Mock Show FiveSeventy class. So, that is where some of the material is coming from.

As a side note, on a couple of newscasts, people may have had some problems accessing the video. You may get a warning message that it has been blocked. Interestingly it’s being blocked by the WWE — World Wrestling Entertainment — allegedly for copyright infringement. A double check and a triple check shows that we are NOT using any WWE video. However, there is a Public Service Announcement (PSA) airing within the newscast that draws upon scenes similar to those used by the WWE. Apparently that is enough to set off the WWE alarms. We have challenged it and will continue to challenge it. In the meantime we have dropped the PSA which we believe may be offending the WWE.

As with so many things, it’s all a matter of how you look at it. The bad news is that the newscasts are being blocked by the WWE. The “good” news is that the newscasts are being blocked by the WWE. Obviously that is being facetious, but the point is that the video is getting on the radar screen of a major media operation.

 

So,newscast #4 by the Tuesday class. And, like the previous Thursday class,they produced a full length newscast. Partly that was done last minute by having the four “anchors” come back and do a brief recap.

That was a wild card I, as executive producer, threw at them. We went into the newscast, knowing we were “short.” When we came to the end, it was clear we were going to be and so I told the four anchors to get back on set and do a brief 15-second recap of their newscast. They did a pretty good job of it, as you can see if you watch the newscast.

The purpose was two-fold. One, yes, they had to have a complete, full-length newscast. We can not “fill” a newscast by just making the stories longer. Some places will do that. That is a dis-service to the viewer and is almost guaranteed to bore the viewer.

The second reason was to give them what really is a real-life situation which does occur. They had to “ad-lib” briefly on a subject. That will happen even in the so-called “real world.” Timing is everything. The ability to “think on your feet” is critical.

In any case, we encourage people to watch and give students feedback.

Now… the third newscast produced by the Thursday class. The rotation continues, and by this point, virtually all of them have had some on-air experience. You can see some differences in how they approach their presentation.

This was the first newscast which hit the schedule times and was truly a full and complete newscast. Most of the earlier newscasts we had the students produce were not full length newscasts. First, we wanted to make sure they understood the gathering and production of the news, and focused on producing material under deadline pressure. Now we added the additional pressure of producing a full 28:00 minute long newscast. And they did it.

In addition to producing the newscast, we added another element to this video on the website. You will see that the video runs longer. That is because we are also recording the post-newscast critique in which the executive producer, senior producer, director and segment producers discuss the newscast. Part of that is technical — how to do certain things. And part of it is logistical. And part of it is presentation.

So, we ask your opinion on these. Now, you can see and hear what the students and staff also have to say.

And the hits keep coming. Here is the third newscast produced by the Tuesday class. As before the students change roles… from anchor to producer to reporter, to give them a broad experience on air and behind the scenes.

As a result of course, for many students, their on air appearance is their first appearance. The challenge is to present the material clearly, concisely… and conversationally. Sometimes the concerns about presentation become the over-riding concerns. While it is extremely important that they can ‘perform’, the most important message we want to send is that their REAL over-riding concern must be the content — what they say, more than how they say it.

Again — comments and feedback are encouraged. To make it more interesting. we have added another element to the newscast presentation. The streaming video also includes the “post-show critique” in which the executive producer, senior producer, director and segment producer review the production. The philosophy is for them to discuss … what went right…. And, NOT, what went wrong so much because things will go wrong as they learn, but more importantly… what could they do better.

This is the second newscast by the Tuesday class for October 7th. As we noted in the welcome page, the students rotate in various groups, so all students will work with each other, and so they all have multiple chances to produce, anchor and report. This session was the second session by the Tuesday group. You will notice a different set of anchors and reporters.

The focus is on getting the information, verifying the information, fact gathering, and then producing pieces. But this is also done under simulated real-life situation, producing the pieces and the newscast under a deadline as if it were “live”. It’s called “live to tape.”

Following each newscast, the students discuss the process with the teacher, looking at what they did right, what they did wrong, and what they could do better.

On presentation issues, they were told to focus on “eye contact” with the viewer. The phrase is the “eyes are the window to the soul.” The viewer wants to make that “connection.” There are times when they want to break eye contact. The simple technique of looking down at their scripts and looking back up between stories does that, and sends a non-verbal signal to the viewer that there is a break, and so there must be a change coming.

On production issues, the concern was that they understand the difference between a Voice Over and a Package. A voice over is when the anchor talks “over” the video appearing on the screen. This is done “live” as the video is rolled by the director during the newscast. In this newscast, the anchors had recorded their voices on the video and then called it a “voice over” which confused the director. A Package can be an “anchor wrap” — that is a story voiced by the anchor and pre-recorded, but it has to be marked as such. Usually, a package refers to a reporter voiced and recorded piece, which includes the reporter voice, and video and the interviews or soundbites from the people interviewed.

We also walked through the issues of defining a One Shot and Two Shot. A “one shot” is a straight head-on shot of the person on set, usually the anchor. A “two shot” is a camera shot, showing the anchor, and the reporter or another anchor together.

On Content, the discussion focused on providing new and updated information. The emphasis was made that they produce their pieces on the basis of what their audience is, but also what time they are presenting the information. The viewers came to the newscast knowing a great deal already, so they must have “new” information or a new “angle” to the story so as to keep the viewers’ attention. The magic part of the word ‘news’ is the word ‘new.’ That of course makes it important that they, the student journalists, keep current on all local and national and international news development. But there is much more emphasis in this course, just as at a local television or digital news operation, on the LOCAL market.

Again — Comments and feedback are welcome.

This is the second newscast by the Thursday class. It was produced on October 9th. As above, you will see a different set of students in the roles of anchors and reporters. The students are rotating through each of the positions to give them a broad experience.

Here are a couple of criticisms / suggestions from the executive producer.

On presentation — they were told to face the camera straight on… do not look sideways towards the camera… sit up straight and be forceful in presentation… AND don’t smile, at least don’t smile on serious stories. Too often people nervous on air will smile inappropriately. They’re talking about death and destruction and they are smiling. It may be out of nervousness, but it sends the wrong signal.

On production — The women, in particular, were told to watch their hair and microphone position… too often, their hair is brushing into the mic and causing audio problems and noises. They were reminded, again, to drop their packages early. The phrase “drop” means filing a story on the video server. A compliment that they are using full screen graphics and getting them done and posted.

On content — The full screen graphics are adding more depth and facts and figures to the story. They needed to make sure they sourced the material properly. The anchor can’t just read or say a list of things without indicating where the information came from. There were some concerns raised that they had not done enough research to find all the various sources of information on any given topic. But we know there will be more of that in future.

As always, comments and feedback are encouraged.